Blond capuchin

Gold Capuchin ( Cebus flavius ​​)

The gold Capuchin ( Cebus flavius ​​) is a primate of the genus of the capuchin monkeys in the New World monkeys. It was rediscovered in 2006 after he was lost for 200 years.

Features

Gold Capuchin reach a body length of 35 to 40 centimeters, the tail is 38 to 41 inches long. The weight is 1.8 to 3 kg, the males are likely to be heavier than the females. The fur of these primates is colored mostly golden yellow, the hands and the feet are black. At the top there is a white-yellow cap, the face is pink.

Dissemination and lifestyle

Gold Capuchin occur only in northeastern Brazil, their range includes the coastal forests of the states of Paraíba, Pernambuco and Alagoas.

Very little is known about their way of life. Like all capuchins are diurnal and arboreal. They live in groups of about 18 animals that are composed of several males and females as well as the common offspring.

Discovery history

The explorer Georg Marggraf described in his published in 1648 Historia Naturalis Brasiliae a yellow primate species under the name Caitaia. They would have been treated to the first report on the gold Capuchins. Johann Christian von Schreber made ​​in 1774 at a drawing of a monkey, which he gave the scientific name Simia flavia. Later, these reports were forgotten or Schreber's image was simply regarded as a synonym of Gehaubten Capuchin or spinal stripe Capuchin. Schreber had left no written description and no type specimen.

In 2006, 232 years after Schreber's drawing, published almost simultaneously two reports on a new, golden yellow colored Kapuzinerart from northeastern Brazil. Pontes, Malta & Asfora (2006) described these findings as a new species Cebus queirozi. Because they recognized the new species as very rare, they stunned an animal, the exact measurements it, it declared the holotype and released it then back into the wild.

Shortly thereafter published de Oliveira and Langguth (2006) initially unaware of the other publishing a report on a primate, in which they recognized the already drawn by Marggraf and allotment type. They gave her based on Schreber's name the scientific name Cebus flavius ​​( Cebus is the generic name of the capuchin monkeys and has now replaced Simia ). According to the International Regulations for Zoological Nomenclature has in a multiple designation of a kind of the older name validity, so Cebus flavius ​​.

Endangering

Gold Capuchins are an endangered species. The main reason is that their habitat has been greatly reduced and fragmented by deforestation. The remaining populations are highly fragmented, there are about 24 populations with an average of 15 head. The total population is estimated at 180 animals, the IUCN lists the species as " threatened with extinction " ( critically endangered ).