The gray mouse lemur is a strepsirrhine primate found only on the island of Madagascar. The species is named for its mouse-like size and coloration and is known locally as tsidy, koitsiky, titilivaha, pondiky, and vakiandry. Like all mouse lemurs, this species is nocturnal and arboreal. Predation pressure is higher for this species than among any other primate species, with one out of four individuals taken by a predator each year.
About Gray mouse lemur in brief
The gray mouse lemur is a type of strepsirrhine primate found only on the island of Madagascar. The species is named for its mouse-like size and coloration and is known locally as tsidy, koitsiky, titilivaha, pondiky, and vakiandry. Like all mouse lemurs, this species is nocturnal and arboreal. It exhibits a form of dormancy called torpor during the cool, dry winter months, and in some cases undergoes seasonal torpor, which is unusual for primates. Predation pressure is higher for this species than among any other primate species, with one out of four individuals taken by a predator each year. Although threatened by deforestation, habitat degradation, and live capture for the pet trade, it is considered one of Madagascar’s most abundant small native mammals. It can tolerate moderate food shortages by experiencing daily torpor to conserve energy, but extended food shortages due to climate change may pose a significant risk to the species. It has a reproductive lifespan of five years, although captive individuals have been reported to live up to 15 years. Its diet consists primarily of fruit, insects, flowers, and nectar. In the wild, its natural predators include owls, snakes, and endemic mammalian predators. It belongs to the family Cheirogaleidae, which contains the mouse leMurs, dwarf lemur, giant mouse le murs, fork-marked lemurred, and hairy-eared dwarf lemur.
The genus Microcebus includes the smallest primates in the world. Phylogenetic analyses suggest that the gray mouseLemur species may be most closely related to the reddish-gray mouse-mur species. First described in 1777 by English illustrator John M. Miller, M. Mmurinus was thought to be a distinct, sympatric species in southeastern part of the island. Upon revision in 1931, the gray lemur was considered the only species of its genus, as well as the name used for all mouse Lemurs on Madagascar, Mrufus. The field study conducted in 1972 and an extensive field revision in 1972 was the first major taxonomic revision between the brown lemur and gray mouse Lemur species on Madagascar. In many cases, these Malagasy names are also used for other visually indistinguishable mouse leur species that live within its range. As its name implies, thegray mouse le murinus, means \”mouse-like\” and derives from the Latin word mus, or \”mouse\”, and the Latin suffix -inus, which means \”like\”. The lemur can be found in several types of forest throughout western and southern Madagascar, and is called pondiky. In the northern end of its range, it was considered a sub-species of the brown lemur then considered a distinct sub- species of the mouse fusus—then considered a sub- Species of Mru fusus.
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This page is based on the article Gray mouse lemur published in Wikipedia (as of Nov. 06, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
