Meet Betsy: The 'World's Oldest' Owl Monkey

Betsy is in Pursuit of a New Partner!

A photo from 2004 of Betsy, her late partner Peanut, and their infant daughter Creamy. Picture courtesy of Dr. Christie Wolovich (c) 2004

This past week we began observing and collecting behavioral data on Betsy.  Betsy is a very special owl monkey because she not only is the oldest owl monkey at the DuMond Conservancy, but she is likely the oldest owl monkey in the world! She lost her mate Peanut last year and has continued living compatibly with her daughter, Crunchy.   Their companionship came to an abrupt and dramatic end about 3 weeks ago when she began fighting with Crunchy.  Owl monkeys live in family units, but once the offspring has reached maturity they will leave the group to find their own mate. Apparently, Betsy saw Crunchy as a threat to her territory and took matters into her own hands. Since then, Betsy’s rates of hooting (a vocalization that sounds like an owl hooting) and scent marking have increased tremendously. Owl monkeys rely heavily on chemical cues to communicate so we are trying to decipher her chemical messages. It seems that Betsy is ready for a new mate!

Introducing...Austin and Wookie's Baby Girl!

Every Tuesday, our team of researchers travels to the DuMond Conservancy to study the owl monkey colony at the DuMond Conservancy. Tonight was particularly interesting, as we discovered the sex of one of our new owl monkey infants. We are happy to announce that Wookie and Austin, two of our Aotus vociferans owl monkeys, are proud parents of a beautiful baby girl. The infant has yet to be named, so we are happy to receive suggestions in the comments box. We do not know very much about the behavioral and physiological development of infant owl monkeys. Wookie and Austin’s daughter is part of an ongoing study that hopes to shed light on the development of infant temperament. It was not an easy process to sex the infant.....

 Contrary to many species of new world primate, owl monkey infants are usually carried by the father until they can move about on their own. Photo courtesy of Christy Wolovich

Our veterinarian, Dr. Bob, had to enter Wookie and Austin’s home cage and capture the infant so that we could determine its sex and record its weight. Although the capture was a little stressful for the infant, we did not waste the opportunity to learn about its response to the stress. All vertebrate animals release stress hormones called glucocorticoids when they are stressed, and these hormones can be measured in blood, saliva, and urine. We collected urine from the infant before and after it was captured so that we could determine the levels of stress hormones that it had produced. Once we have collected urine from several of our infants at the Conservancy, we will compare their hormone levels to see if there are any differences between them. You will hear our results here first, so stay tuned to the team Aotus blog to keep updated on the happenings at the DuMond Conservancy’s research evening!