Animal Diversity Web

Ge­o­graphic Range

Sooty mangabeys are pri­mar­ily en­demic to Upper Guinea in coastal West Africa (King­don 1997, San­ti­ago et al. 2005). The na­tive range used to ex­tend from the Casamance River in Sene­gal to the Sas­san­dra/Nzo River sys­tem in Ivory Coast, but their pop­u­la­tion has been re­duced and is mostly ex­tinct today in Sene­gal, Guinea Bis­sau, and parts of Guinea (Rowe 1996, Groves 2001). Large num­bers of sooty mangabeys still exist in Sierra Leone, Liberia, and west­ern Ivory Coast (San­ti­ago et al. 2005). Their range over­laps with that of other mangabey species (Estes 1991). (Estes, 1991; Groves, 2001; King­don, 1997; Rowe, 1996; San­ti­ago, et al., 2005)

• Biogeographic Regions
• ethiopian
  • native

Habi­tat

Sooty mangabeys are pri­mar­ily ter­res­trial and re­side in val­leys in pri­mary, sec­ondary, flooded, dry, mo­saic and man­grove forests in the Guinean For­est Zone. They also in­habit gallery forests and are com­monly spot­ted near swamp and palm forests (King­don 1997, Carey and Judge 2000). (Carey and Judge, 2000; King­don, 1997)

The Tai Na­tional Park in south­west­ern Ivory Coast is the only pri­mary for­est left in West Africa, and many wild sooty mangabey groups are found and stud­ied ex­ten­sively there (Range and Noe 2002). In this park, there are two dry sea­sons and av­er­age rain­fall is 1,830 mm. The mean tem­per­a­ture is 24 de­grees Cel­sius (Mc­Graw 1998). (Mc­Graw, 1998; Range and Noe, 2002)

Sooty mangabeys live from sea level up to 1000 m above sea leval, pos­si­bly higher in the Lome Moun­tains in Sierra Leone (Oates, Gip­politi, and Groves 2011). (Oates, et al., 2011)

• Habitat Regions
• tropical
• terrestrial

• Terrestrial Biomes
• forest
• rainforest

• Wetlands
• swamp

• Other Habitat Features
• agricultural
• riparian

• Range elevation

  0 to 1000 m

  0.00 to 3280.84 ft

Phys­i­cal De­scrip­tion

A mem­ber of the Cer­co­p­itheci­nae, mon­keys with cheek-pouches, sooty mangabeys are a smoky, slate-grey or brown-grey mon­key with lighter white on their ven­tral side (Groves 2001). They are noted for their light col­ored fa­cial whiskers, which have the great­est con­trast in color in the east­ern pop­u­la­tions, and hands and feet of slightly darker color than the body. Their bare fa­cial skin is mot­tled dark grey and pink salmon color, while the upper eye­lids are white and the or­bits and muz­zle are more rec­tan­gu­lar than round in out­line (King­don 1997, Rowe 1996, Meester and Set­zer 1971). Their face has a black­ish muz­zle and their ears are a sim­i­lar color to their muz­zle. En­large­ment of the sec­ond pre­mo­lar (P4) rel­a­tive to the first molar sep­a­rates the sooty mangabey’s den­ti­tion from other closely re­lated species (Daegling et al. 2011). This species is also less sex­u­ally di­mor­phic than Cer­co­ce­bus torqua­tus (Groves 2001). The skull of the male is smaller than in C. torqua­tus and also has a nar­rower, shorter face. Both sexes also have a sig­nif­i­cantly lower as­cend­ing ramus of the mandible com­pared to other closely re­lated species (Groves 1978). (Daegling, et al., 2011; Groves, 1978; Groves, 2001; King­don, 1997; Meester and Set­zer, 1971; Nowak, 1991; Rowe, 1996)

Male sooty mangabeys are larger, heav­ier, and have larger ca­nines than in fe­males (Fruteau, Range, and Noe 2010). The fe­male skull is 87% the size of that of the male (Groves 1978). (Fruteau, et al., 2010; Groves, 1978)

