Species Fact Profile: Bolivian Gray Titi Monkey (Plecturocebus donacophilus)

                                                                Bolivian Gray Titi Monkey

                                                        Plecturocebus donacophilus (D'Orbigny, 1836)

Range: Eastern Bolivia, a very small portion of adjacent western Brazil

Habitat: : Primary and Secondary Forests, favoring understory habitat beneath closed canopy.  Up to 1000 meters elevation

Diet: Fruit, Leaves, Seeds, Insects

Social Grouping: Pairs or Small Family Groups (2-7)

Reproduction: Monogamous for life.  Females give birth once a year.  Breeding season is in spring, the start of the rainy season, though captives may breed year round.  Gestation period of 18 weeks.  Usually single offspring (twins are rare) carried by the mother for the first week or so, after which they are largely carried by the father, who gives them back to the mother for nursing.  Sexually mature at two years old, but generally don’t breed until they are four years old.  Generally independent at maturity

Lifespan: 20-25 Years

      Conservation Status: IUCN Least Concern, CITES Appendix II 

• One of the smallest titi species.  Head to body length 30-33 centimeters, with an additional 48-51 centimeters made up by the long, non-prehensile tail.  Weight 0.8-1.18 kilograms, with males generally slightly larger than females.  Compact body, long hind limbs.  Males have slightly larger canine teeth than females)
• Sexes look alike.  Coat is dense and plush, gray in color with alternating light and dark bands and some orange-brown flecks, giving an agouti appearance.  White tufts of hair around the ears, giving the species the alternative common name of “white-eared titi”.  Tail is light gray on the underside, dark gray on the back, but tends to grow lighter with age.
• Highly arboreal, rarely come to the forest floor.  Most active in early morning and late afternoon, resting during the midday to allow leaf-heavy diet to digest.  Travel through the forest quadrupedally, taking some short leaps but moving cautiously.  Range about 0.5-1.5 square kilometers per day.  Sleep high in the trees (about 15 meters up) to avoid predators
• Predators include raptors, wild felids, and large snakes.  Infants have been observed being predated by capuchins
• Adult pairs are very closely bonded, often sit together with their tails intertwined, become anxious when separated from one another
• Highly communicative, series of chirrups (used to locate group members), moans, pants, and screams.  Calls used in part to demarcate territory.  Males are territorial, try to intimidate one another with piloerection, tail lashing, and chasing
• The white-coated titi (P. pallescens) is sometimes treated as a subspecies of Bolivian gray titi, but is more often recognized as a full species.
• Tolerant of some degraded habitat (found in the forests around Bolivia’s largest city, Santa Cruz de la Sierra), but threatened by habitat fragmentation