Going Ape

Hi, Nethryk, A happy New Year to you and I just want to say that I am also one of the many who very much appreciate your contributions here! To start off the year:
Barbery monkeys or macaques (Macaca sylvanus) are the only species of primates living in the wild in Europe. Perhaps one might say that they are no longer wild enough because they are so used to people that some of them have become problem monkeys and now it is a heavily fined offence to feed any. You surely know of the saying that Britain will stay in Gibraltar as long as there are any monkeys there. Kris

Monkey stamps keep on coming - one wonders what they are going to do for 2016 which will be the Year of the Monkey?
Below are some new issues from Liberia. An interesting addition to these MSs are the CITES rankings. First, the Western lowland gorilla:




Next, the gentle lemur:



The following MS shows a mandrill and the rare sun-tailed guenon, only discovered at the end of the last century:




Finally, the barbary monkey also shown above in the Gibraltar issues:

Sorry, that should have been "Mountain gorilla" for the first MS in my last post. Below are some more issues, this time from Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast). The first two are a little more than the usual in that the animals on the stamps are in slight relief, however, it is hard to see from a picture and only really clear when looking at the back. I have not come across such stamps in my monkey collection - is it common?

First, going ape, with more chimpanzees:




And some other species:





Better images than some of the above in this other 2014 issue:





and its 4 stamp MS:





The Zanzibar red colobus occurs only on the island of that name, and is frequently shown on issues of Tanzania - but I'll leave that to another time.

Happy New Year to you all!

Kris Rascher - Happy New Year! Thanks for the kind words. I am sure that many SCF members appreciate your excellent contributions here, too.

cobie - Very nice! Yes, the Year of the Monkey should provide us with a superabundance of simian stamps.

Q: What do you call a baby monkey?
A: A chimp off the old block.

Monkey mommy and baby in an apple tree, designed by T.M. Trang, printed by lithography, and issued by Vietnam on December 1, 2003, Scott No. 3203.

- nethryk

Here are some fine issues form Bietnam 2014, on the occasion of the International Congress of Primatology, held in Hanoi last year. They all show some of the langurs and gibbons of Vietnam, some native to that country only. Many people do not realize That these species are some of the rarest primate species, much rarer than say, the mountain gorilla, of which there are several hundreds, and whose numbers are actually increasing, thanks to public awarness and eco-tourism. In contrast, these species are difficult to show to tourists because of their rarity. The Tonkin snub-nosed langur, black gibbon and Francois langur are critically endangered. And only last year, an entirely new species was found - from hunters.....







And here are the first new issues to come to my notice in 2015 I rather like them since you can almost see the brush strokes of the artists when you enlarge the picture:







It is nice to see the woolly monkey on a stamp - there are rather few of these,only half a dozen or so. Like wise, the gelada baboon - maybe about fifteen; and of the golden snub-nosed monkey, on the one stamp MS, also only about fifteen or so, most of these from China. All three species are endangered or vulnerable and rarely seen in captivity.

The Demidoff Galago, or Bushbaby, has appeared on earlier posts but not this particular one (here spelled demidovii). It also appears to be more bushy-tailed than in other pictures; I don't know what subspecies it is. In 1806 it was named after Prince Davidoff, the Russian supporter of natural sciences.



(Thanks Nethryk for your encouragement!)

Hi Kris: Thanks for your pictures! The correct scientific name is Galagoides demidovii - Demidoff's name would have been Latinnized to "demidovius", of which "demidovii" is the genitive case, "Demidoff's". This stil (Half) applies to modern nomenclature, so that the okapi, for instance, is called "johnstoni". I love galagos, or bushbabies - with their big eyes, they do elicit the cute response; being small and usually furry helps too. Fortunately they are small and nocturnal and therefore "least concern" on the Red list.

Here is one as part of a nice issue from Namibia:




I think Namibia, with Botswana, produces some of most beautiful wildlife stamps.

Oops - something went wrong with uploading the picture - let's try that again:

The drawing on this Nepalese stamp shows how thickset the Assamese macaque (Macaca assamensis)may get, particularly the adult male, which reaches a weight of about 12kg. These monkeys are native to the upland forests of the Himalayas, this one from Nepal probably belonging to the western subspecies.
(Cobie, your nocturnal zoo is beautiful. K.)

Thanks for that one, Kris - they are a large species, just like the closely related Thibetan macaque (there is a stamp of that species but I have to hunt for it) and the pig-tailed macaque from South-East Asia (more later).

While I look for the ones I want, I thought you might like this one, another favourite of mine. This one is from Malaysia's 2008 "Nocturnal animals" issue and shows Horsfield's tarsier (Tarsius bancanus) and the slow loris (Nycticebus coucang). Apart from being very good pictures (which make one see why the slow loris, and even more the smaller but similar pygmy slow loris of Vietnam is threatened by the pet trade), the eyes of the animals shown in the top right corner glow in the dark!

Sun-tailed monkey (Cercopithecus solatus), printed by lithography, and issued by Gabon on March 6, 1996 to publicize protected indigenous species, Scott No. 826, plus a photo.

- nethryk

Here's the Tibethan macaque I promised, one of the UN Endangered species series of 1998:






Classified as Near Threatened, the species lives high in the mountains, which explains its size and coat (as well, it has only a very short tail, like the Japanese snow monkey; when long-tailed macaques are kept in zoos where there is severe frost, their tails can get frost bite, severe necessitating amputation. While this could explain the short tail, other short tial macaques live in the tropic while other high-altitude, snow-exposed species have very furry tails, like China's snub-nosed monkeys, and of course snow leopards).

Thought I'd add the golden snub-nosed monkey - surely one of the most spectecular primate species and very rarely seen outsied (and even inside) China. The San Diego Zoo had some on loan many years ago but I don't think any Western zoos exhibit them now. You will find them in Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing. In the wild, you will be looking at a serious trek in the high mountains of Central China, and they are rare there.

China first issued the species on a set of much sought after stamps in 1963:




and later, as part of a series of wildlife stamps, in 2000:'



and here is picture of a male - the "warts' at the corners of the mouth make them look a bit sad - or like Grumpy Cat?

Here's another member of the Genus Cercopithecus (C. neglectus) native to the forests of western central Africa. Its most distinctive feature may be the light brown eyebrow crescent in combination with the white beard. The males also have some blue skin coloring, but not anything like the snub-nosed monkey. Cobie, he's lovely, and you can't beat that red fur.

Here are images of the four stamps in a set depicting indigenous gibbons, combined engraved and photogravure, and issued by China (People's Republic) on December 7, 2002, Scott Nos. 3249-52, plus some relevant photos.

- nethryk

Lar gibbon (Hylobates lar)


Northern white-cheeked gibbon (Nomascus leucogenys, aka Hylobates leucogenys)


Black crested gibbon (Nomascus concolor, aka Hylobates concolor)


Eastern hoolock gibbon (Hoolock leuconedys, aka Hylobates hoolock)