The mass of the sooty mangabey ranges from 8.5 to 14 kg for males and 5 to 9 kg for fe­males, with an av­er­age of 8.593 kg (King­don 1997, Rowe 1996, Mann et al. 1983). The head and body length is 40 to 60 cm in fe­males and 47 to 67 cm in males, while tail length is 40 to 80 cm in both sexes. The height at shoul­der for fe­males is 38 to 42 cm and 40 to 45 cm in males (King­don 1997). (King­don, 1997; Mann, et al., 1983; Rowe, 1996)

The skin of the sooty mangabey has unique his­to­log­i­cal and bio­chem­i­cal prop­er­ties in­clud­ing subepi­der­mal cholinesterase-re­ac­tion nerve fibers over the body sur­face, and spe­cial­ized nerve end or­gans in many areas of the body. There are also spe­cial­ized nerve end-or­gans at the base of the epi­der­mal ridges of the fin­ger­tips (Machida et al. 1965). (Machida, et al., 1965)

There are two known sub­species of C. atys. The first, Cer­co­ce­bus atys atys, is noted for being smoky gray, oc­ca­sion­ally with a small dor­sal stripe but never with a whorl or crown on the head, and crown hairs with a black tip and straw-col­ored band. The sec­ond, Cer­co­ce­bus atys lunula­tus (white col­lared (crowned) mangabeys) is noted for a whorl or crown on the head, a darker face, a more promi­nent dor­sal stripe, and a white oval mark edged with black on the nape. The hands and feet in white col­lared mangabeys are more sim­i­larly col­ored to the body and have a white un­der­side (Groves 2001). (Groves, 2001)

• Other Physical Features
• endothermic
• homoiothermic
• bilateral symmetry

• Sexual Dimorphism
• male larger

• Range mass

  5 to 14 kg

  11.01 to 30.84 lb

• Average mass

  8.6 kg

  18.94 lb

• Range length

  40 to 67 cm

  15.75 to 26.38 in

Re­pro­duc­tion

Sooty mangabeys live in multi-male, multi-fe­male groups of 15 to more than 100 in­di­vid­u­als (Stahl and Kau­manns 2003). This so­cial struc­ture has led to a polyg­y­nan­drous (promis­cu­ous) breed­ing sys­tem, where both males and fe­males have mul­ti­ple part­ners (Gouzoules 1984; Fruteau, Range, and Noe 2010). (Fruteau, et al., 2010; Gouzoules, 1984; Stahl and Kau­manns, 2003)

Al­though in a promis­cu­ous sys­tem fe­males are ex­pected to be ag­gres­sive to­wards each other when com­pet­ing for mates, no such be­hav­ior has been found in the sooty mangabey. How­ever, fe­males are often the vic­tims of ag­gres­sion from males, and res­i­dent males some­times slap fe­males when they pre­sent them­selves at the be­gin­ning of the breed­ing sea­son. Males are part of a lin­ear dom­i­nance hi­er­ar­chy, where the high­est-rank­ing male at­tempts to cop­u­late with all fe­males (Range 2005). Over­all, more highly ranked males mount fe­males more often (Fruteau, Range, and Noe 2010). (Fruteau, et al., 2010; Range, 2005)

Non-res­i­dent males who visit a group often at­tack moth­ers with in­fants, and often suc­ceed in com­mit­ting in­fan­ti­cide. Older and higher rank­ing males de­fend the fe­males they mated with against such in­fan­ti­cide. After in­fan­ti­cide has been com­mit­ted, the fe­male im­me­di­ately goes into es­trous, giv­ing the at­tack­ing, sneaky male an op­por­tu­nity to mate with her (Fruteau, Range, and Noe 2010). (Fruteau, et al., 2010)

• Mating System
• polygynandrous (promiscuous)

Male sooty mangabeys be­come sex­u­ally ac­tive at a lit­tle less than 1 year of age, but their ear­li­est ejac­u­la­tion is at 4 years old. Young males, start­ing at 1 year, mount sex­u­ally ma­ture fe­males. Males ac­tively mount more fe­males from the ages of 3 to 4, dur­ing ado­les­cence, than from ages 5 to 6, dur­ing sex­ual ma­tu­rity (Gust and Gor­don 1991). Ju­ve­nile males are even more likely to mount sex­u­ally ma­ture fe­males than adult males (Rowe 1996). The age of first per­ineal swelling for fe­males is at 30 to 39 months, around the age of the first menses, and the first birth is usu­ally ap­prox­i­mately a year later at 49 to 55 months (Ehardt 1988a, Ehardt 1988b, Mann et al. 1983). The av­er­age time be­tween births is 13 to 16 months; hav­ing a longer in­ter­birth in­ter­val is as­so­ci­ated with lower in­fant mor­tal­ity rates (Gust and Gor­don 1991). Sooty mangabeys give birth to a sin­gle in­fant at a time. Their birthrate is 0.92/yr, and their av­er­age ges­ta­tion pe­riod is 167 days (Re­fisch and Kone 2005). (Ehardt, 1988a; Ehardt, 1988b; Gust and Gor­don, 1991; Mann, et al., 1983; Re­fisch and Kone, 2005; Rowe, 1996)

