Endangered
Zanzibar red colobus
Piliocolobus kirkii
The Zanzibar red colobus is a red colobus monkey endemic to Unguja, the main island of the Zanzibar Archipelago, off the coast of Tanzania.
Appearance
Its black face is crowned with long, white hair, and features a distinguishing pink mark on its lips and nose. Sexual dimorphism is generally decreased in the species, meaning the females have little difference in their body size and colour from their male counterparts.
The species has a notably small cranium and rotund body shape, with males potentially reaching over 12 kg (26 lb) and females, 10 kg (22 lb).
Range and habitat
The Zanzibar red colobus is found in three forests of the Zanzibar archipelago. Its habitats include coastal thickets and coastal rag scrub, but it can also be found in agricultural areas and in mangrove swamps. The latter provides food year-round. When found in agricultural areas, the monkey is more used to humans and comes closer to the ground.
The Zanzibar red colobus is a red colobus monkey endemic to Unguja, the main island of the Zanzibar Archipelago, off the coast of Tanzania. In 1974, specimens were moved to Ngezi Forest on Pemba Island to try to re-establish the monkey's population.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Diet and breeding
It begins to feed in the morning, and is more active during the cooler parts of the day. Loud calls from males indicate the group is ready to move to another tree to feed.
It is one of the few species that do not eat ripe fruits. It has a sacculated stomach with four chambers specific for breaking down plant materials, however it cannot digest the sugars contained in mature fruits. This is immediately followed by sniffing the area because estrogen and progesterone can be detected by this method, further helping the male conclude if the female is indeed ready to breed.
In crisis
It is now classified as an endangered species and in the mid-1990s was adopted as the flagship species for conservation in Zanzibar. The population is still decreasing, and conservationists are attempting to work with the local government to devise a proper, effective strategy to protect the population and habitat. A number of factors have contributed to the monkey's endangered status.
To counteract the decline in population, various attempts have been made to protect the species. It had been found, even so, that 20 years after the translocation to the island only one group of Zanzibar red colobus was found and with few sightings and interviews with locals, the population was estimated to be between 15 and 30 individuals.
CITES lists this taxon on Appendix I. Confirm the current appendix on the CITES checklist.
Zanzibar red colobus is Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Zanzibar red colobus, Wikidata item Q913807. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
