Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
1
The common monkey of Southeast
Asia: Long-tailed macaque
populations, ethnophoresy, and their
occurrence in human environments
Michael D. Gumert
The long-tailed macaque (
Macaca fascicularis
) population spreads over one
of the widest geographical ranges of any primate, trailing only humans (
Homo
sapiens
) and rhesus macaques (
M. mulatta
) (Wheatley,
1999
) (
Figure 1.1
).
According to Fooden (
1995
,
2006
), the population extends across the major-
ity of mainland Southeast Asia. They occur in the southeastern most part of
Bangladesh, spreading south along the coast of Myanmar, east through the
southern two-thirds of Thailand, all of Cambodia, the southeastern tip of Laos,
and through the southern half of Vietnam. Through Thailand, the population
extends past the Isthmus of Kra, and occurs all through Sundaland (i.e., pen-
insular Malaysia and the Indonesian archipelago west of the Wallace line) and
into the Philippines. Long-tailed macaques also occur on smaller islands. For
example, long-tailed macaques occur off the northern coast of Sumatra on the
most southern Indian Nicobar Islands, as well as occurring on small islands
off the west coast, such as Simeulue and Lasia. Other island habitats include
Maratua, off Kalimantan, Karimunjawa, off Java, Koh Khram Yai, off Thailand,
and Con Son, off Vietnam. They certainly occur on many other small islands,
as the region is covered with tens of thousands of islands.
Long-tailed macaques are found predominantly on the western side of the
Wallace line and are considered Asian fauna. Despite this, populations in
Wallacea exist on the eastern side of the line, which are possibly the result of
historical human introductions (e.g., Lombok, Nusa Tenggara, and East Timor)
(Kawamoto
et al
.,
1984
). Confirmed cases of recent human introductions of
macaques across the Wallace line have occurred on an island off Sulawesi
(Froehlich
et al
.,
2003
) and on West Papua (Kemp and Burnett,
2007
). In
