Researchers Photograph Primate Previously Thought Extinct in Sri Lanka

A small nocturnal primate believed to be extinct for six decades was recently photographed by UK researchers in the montane tropical forests of Sri Lanka. The Horton Plains slender loris, Loris tardigradus, a subspecies of the red slender loris, was spotted during an expedition by the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) in the biodiverse forests of Sri Lanka’s central highlands. Researchers spent 200 hours looking for the creature during an intensive survey of all loris species to assess their current condition and threats. The species, which is officially listed as endangered by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and has only been seen by scientists four times since 1937, is threatened by hunting and the fragmentation and loss of the montane forest, which now accounts for less than 1 percent of the nation’s land area. Slender lorises, which are more closely related to lemurs than monkeys, live in Sri Lanka and southern India. The larger slow lorises live across Southeast Asia. “The discovery improves our knowledge of this species, but we need to focus our efforts on the conservation and restoration of the remaining montane forest where this species still exists,” said Craig Turner, a ZSL conservation biologist.