Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 55
A leaf-tailed gecko,
Uroplatus
, with an uncanny resemblance to a dead leaf, sits
motionless on a dry branch in Ranomafana. The gecko's head, with its pink eyes, is on the
lower right.
in the middle of the day. Indeed, Patricia Wright had initially thought that
her new species of golden lemur was simply a color variant of the greater
bamboo lemur that she had been searching for. Only after catching one of
these new lemurs, measuring it carefully, and getting DNA samples was she
sure that she had found a new species.
During our excursions into the forest we were also able to spot the sup-
posedly extinct greater bamboo lemurs. Wright had rediscovered them on
a subsequent expedition, thus rescuing them from apparent oblivion. She
was able to use the publicity about her new species of golden lemur, along
with the dramatic resurrection of the greater bamboo lemur, to persuade the
government to declare Ranomafana a national park.
Madagascar, it seems, was an ideal place for speciation to begin among
the animals that arrived there. But what drives the evolution of one species
to become two or more? To fi nd out, we must examine the ecology of some
of Ranomafana's lemurs.