Fe­male per­ineal swellings dur­ing the es­trous cycle last 34.5 days and sig­nal to males that they are ca­pa­ble of mat­ing. Males are able to dis­tin­guish be­tween a fe­male’s max­i­mal fer­tile swelling and a post­con­cep­tion swelling, which oc­curs dur­ing the post­con­cep­tion es­trus (Rowe 1996). How­ever, sex­ual swellings in cap­tive fe­males were not shown to ac­cu­rately re­flect peak fer­til­ity, but do rep­re­sent over­all abil­ity to cop­u­late (Whit­ten and Rus­sell 2006). Fe­males sex­u­ally pre­sent them­selves more fre­quently to males than to other fe­males, do al­most all of the pre­sent­ing, re­ceive all of the mount­ings, and per­form as many gen­i­tal in­spec­tions as males (Bern­stein 1976). More highly ranked males mount fe­males more often than do lower ranked males (Fruteau, Range, and Noe 2010). (Bern­stein, 1976; Fruteau, et al., 2010; Rowe, 1996; Whit­ten and Rus­sell, 1996)

Mat­ing first be­gins with the male grasp­ing the fe­male’s an­kles while he mounts her from be­hind; the fe­male then vo­cal­izes and darts away from him be­fore al­low­ing him to mount her again. Fe­males make a soft grunt dur­ing cop­u­la­tion (Gust and Gor­don 1994). Fe­males often man­u­ally stim­u­late their per­ineal area dur­ing cop­u­la­tion (Gust and Gor­don 1991). (Gust and Gor­don, 1991; Gust and Gor­don, 1994)

In the wild, mat­ing be­gins in May, peaks in July to Au­gust, and ends in Sep­tem­ber, al­though births are some­times seen through­out the year (Mann et al. 1983). Sooty mangabeys in cap­tiv­ity do not show strong sea­son­al­ity in mat­ing (Bern­stein 1976). (Bern­stein, 1976; Mann, et al., 1983)

• Key Reproductive Features
• iteroparous
• seasonal breeding
• gonochoric/gonochoristic/dioecious (sexes separate)
• sexual
• viviparous

• Breeding interval

  Breeding occurs once every 13 to 16 months.

• Breeding season

  The breeding season is from May to September.

• Average number of offspring

  1

• Average gestation period

  167 days

• Range weaning age

  4 (low) months

• Average weaning age

  10 months

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (female)

  55 months

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (male)

  4 years

At birth, in­fants are car­ried on their mother's ven­tral side but are later car­ried on the back after a few months. The mother of the in­fant gives it in­ten­sive care for the first 2 to 7 months of life, and more gen­eral at­ten­tion through­out the rest of the first year (Bern­stein 1976). The lac­ta­tion pe­riod is 4 to 10 months (Fruteau, Range, and Noe 2010). Aunts of the in­fant groom the in­fant from ages 10 to 12 months more than the mother does; sib­lings, both male and fe­male, also groom in­fants they are re­lated to (Bern­stein 1976). Moth­ers have also been ob­served groom­ing the in­fants’ eye­lashes with a stone (Kyes 1988). Males oc­ca­sion­ally carry young to pro­tect the young, but not as a so­cial buffer, since they usu­ally carry in­fants that they sired them­selves (Range and Noe 2002). (Bern­stein, 1976; Fruteau, et al., 2010; Kyes, 1988; Range and Noe, 2002)

