A young Verreaux’s Sifaka regards us with no apparent fear at all.
Let me begin by saying that it is difficult to photograph these fascinating animals, so apologies for my camera work. They are astoundingly agile and quick as they leap from branch to branch, often with babies clinging to their backs. First I’ll show you Verreaux’s Sifaka, a lemur of the Spiny Forest which we saw in Zombitse. An extended family group cavorted in the trees above us in but then a curious youngster climbed down and just stayed, grasping a tree trunk and allowing everyone to get good shots.
Zombitse Sportive Lemur
By contrast this nocturnal Zombitse Sportive Lemur we inadvertently woke up seemed frightened. Our next lemur was the Ring-tailed Lemur, made famous in the movie “Madagascar.”
Ring-tailed Lemur
We saw the Red-fronted Brown Lemurs in two different locations.
Red-fronted Brown Lemur
Another lemur of the Spiny Forest was the tiny Mouse Lemur. My picture even more horrible than these so I am including my Journal entry, just I hope, to give you an idea of how dear they are.
One final lemur (before you glaze over) is the Indri. We were awakened by their haunting cries every morning in Perinet which is in the rain forest. Like most of the other lemurs, these were in a tight family group. Our guide called them “balls of lemurs” which I thought very apt as they curl up in clusters of three or four to rest. I did a little video so you could hear these calls which are equivalent to flock contact calls in birds but I can’t figure out how to get it on here. If I ever do, I’ll add it.
Indri with her baby
A Naturalist's Table 