Friday, March 29, 2024
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I came upon this interesting troop of leaf-monkeys that were feeding off a sandy rock-face in Maxwell's Hill (Bukit Larut).

It was quite an interesting find. Although the dusky leaf-monkeys are normally not shy they still usually keep a distance from us. But this time I was just a few feet from their young as the adults were busy licking what must be salt from the rock face. 

Dusky Leaf-monkey

I came upon this interesting troop of leaf-monkeys that were feeding off a sandy rock-face in Maxwell's Hill (Bukit Larut).

It was quite an interesting find. Although the dusky leaf-monkeys are normally not shy they still usually keep a distance from us. But this time I was just a few feet from their young as the adults were busy licking what must be salt from the rock face.

The rock face was actually revealed by soil erosion which revealed a deep gash on this hill side. Tree roots can be seen behind the monkeys. I wonder how long the roots will hold before the further erosion brings down the trees. Nevertheless it seems to be quite stable and has been in that state long enough for mushrooms to appear.

The Dusky leaf monkey (Trachypithecus obscurus) is also known as the spectacled langur monkey or spectacled leaf monkey. It has large eye rings that look more like goggles and give the monkey a very adorable looking face. The adults also have some light grey fur on their heads.

In addition to the white circles around each eye, the dusky leaf monkey also has white skin surrounding its mouth region and creamy white coloring on its stomach region.

The babies are born a very bright orange or yellow. and after about six months, the fur starts to turn gray, and by ten months, the young monkey has usually darkened to a gray or a brown. So the babies in the video above should be older than 6 months old but the earlier part of video showed a younger baby carried by the parent.

Here's another video of the monkeys at the salt lick.

Recently, in June 2018, I had the pleasure of observing and photographing a troop of duskies relaxing during a hot afternoon. I was all alone and quite comfortable actually sipping a coffee and looking through some moth photos when the troop of about 10 crashed into my serene afternoon. I was hiding behind Nest's long dining, the roof and the orange tree. Moving quietly to reach out to my camera, I managed to setup and capture some nice long shot of this magnificent bunch. Simply love the hair and their antics. Here is something I had pieced together...