Fe­males who lose their in­fants within six months of their birth im­me­di­ately re-en­ter es­trus, while moth­ers who do not lose their in­fants do not. There­fore, males who kill in­fants within these six months can re­pro­duce with the fe­male soon after com­mit­ting in­fan­ti­cide (Fruteau, Range, and Noe 2010). (Fruteau, et al., 2010)

At birth, the in­fant is given a rank im­me­di­ately below the mother, but male off­spring quickly rise above the mother in the group rank­ing after a few years (Bern­stein 1976). (Bern­stein, 1976)

In­fant ne­glect and abuse, while not com­mon, has been ob­served in cap­tive sooty mangabey groups, and is more likely to im­pact first born young (Maestrip­ieri, Wallen, and Car­rol 1997). (Maestrip­ieri, et al., 1997)

• Parental Investment
• female parental care
• pre-fertilization
  • provisioning
  • protecting
    • male
• pre-hatching/birth
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • female
• pre-weaning/fledging
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • female
• pre-independence
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • female
• maternal position in the dominance hierarchy affects status of young

Lifes­pan/Longevity

Av­er­age lifes­pan in the wild for sooty mangabeys is 18 years (Rowe 1996). Av­er­age lifes­pan in cap­tiv­ity for males is 26.8 years (Carey and Judge 2000). (Carey and Judge, 2000; Rowe, 1996)

• Average lifespan
  Status: wild

  18 years

• Average lifespan
  Status: captivity

  26.8 years

Be­hav­ior

Sooty mangabeys are quadrupedal, ter­res­trial, di­ur­nal mon­keys who live in multi-male, multi-fe­male groups (Rowe 1996, Range 2005). They have sex­u­ally di­mor­phic be­hav­ioral pat­terns: males en­gage in so­cial be­hav­iors more often and fe­males en­gage in sub­mis­sion and re­ceive ag­o­nis­tic be­hav­iors more often. In cap­tiv­ity, they spend 70% of the day on the ground, and of that 35% of their day feed­ing and 5% of it drink­ing. Im­ma­ture mon­keys play more than adults do. They are al­ways within 1 meter of an­other mon­key, and are closer dur­ing harsher weather con­di­tions, when hud­dling be­comes more com­mon (Bern­stein 1976). In the wild, 74% of time is spent for­ag­ing or con­sum­ing food, and the rest of the time is spent rest­ing and trav­el­ing (Range and Noe 2002). Al­though they are mostly ter­res­trial, they will oc­ca­sion­ally be­come ar­bo­real, es­pe­cially to avoid preda­tor at­tacks (Range and Fis­cher 2004). (Bern­stein, 1976; Range and Fis­cher, 2004; Range and Noe, 2002; Range, 2005; Rowe, 1996)

Un­like many non-hu­man pri­mates, sooty mangabeys do not have a typ­i­cal strictly ma­tri­lin­eal so­cial struc­ture (Gust and Gor­don 1994). How­ever, the be­hav­ior of wild ju­ve­nile sooty mangabeys in­di­cates that the so­cial struc­ture of sooty mangabeys most closely re­sem­bles a ma­tri­lin­eal struc­ture. Their so­cial struc­ture has also been de­scribed as a “con­test com­pe­ti­tion,” where fe­males es­tab­lish ma­tri­lin­eal dom­i­nance based lines (Range and Noe 2002). Fe­male ranks re­main con­stant and re­sem­ble that of their mother upon birth, while males’ ranks ini­tially re­sem­ble their moth­ers at birth but are sub­se­quently un­sta­ble, per­haps at the same time they grow larger ca­nines around 4 years of age. Males and fe­males rank dif­fer­ently; all fe­males are ranked below the alpha fe­male, and all males age 5-6 are ranked higher than all fe­males. So­cial rank for the sooty mangabey is not solely kin-based since broth­ers and sis­ters do not oc­cupy sim­i­lar ranks. This sys­tem may pre­vail since fe­males do not com­monly as­so­ci­ate with their kin more fre­quently than non-kin, other than their own in­fants (Gust and Gor­don 1994). They also show no kin-pref­er­en­tial be­hav­ior among adults (Ehardt 1988b). Ju­ve­nile males ap­proach adult males more than fe­males do, and ju­ve­nile fe­males do not ap­proach other fe­males based on their rank (Range 2006). The fe­male of the alpha ma­tri­line in­ter­acts more with males than other fe­males, and pref­er­ence is shown for groom­ing the old­est male (Ehardt 1988a). Cap­tive sooty mangabeys do not ex­hibit a uni­di­rec­tional ma­tri­lin­eal hi­er­ar­chy, but are more af­fil­ia­tive and less kin-de­pen­dent (Stahl and Kau­manns 2003). (Ehardt, 1988a; Ehardt, 1988b; Gust and Gor­don, 1994; Range and Noe, 2002; Stahl and Kau­manns, 2003)

