A NEW survey shows lemurs are far more threatened than previously thought.
A group of specialists is in Madagascar - the only place where lemurs are found in the wild - to systematically assess the animals and decide where they sit on the Red List of Threatened Species.
More than 90% of the 103 species should be on the Red List, they say.
Since a coup in 2009, conservation groups have repeatedly found evidence of illegal logging, and hunting of lemurs has emerged as a new threat.
The assessment, conducted by the Primate Specialist Group of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), concludes that 23 lemurs qualify as Critically Endangered - the highest class of threat.
Fifty-two are in the Endangered classification, and a further 19 Vulnerable to extinction.
“That means that 91% of of all lemurs are assessed as being in one of the Red List threatened categories, which is far and away the largest proportion of any group of mammals,” said Russ Mittermeier, chairman of the specialist group and president of Conservation International. Species can qualify for a Red List category on several measures.
A Critically Endangered listing can mean the population numbers less than 50 mature adults or that it has shrunk by 80% over 10 years, for example. The previous lemur assessment, published in 2008, put eight species in the Critically Endangered class. Eighteen were Endangered, and 14 Vulnerable. –BBC