Welcome back to another fun-filled week of Wild Facts. I hope all of you enjoyed the Cartoon Wild Facts last week. If you don’t know what I am talking about then I suggest you go back a few days and read up on some real life animals based on your favourite cartoon characters. I am around all week so it will just be the usual, random animals. We are going to start off the randomness with the Squirrel Monkey. For the record, I think the picture above is one of the cutest pictures I have posted on Wild Facts. I highly recommend checking out Luc Viatour’s website at http://www.lucnix.be since he has some incredible photos. Honestly, his photography will blow you away. Okay, back to our Wild Fact! Let’s head to the tropical forests of Central and South America to see if we can track down a real, live version of the Squirrel Monkey.
You better be on your toes to catch a glimpse of this unique monkey since they are only 20 to 35 cm (7.8 – 14″) long. To increase our chances of spotting a Squirrel Monkey we should probably find out exactly what they look like. Well, they look like the picture below, silly! Okay, I will do a better description than that. They have short fur and usually olive coloured fur on their shoulders and orange on their back. Meanwhile their throat and ears are white and their head is actually quite hairy compared to the rest of their body. There, now we have no excuse for not recognizing this monkey throughout our trek in the rain forest.
When you meet a Squirrel Monkey I don’t want you to be jealous okay? What could you possibly be jealous about you ask? Well, other than the fact they get to spend all their time hanging around trees in the tropics, they also have the largest brain to body mass ratio of all the primate species. That’s right, for their body size their brain is actually larger than ours. It isn’t just a pretty cool fact as the Squirrel Monkey does actually use their brain and is known to be one of the more intelligent monkey species out there.
Squirrel Monkey Fast Fact – When you see one of these little monkey’s you are probably going to see many more. The Squirrel Monkey is known to live in fairly large troops. I am talking upwards of 500 individual monkey’s living together. There are towns in Canada that don’t have that many individuals.
That does it for Monkey Monday! Make sure you check out the short video clip of a Squirrel Monkey (with a baby) below. Have a great day!
So cute!
I actually owned one when I was a boy. He wouldn’t let me any where near him. In fact no one in the house except my mother. He would come out of the cage and sit on her shoulder. She would feed it grapes and sometimes banana bits she would brake off. It did like to bite everyone else. We had to get rid of it because he kept getting out and biting the neighbors. He is so cute you want to pick him up. Better not. They have some sharp teeth.
I can’t believe you actually owned a Squirrel Monkey! That is pretty cool.
It is funny that your mother had the special touch with the little monkey. I can imagine their sharp teeth would hurt and although it is unfortunate you had to get rid of him, I suppose the reasoning was valid.
Thanks for sharing your amazing story!