Fe­males are philopatric, while males im­mi­grate into other groups. Sooty mangabey males have a dis­per­sal pat­tern where some males are al­ways res­i­dents of the same group, while oth­ers leave their group for sev­eral months at a time. Soli­tary un­known males and res­i­dent males of near-by groups often in­ter­act with fe­males. Fe­males can dis­tin­guish be­tween group and non-group mem­ber calls, pos­si­bly to help pre­vent in­fan­ti­cide at­tacks (Range 2005). (Range, 2005)

Sooty mangabeys have one of the low­est rates of ag­o­nis­tic be­hav­ior and con­tact ag­gres­sion of any Old World mon­key. Most bit­ing be­hav­ior is harm­less, con­sist­ing of a light bite on the tail or rump. Al­liances and strong ma­tri­lin­eal sup­port are rel­a­tively unim­por­tant in this species, and thus a con­trolled form of ag­gres­sion is ob­served. How­ever, rank chal­lenges by fe­males, some even fatal, were ob­served in the for­ma­tion of so­cial rank in a cap­tive group (Gust and Gor­don 1991). (Gust and Gor­don, 1991)

In cap­tiv­ity, higher ranked fe­males have been ob­served to stay longer at feed­ing sites and eat higher qual­ity foods than low rank­ing fe­males. Males en­gaged in ag­o­nis­tic in­ter­ac­tion with fe­males when lim­ited food was avail­able, and thus fe­males were sub­mis­sive to males based on their own rank. Fe­males in the wild as­so­ci­ate with higher-rank­ing males in order to gain ac­cess to higher qual­ity food patches. This as­so­ci­a­tion also pro­tects fe­males against po­ten­tial preda­tors and in­fan­ti­ci­dal males, while the male main­tains ac­cess to a high qual­ity fe­male for mat­ing (Stahl and Kau­manns 2003). (Stahl and Kau­manns, 2003)

Sooty mangabeys have been ob­served using a stone for groom­ing in­fants. It is un­clear whether this use rep­re­sents tool use (Kyes 1988). Fru­giv­o­rous mon­keys, like the sooty mangabey, who re­quire high lev­els of spa­tial mem­ory, are ex­pected to have high lev­els of in­tel­li­gence, so tool use does not seem un­rea­son­able for their level of in­tel­li­gence. Sooty mangabeys can also dis­tin­guish be­tween trees that are fruit­ing and not fruit­ing, and choose to ap­proach fruit­ing trees with a higher prob­a­bil­ity. They also may have the abil­ity to as­sess whether a tree is fruit­ing with­out vi­sual cues, based on spa­tial mem­ory of pre­vi­ous tree vis­its. They even re­mem­ber the lo­ca­tion of fallen fruit, and re­turn later to re­trieve it when it be­comes ac­ces­si­ble (Jan­maat, Byrne, and Zu­ber­buh­ler 2006). (Jan­maat, et al., 2006; Kyes, 1988)

• Key Behaviors
• scansorial
• terricolous
• diurnal
• motile
• sedentary
• social
• dominance hierarchies

• Range territory size

  6 to 8 km^2

Home Range

Sooty mangabeys live in groups in the wild that are spaced 3 km from each other (Mc­Graw and Bshary 2002). They can live in groups of over 100 in­di­vid­u­als with home ranges of 6-8 km2 (700-800 ha), which often over­lap with other groups (Mc­Graw, Vick, and Daegling 2011; Jan­maat, Byrne, and Zu­ber­buh­ler 2006). (Jan­maat, et al., 2006; Mc­Graw and Bshary, 2002; Mc­Graw, et al., 2011)

