Babakotia
Babakotia is an extinct genus of medium-sized lemur, or strepsirrhine primate, from Madagascar. It is known only from subfossil remains and may have died out shortly after the arrival of humans on the island. It had long forearms, curved digits, and highly mobile hip and ankle joints.
About Babakotia in brief
Babakotia is an extinct genus of medium-sized lemur, or strepsirrhine primate, from Madagascar that contains a single species. It is known only from subfossil remains and may have died out shortly after the arrival of humans on the island. It had long forearms, curved digits, and highly mobile hip and ankle joints. It was primarily a leaf-eater, though it also ate fruit and hard seeds. It lived in the northern part of Madagascar and shared its range with at least two other sloth lemur species, Palaeopropithecus ingens and Mesopropheticcus dolichobrachion. The name of the genus derives from the Malagasy common name for the Indri, babakoto, a close relative of BabakOTia.
The species name, radofilai, was chosen in honor of French mathematician and expatriate Jean Radofilao, an avid spelunker who mapped the caves where remains were first found. It belongs to the family Palaeopsithecus, which includes three other genera of slothLemur: Palaeoindris, ArchaeoINDris, and MesOPropitheus. This family in turn belongs to the infraorder Lemuriformes, which including all theMalagasy lemurs. It also helped to settle a debate about the relationship between the sloth Lemurs, the monkey le murs, and the living indriids.
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This page is based on the article Babakotia published in Wikipedia (as of Oct. 29, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
