As its name suggests, the black and white ruffed lemur has black and white body fur.
Out of nearly 100 different types of lemur, there are only two which are ruffed – the black and white and the red. We have both types of ruffed lemur at Folly Farm. The black and white ruffed lemur can be found in the trees in the Madagascan rainforests. They live for up to 20 years in the wild.
Our black and white ruffed lemurs live next to our red ruffed lemurs, near to the Pride of Pembrokeshire enclosure and the meerkats.
The black and white ruffed lemur is critically endangered and is one of the breeding programmes we belong to.
The biggest threat to black and white ruffed lemurs, and many lemur species, is hunting for their meat and their habitat being destroyed, by cutting down trees. The Madagascan rainforest is shrinking and many different types of animal need the trees to survive.
Latin name
Varecia Variegata
Class
Mammalia
Order
Primates
Family
Lemuridae
Conservation status
Critically endangered
Impress your friends with everything you know about Black and white ruffed lemurs!
They live in the rainforest on the East coast of Madagascar, an island just off the East coast of Africa. You’ll mostly find them high up in the trees, staying out of the way of their main predator – the fossa.
Black and white ruffed lemurs are frugivorous. That means they love eating fruit. When it’s really hot our lemurs like their fruit in an iced lolly which the zoo keepers make for them.
We’ve heard all kinds of names for a group of lemurs. One of our favourites is a ‘congress of lemurs’.
Both types of ruffed lemur are very noisy. The sounds they make are like howls, barks and growls. Black and white ruffed lemurs can understand the calls of the red ruffed lemur even though they do not live amongst each other.
Too many to list! There are thought to be nearly 100 different lemurs. The most common colours are black, grey, white, brown and red-brown.
No they’re not. But they are primates. The primate order is made up of ‘apes’, ‘monkeys’ and ‘prosimians’ (that means ‘before monkeys’). Lemurs are prosimians which is why they are like monkeys, or rather, why monkeys are like them.
Black and white ruffed lemurs usually have two or three babies at a time. Ruffed lemurs are the only primates which build nests in trees for their babies. Most primates carry their babies around with them but ruffed lemurs leave them in the nest whilst they look for food.