Com­mu­ni­ca­tion and Per­cep­tion

The most com­mon call of sooty mangabeys is a soft grunt, also known as a stac­cato bark, which con­sists of a mul­ti­tude of rapid grunts and a whoop that is fin­ished by a multi-syl­la­bled rum­ble (King­don 1997). Sooty mangabey vo­cal­iza­tions can be grouped into sev­eral main cat­e­gories. Grunts, low fre­quency vo­cal­iza­tions, are the most com­mon vo­cal­iza­tion, and are more com­monly pro­duced by males and in for­ag­ing ac­tiv­i­ties. Twit­ters, rang­ing from soft, melodic sounds to harsher sounds, are only heard from adult fe­males and ju­ve­niles of both sexes in for­ag­ing and so­cial in­ter­ac­tions. They can con­sist of up to 23 syl­la­bles. Twit­ters can be heard when a fe­male ap­proaches an­other group mem­ber, and are com­mon when for­ag­ing in widely dis­persed areas to lo­cate an­other for­ag­ing group. Screams, which are loud, noisy ag­o­nis­tic vo­cal­iza­tions, are mostly heard from ju­ve­nile and adult fe­males dur­ing con­tact ag­gres­sion. Growls are multi-syl­labic, also occur in ag­o­nis­tic sit­u­a­tions, and are often ac­com­pa­nied by a raised eye­brow. Grum­bles, hoos, in­tense threats, and waus are other calls heard dur­ing ag­o­nis­tic in­ter­ac­tions. Cop­u­la­tion calls have a com­plex phrase struc­ture and last up to 10 sec­onds. They can be heard from fe­males dur­ing cop­u­la­tion and oc­ca­sion­ally dur­ing defe­ca­tion, as well as from males after ejac­u­la­tion. Whoop gob­bles are long calls, only used by adult males, and are as­so­ci­ated with con­tact­ing other groups. Alarm calls are pro­duced by both males and fe­males, and have been heard in re­sponse to Ga­boon vipers, leop­ards, and African crowned ea­gles. There ap­pears to be a dif­fer­ent alarm call spe­cific to each preda­tor (Range and Fis­cher 2004). (King­don, 1997; Range and Fis­cher, 2004)

Sooty mangabeys ex­hibit many vari­able fa­cial ex­pres­sions, most of un­known mean­ing (King­don 1997). A lip­grin with a pro­tru­sion of the tongue is often seen but its sig­nif­i­cance is un­known (Bern­stein 1976). Fre­quent eye­lid rais­ing in­di­cates a threat (Gust and Gor­don 1994). (Bern­stein, 1976; Gust and Gor­don, 1994; King­don, 1997)

• Communication Channels
• visual
• acoustic

• Perception Channels
• visual
• tactile
• acoustic
• chemical

Food Habits

Sooty mangabeys are hard ob­ject feed­ers with a nar­row diet pri­mar­ily con­sist­ing of fruits and nuts, es­pe­cially palm nuts, with spe­cial­iza­tion on their flesh and ker­nels. They are also known to eat stems, roots, shoots, and leaves of swamp plants, as well as grass, seeds and fungi (King­don 1997, Mac­don­ald 2001). In­ver­te­brates are an­other sta­ple of their diet (Mc­Graw, Vick, and Daegling 2011). They have ex­tremely strong, pow­er­ful jaws and mas­sive in­cisors that allow them to con­sume a hard ob­ject diet. Pow­er­ful post-ca­nine bit­ing al­lows them to crack and con­sume hard nuts that other an­i­mals can­not eat (Rowe 1996, Estes 1991). A com­plex pre­mo­lar pro­file and their thicker enamel also re­flect their hard ob­ject feed­ing lifestyle (Daegling et al. 2011). (Daegling, et al., 2011; Estes, 1991; King­don, 1997; Mac­don­ald, 2001; Mc­Graw, et al., 2011; Rowe, 1996)

The most com­mon food in their diet and hard­est item they feed on is nuts from Sacoglot­tis gabo­nen­sis, which can com­prise 25 to 80% of the whole diet sea­son­ally and which they crush using their large pre­mo­lars. These nuts are mostly re­cov­ered from leaf lit­ter on the for­est floor and are cov­ered with an ex­tremely hard cas­ing (Mc­Graw, Vick, and Daegling 2011). When con­sum­ing these nuts, they ex­hibit a pow­er­ful iso­met­ric bite with in­cisal prepa­ra­tion and pow­er­ful post-ca­nine crush­ing (Mc­Graw, Vick, and Daegling 2011). The fruit of An­thonota fra­grans was ob­served to sea­son­ally form up to 25% of the diet (Jan­maat, Byrne, and Zu­ber­buh­ler 2006). (Jan­maat, et al., 2006; Mc­Graw, et al., 2011)

