Where Do Lemurs Live? Why Lemurs Are Found Only in Madagascar

Why are lemurs found only on Madagascar?

Madagascar broke away from Africa as part of the ancient supercontinent Gondwana more than 150 million years ago, and later separated from India around 88 million years ago. By the time early primates appeared, the island was already surrounded by sea. The Mozambique Channel between Madagascar and Africa is at least about 400 km (250 mi) wide.

Lemur ancestors therefore had to cross open water. Genetic studies suggest that all lemurs descend from one small founding group that arrived roughly 50 to 60 million years ago, although estimates vary. The most widely accepted idea is rafting: animals clinging to mats of vegetation or floating trees washed out to sea by African rivers during floods.

For years this seemed unlikely, because today’s currents flow away from Madagascar. In 2010, geologists Jason Ali and Matthew Huber modeled ancient ocean currents and found that, around 60 to 20 million years ago, currents flowed from Africa toward the island and were strong enough to carry a raft across in a few weeks. A small, possibly torpid animal could survive that trip.

Monkeys and apes never made the crossing. On the African mainland, early strepsirrhines lost ground to monkeys, but on Madagascar, lemurs had the forests to themselves.

What habitats do lemurs live in?

Madagascar is about 587,000 sq km (227,000 sq mi), the fourth-largest island in the world, and it has very different climates from east to west. Lemurs occupy almost every type of forest and scrub.

The eastern rainforests are richest in species. Parks such as Andasibe-Mantadia and Ranomafana hold a dozen or more species each. The west is home to dry forests where lemurs must cope with a long dry season, and some dwarf lemurs survive it by hibernating for months on fat stored in their tails.

Where does each kind of lemur live?

Lemurs vary hugely in size and lifestyle, and many species have tiny ranges.

• Mouse lemurs are the smallest primates in the world. Madame Berthe’s mouse lemur weighs about 30 g (1 oz) and lives in the dry forests of western Madagascar. Mouse lemurs as a group are found all around the island.
• True lemurs (genus Eulemur), such as the brown and black lemurs, live in forests across the island and are active by both day and night.
• Sifakas are large leaping lemurs. Verreaux’s sifaka of the south and west is famous for “dancing” sideways across open ground.
• The indri, the largest living lemur at up to about 9 kg (20 lb), lives only in the eastern rainforest and is known for its loud, wailing songs.
• The aye-aye lives in scattered forests across much of the island and uses a long, thin middle finger to pull grubs out of wood.
• The ring-tailed lemur lives in the dry south and southwest, from gallery forest along rivers to rocky mountain slopes up to about 2,600 m (8,500 ft).

Many species are restricted to a single river basin or patch of forest, because Madagascar’s large rivers act as barriers that small lemurs cannot cross. This helps explain why the island has so many species.

Do lemurs live anywhere else?

Outside Madagascar, the only wild lemurs live on the Comoro Islands to the northwest. The mongoose lemur is found on Anjouan and Mohéli, and the common brown lemur on Mayotte. Both were most likely brought there by people several centuries ago.

Lemurs do not live wild in Africa, Asia or South America. Lemurs in zoos and research centers in Europe and North America are captive, often part of breeding programs that support conservation in Madagascar. The extinct relatives found as fossils in Africa and Asia were early primates, not members of the lemur group.

How people changed where lemurs live

Before humans arrived around 2,000 years ago, Madagascar also had giant lemurs, including Archaeoindris, which may have weighed as much as a male gorilla. At least 17 lemur species, all of them larger than any living lemur, have since gone extinct.

Today many lemurs survive only in protected areas or fragments of forest, because much of the island’s forest has been cleared for farming, grazing and charcoal. That is why lemurs are among the most threatened mammals on Earth, as explained in Why are lemurs endangered?. For other wildlife found only on the island, see animals of Madagascar.