3-Sentence Science

Primate Selfies Lead to Habitat Discovery

April 15, 2019

Photo credit: WCS Indonesia Program

Each year, Wildlife Conservation Society scientists publish more than 300 peer-reviewed studies and papers. “WCS 3-Sentence Science” is a regular tip-sheet — in bite sized helpings — of some of this published work.

Here we present Noviar Andayani and Iwan Hunowu’s work on black macaques:

1. Researchers in northern Sulawesi, Indonesia, used camera traps to survey for the Critically Endangered crested black macaque (Macaca nigra) and Vulnerable Gorontalo macaque (Macaca nigrescens).
2. Using spatially explicit photographic records of both species, they found the boundary between the two species is 14.85 kilometers farther west than previously defined, which equates to the discovery of 224 square kilometers, or 7.5 percent, of additional suitable additional habitat for M. nigra.
3. The authors encourage primatologists to think more broadly about the possible applications of camera traps — particularly as they become cheaper — and to include them as tools in their conservation inventories.

Study and Journal: “Camera traps clarify the distribution boundary between the crested black macaque (Macaca nigra) and Gorontalo macaque (Macaca nigrescens) in North Sulawesi” from International Journal of Primatology.
WCS Co-Author(s): Noviar Andayani , WCS Indonesia Program; Iwan Hunowu , WCS Indonesia program.

For more information, contact: Stephen Sautner, 718–220–3682, ssautner@wcs.org.