Male and fe­male sooty mangabeys have dif­fer­ent di­etary pat­terns. Males tend to eat more hard nuts, seeds, and in­ver­te­brates, while fe­males typ­i­cally con­sume softer seeds and fruits. Males tend to use more in­ci­sions and post-ca­nine crush­ing. Adults and non-adults also dif­fer in feed­ing pat­terns, with adults eat­ing more fungi and soft seeds, and non-adults eat­ing more S. gabo­nen­sis seeds (Mc­Graw, Vick, and Daegling 2011). (Mc­Graw, et al., 2011)

• Primary Diet
• herbivore
  • granivore

• Animal Foods
• insects
• terrestrial non-insect arthropods
• terrestrial worms

• Plant Foods
• leaves
• roots and tubers
• wood, bark, or stems
• seeds, grains, and nuts
• fruit

• Other Foods
• fungus

Pre­da­tion

Sooty mangabey preda­tors in­clude crowned hawk ea­gles, leop­ards, hu­mans, and chim­panzees. Sooty mangabeys are noted for their sen­tinel abil­ity to spot preda­tors on the ground (Mc­Graw and Bshary 2002). Ga­boon vipers also elicit alarm calls, al­though a death from one has yet to be ob­served in the wild (Range and Fis­cher 2004). In re­sponse to perched African crowned hawk ea­gles, sooty mangabeys pro­duce an alarm call, and if one is ob­served fly­ing, the sooty mangabeys de­scend trees onto the ground. When leop­ards are ob­served, sooty mangabeys as­cend trees and vo­cal­ize alarm calls (Range and Fis­cher 2004). (Mc­Graw and Bshary, 2002; Range and Fis­cher, 2004)

• Known Predators

  • chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes)
  • leopards (Panthera pardus)
  • crowned hawk eagles (Stephanoaetus coronatus)
  • humans (Homo sapiens)
  • gaboon vipers (Bitis gabonica)

Ecosys­tem Roles

Sooty mangabeys fol­low ar­bo­real mon­keys to feed on their dropped fruit. They also act as seed dis­persers since their diet in­cludes seeds (Rowe 1996). (Rowe, 1996)

Sooty mangabeys have been ob­served in the wild as par­tic­i­pants in mixed pri­mate species groups in the Tai Na­tional Park along with west­ern red colobuses (Pil­io­colobus ba­dius) and Diana mon­keys (Cer­co­p­ithe­cus diana). These in­ter-species groups en­sure bet­ter pro­tec­tion against preda­tors, and usu­ally in­volve mon­keys with dif­fer­ent di­etary needs to elim­i­nate food com­pe­ti­tion (Mac­don­ald 2001). These in­ter-species groups allow ar­bo­real mon­keys to come closer to the ground and ex­tend their niche when sooty mangabeys are nearby, due to a per­ceived re­duced threat of ter­res­trial preda­tors. The sooty mangabey acts as a sen­tinel for ground preda­tors, and its alarm call helps warn the less ob­ser­vant ar­bo­real species of preda­tors (Mc­Graw and Bshary 2002). (Mac­don­ald, 2001; Mc­Graw and Bshary, 2002)

A necro­p­osy of a ju­ve­nile fe­male sooty mangabey in­di­cated the pres­ence of lung worms of the Metas­trongyl­i­dae fam­ily, the lar­val form of Poro­cephalus armil­la­tus, the pan­cre­atic fluke Bro­de­nia ser­rata, and He­pa­to­cys­tis kochi (Hy­sell et al. 1970). Ab­bre­vi­ata poicilome­tra, a physa­lopterid, can also in­fect this species (Slaugh­ter and Bostrom 1969). (Hy­sell, et al., 1970; Slaugh­ter and Bostrom, 1969)

