LEMUR  (CONT)

Indris and other lemurs are only found on the Comoro islands and Madagascar, an evolutionary mad-house that began breaking away from Africa about 160 million years ago, becoming its own version of Noah's Ark as it drifted out into the Indian Ocean.

"Madagascar is truly the naturalist's promised land," wrote the naturalist Joseph Philibert Commerson in 1771. "Nature seems to have retreated there into a private sanctuary, where she could work on different models from any she used elsewhere."

Madagascar has no deer or antelope species, and also lacks large predators. Poisonous snakes are absent as they are a relatively recent evolutionary development.

Madagascar also boasts half of the world's roughly 135 species of chameleons. But the lemurs are what really draw wildlife enthusiasts to this island.

Regarded as "primitive" primates, some 50 surviving species of lemurs make their home in Madagascar. Kin to monkeys, apes and humans, their behavior and characteristics shed vital clues on our own distant past.

But 15 species of lemurs have become extinct since sea-faring humans who originated in present-day Indonesia arrived on Madagascar's shores about 2,000 years ago.

Humanity is still wreaking ecological destruction on the island, as a swelling and desperately poor rural population hacks away forests, creating what some environmentalists say is the most heavily-eroded place on the planet.

For the lemurs, the last chance for survival may lie in the employment and cash generated by eco-tourists who come from afar to view them.

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.