Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
2
Distribution and current status
of long-tailed macaques (
Macaca
fascicularis aurea
) in Myanmar
Aye Mi San and Yuzuru Hamada
Introduction
Myanmar is situated in the west of the Indochina Peninsula and geographically
ranges from 9˚58' N to 28˚29'N and from 92˚10'E to 101˚10'E, with a land
area of 676,553 km
2
and a coastline of 2,832 km (Bird Life International,
2005
).
The wide variation in topography and climate has produced a rich diversity of
wildlife in Myanmar, which is a component of the Indo-Myanmar Hotspot for
biodiversity (Bird Life International,
2005
). New mammal species have been dis-
covered quite recently, such as the leaf deer (
Muntiacus putaoensis
, Amato
et al
.,
1999
) and the Kachin woolly bat (
Kerivoula kachinensis
, Bates
et al
.,
2004
).
Primate fauna are also rich in Myanmar (Tun Yin,
1967
; FAO,
1985
; Kyaw
Nyunt Lwin,
1995
; Parr and Tin Than,
2007
), including one species of slow loris
(
Nycticebus coucang
), five species of macaques (
Macaca assamensis
,
M. arc-
toides
,
M. fascicularis
,
M. mulatta
, and
M. nemestrina
), five species of leaf mon-
keys (
Trachypithecus obscurus
,
T. phayrei
,
T. cristatus
,
T. pileatus
, and
Presbytis
femoralis
), and two species of gibbons (
Hylobates hoolock
and
H. lar
).
The long-tailed macaque in Myanmar is classified as a distinctive subspe-
cies (
Macaca fascicularis aurea
), with parts of this subspecies population
also occurring in Thailand and Bangladesh. For the most part, the biology and
evolution of this subspecies remains unknown. Evolutionary scenarios on the
origins of long-tailed macaques (
Macaca fascicularis
) have suggested that
proto-
fascicularis
expanded north from Sundaland into continental Southeast
Asia (Delson,
1980
). After this dispersal, proto-
fascicularis
diversified into
the rhesus macaque (
M. mulatta
) and the ten subspecies of
M. fascicularis
(Fooden,
1995
). The Myanmar subspecies (
Macaca fascicularis aurea
) is con-
sidered to have arisen from such northern colonizers, perhaps after becoming
