Discovering monkeys that have been dubbed

Living on tall trees, they are as agile as birds.

When the Moon rises high in the sky of Sulawesi island in Indonesia, primates with faces similar to the character Yoda in the Star Wars series appear to find food. They raised their voices like a chorus orchestra to recognize each other and mark the territory.

According to a study published May 4, these sounds have helped scientists identify two small monkey-sized animal families that live in deep forests, named after them. Tarsius spectrumgurskyae and T.supriatnai, raising the number of Tarsier monkeys in Sulawesi to 11 species.

Two new Tarsier monkeys were discovered in the northeastern forest of the island, named after biologist Jatna Supriatna and expert Sharon Gursky about Tarsier monkeys, he is also a primate at Texas A&M University.

New species of Tarsius spectrumgurskyae has been found to cling to tree trunks in the northeastern forest of Sulawesi Island, Indonesia.(Photo: Myron Shekelle).

Researcher Myron Shekelle, a researcher at the University of Western Washington, said: "They have an almost identical appearance, but the way they call it is very different."

Tarsier monkeys were evolved from their monkey ancestors at the time of the extinct dinosaurs between 64.2 and 58.4 million years ago, the monkeys then divided into many different branches and scattered throughout Asia and North Africa.

There have been 18 Tarsier monkeys found throughout the Southeast Asian archipelago.

Tarsier monkeys have some unusual morphological characteristics. Their ancestors lost the layer of tapetum lucidum - a layer of mirrors-like cells located behind the retina, which helps to reflex and amplify light. Therefore, in order to make up for this shortcoming, Tarsier must develop larger, nearly as large eyes as their brains, allowing them to observe well during the night.

Because the eyes are so big, they can't glimpse, but have to turn their heads if they want to look at something on either side. They rotate their heads similarly to owls, and they are the only primates that can rotate their heads in a 360 degree turn.

Rafe Brown, a forest researcher at the University of Kansas, said: "They always make me tremble in the forest. You can see their bright eyes. They don't seem to be Tarsier monkeys, looking at them. like jungle goblins ".

Dinagat monkey was discovered in 2014 in the Philippines, is also a tarsier monkey.(Photo: Andrew Cunningham).

Living on tall trees, they are as agile as birds. Adults only average about 113 grams, they are a good climber."Nobody expected that an animal as small as a butter tube could jump up to three meters," said Shekelle from the United States National Geographic Association.

Different Tarsier monkeys all look alike, even like their distant ancestors. Gursky said: "I have seen their fossils from 50 million years ago, looking exactly like modern monkeys."

But physical similarity is a major barrier in the effort to identify new species, even within the island. Sulawesi Island originated from many small islands combined together about a million years ago. Geological evidence suggests that different Tarsier monkeys evolved differently in each island before the islands merged.

However, they are trying to rely on each other for survival, because deforestation is taking place seriously above. Scientists are looking for ways to protect them before they become extinct due to the destruction of humanity.