MALAYSIAN WILDLIFE PHOTOGRAPHY

A Dusky Langur mother with her orange baby The Lutongs (lutungs), langurs or leaf monkeys are a group of Old World monkeys in the genus Trachypithecus . The name 'Lutung' from the Sundanese language means 'blackness'; and is the preferred name for members of this genus. DNA genetic analysis indicates that the ancestors of the modern species of lutung first differentiated from one another a little over 3 million years ago, during the late Pliocene, The various species alive today then diverged during the Pleistocene, presumably driven by habitat changes during ice ages. There are 20 species in the genus Trachypithecus today, listed below. The current lutung species, although living in different habitats have a number of similar habits and traits. One of these is that they mostly have orange coloured babies. This  suggests that the genes encoding orange fur in infants is an ancestral gene(s) that has been maintained because it gives each species a survival advantage in t...

                The apparently odd relationship Drongos  Drongos and especially Racket-tailed Drongos have been called, thugs, thieves and tricksters or are they just vocally gifted and very intelligent. Fork-tailed Drongo Greater Racket-tailed Drongo The  drongos  are a family,  Dicruridae , of birds of the Old World tropics. The 29 species in the family are placed in a single  genus  Dicrurus .  Drongos are mostly black or dark grey, short-legged birds, with an upright stance when perched. They have forked tails and some have elaborate tail decorations. They feed on insects which they catch in flight or on the ground. Some species are accomplished mimics and have a variety of alarm calls, to which other birds and animals often respond. There is evidence that they utter hoax alarm calls that typically scare other animals off food, which the drongo then eats. This phenomena is a matter of interest to re...