Crab-eating Macaque

A crab Eating Macaque is a native primate to south East Asia and is also known as the long tailed macaque.

These small monkeys have been used a great deal in experiments for medical research, and neurological drug research in particular.

The Crab-eating Macaque ranges in a wide variety or areas and can live in many different habitats, including the rainforest, river and coastal forests as well as near human settlements.

They are easily adaptable and will adjust to living near humans almost too well.

In some areas they become a real pest when they live near to farms and villages, but in others they are considered sacred animals, such as at Hindu temples.

Crab-eating Macaque

The animals have been considered an alien species on many islands, and are called weed species, because they are a significant threat to the actual ecology of the island and the animals that live there.

Macaque’s are extremely social and will live in groups that can number as many as nearly a hundred.

They will contain more than one male and nearly three times the number of females as there is males. Juveniles or infants usually number one or two for each female.

They are female centric in orientation. Males will move in and out of the groups, staying for five or six years before leaving.

They have a very strict hierarchy in the group with males ranking higher than females although the female ranking structure is a great deal more stable.

Females produce one infant, very rarely twins, after being pregnant for about 175 days. The babies will weigh about a pound, are black in color which gradually changes to the red brown color of the adults at about 4 months.

New males to the group will sometimes kill infants which are not theirs and higher ranking females will often kidnap the babies of the lower ranking females, particularly if they have lost a baby, but sometimes when they have not.

This will usually result in the babies death as the new made mother who had taken the child has no milk for the baby to nurse.

Males who come to the group with a female mate will usually last longer than those who do not.
Find out more about the Crab-eating Macaque over at Wikipedia »