Lemur Life Stories: Varying Effects of Captivity as Seen In Skeletal Remains (Lemur catta)

Undergraduate Honors Thesis

Citations

Citeable URL: https://scholar.colorado.edu/concern/undergraduate_honors_theses/8623j0355

Abstract

A 37-year-old Ring-tailed Lemur named Mamu who lived at the Pueblo Zoo in Southern Colorado unintentionally bypassed major species' life milestones by living to such an old age. By studying Mamu and others like her and others who lived shorter lives we can study a curated life history. From analyzing the various specimens, and 3D scanning them we have created a database of these specimens, and analyzed the curated life history that comes from living in a specialized environment such as a zoo as it relates to aging and morphology. Another goal of this project is to create a database that is accessible to those in the field as well as in school to make comparisons of findings and their morphological niches regarding gerontology in Strepsirrhine primates; such as in captivity being susceptible to dental disease and less overall long bone injury but greater disc degeneration.

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