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Howler Monkeys

Alouatta palliata

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Field Notes

Description:

Howler monkeys have short snouts and wide-set, round nostrils. Their noses are very keen, and the Howler monkey can smell out its food (primarily fruit and nuts) up to 2km away. Their noses are usually roundish snout-type, and the nostrils have many sensory hairs growing from the interior. They range in size from 56 to 92 cm (22 to 36 in), excluding their tails, which can be equally as long, in fact in some cases the tail has been found to be almost 5 times the body length. This is a prime characteristic. Like many New World monkeys, they have prehensile tails. They can grasp items with it, hence why they are often found using their prehensile tails for picking fruit and nuts from trees. Unlike other New World monkeys, both male and female howler monkeys have trichromatic color vision. This has evolved independently from other New World monkeys due to gene duplication. They have lifespans of 15 to 20 years. Howler species are dimorphic and can also be dichromatic (i.e. Alouatta caraya). Males are, on average, 1.5 to 2.0 kg heavier than females. [Wikipedia.org]

Habitat:

The mantled howler is among the most commonly seen and heard primates in many Central American national parks, including Manuel Antonio, Corcovado, Monteverde and Soberania. The mantled howler lives in several different types of forest, including secondary forest and semi-deciduous forest but is found in higher densities in older areas of forest and in areas containing evergreen forest. [Wikipedia.org]

Notes:

This family group (or troop) was found on the property of the JW Marriott hotel in Guanacaste, Costa Rica - near the Pacific Coast. You can see the infant monkey clinging to his mother in the first and second photos.

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