Conservation International (CI) is posting a blog from its annual Global Symposium, held this year in Madagascar. The blog entry as of today showed two items of special interest.
First, a new study of Madagascarene waters, combined with information from a study in 2002, resulted in doubling the number of fish species known pre-2002, up to a new figure of 849.
Second, everyone loves stories about cute, fuzzy animals, and Mittermeier's mouse lemur is the latest. About the size of a hamster and looking a bit like one, too, the primate has been christened Microcebus mittermeieri after CI's president, Dr. Russell Mittermeier. This is one of three new mouse lemurs described in a paper by primatologists Mireya Mayor and Edward Louis. Mayor said, “Here we are in the 21st century discovering a new primate, one of our closest living relatives. It shows the urgency for protecting these areas.”
Mittermeier was flattered. "I've had a couple of frogs and an ant named after me. This is different."
Self-serving promotion alert: The continued discoveries of new animals on Madagascar, and the mysteries surrounding some large mammals that might still be found there, are covered in my book Rumors of Existence (1995) and brought up to date through 2005 in the new book Shadows of Existence (available in a week or so.)
All those interested in this topic should also read a really superb book by Peter Tyson, The Eighth Continent: Life, Death, and Discovery in the Lost World of Madagascar.
No comments:
Post a Comment