• Ecosystem Impact
• disperses seeds

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Pos­i­tive

Sooty mangabeys pro­vide a good study pri­mate for evo­lu­tion­ar­ily, be­hav­iorally, eco­log­i­cally, and med­ically re­lated stud­ies. They are stud­ied in the wild at Tai Na­tional Park in south­west­ern Ivory Coast, and in a cap­tive colony at the Yerkes Re­gional Pri­mate Re­search Cen­ter at Emory Uni­ver­sity (Fruteau, Range, and Noe 2010; Gust and Gor­don 1992). An­thro­po­log­i­cal re­search has al­lowed in­fer­ences on human be­hav­ior, such as hard ob­ject feed­ing, due to their rel­a­tively close phy­lo­ge­netic re­la­tion­ship to hu­mans (Daegling et al. 2011). This species is also an in­cred­i­bly im­por­tant med­ical study an­i­mal as it is a nat­ural host of simian im­mun­od­e­fi­ciency virus 2 (SIV-2), giv­ing re­searchers in­sights on HIV-2 in hu­mans. Sooty mangabeys can also con­tract and spread lep­rosy (Hamil­ton et al. 2008; Rid­dick et al. 2010). (Daegling, et al., 2011; Fruteau, et al., 2010; Gust and Gor­don, 1994; Hamil­ton, et al., 2008; Rid­dick, et al., 2010)

Sooty mangabeys are hunted for their meat (Re­fisch and Kone 2005). (Re­fisch and Kone, 2005)

• Positive Impacts
• food
• research and education

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Neg­a­tive

Sooty mangabeys are seen as agri­cul­tural pests since they fre­quently rav­age farms, mostly rice pad­dies, where they can cause ex­ten­sive eco­nomic dam­age (King­don 1997). At­tempts to con­serve this species may hurt in­dus­tri­al­iza­tion in the re­gion, since the habi­tat of this species is com­posed of trees use­ful for tim­ber and fire­wood (Galat and Galat-lu­ong 2006; Oates, Gip­politi, and Groves 2011). (Galat and Galat-Lu­ong, 2006; King­don, 1997; Oates, et al., 2011)

East­ern sooty mangabeys, which are often in­fected with SIV-2, may have ini­tially been the vec­tors for SIV-2 to evolve into HIV-2 in hu­mans (San­ti­ago et al. 2005). (San­ti­ago, et al., 2005)

• Negative Impacts
• injures humans
  • carries human disease
• crop pest

Con­ser­va­tion Sta­tus

While hunt­ing sooty mangabeys is dif­fi­cult be­cause they live in dense, swampy forests, they are eas­ily trapped since they spend the vast ma­jor­ity of their time for­ag­ing on the for­est ground (King­don 1997). Sooty mangabeys are cur­rently being hunted at two times a sus­tain­able rate in the Tai for­est re­gion in Ivory Coast for their meat, which is dec­i­mat­ing their pop­u­la­tion (Re­fisch and Kone 2005). Human ac­tiv­i­ties and land use also threaten the sooty mangabey, as ur­ban­iza­tion has caused de­for­esta­tion in their nat­ural habi­tat (Galat and Galat-lu­ong 2006). Large-scale log­ging has greatly re­duced the range of this species (Nowak 1991). For this rea­son, C. atys is listed as vul­ner­a­ble ac­cord­ing to the IUCN and is in Ap­pen­dix II of the CITES data­base (Oates, Gip­politi, and Groves 2011; UNEP-WCMC 2012). (Galat and Galat-Lu­ong, 2006; King­don, 1997; Nowak, 1991; Oates, et al., 2011; Re­fisch and Kone, 2005; UNEP-WCMC, 2012)

Sooty mangabeys, Cer­co­ce­bus atys atys, are near threat­ened, as their pop­u­la­tion has de­clined 20 to 25% over the past few decades (Oates, Gip­politi, and Groves 2011). This sub­species is pre­sent in two pro­tected areas, Tai Na­tional Park and Sapo Na­tional Park (Oates, Gip­politi, and Groves 2011). (Oates, et al., 2011)

White-naped mangabeys, Cer­co­ce­bus atys lunula­tus, are en­dan­gered, and was one of the 25 most threat­ened pri­mate species (Galat and Galat-Lu­ong 2006). The pop­u­la­tion has de­clined by at least 50% over the past 27 years, largely at­trib­uted to habi­tat de­struc­tion and hunt­ing pres­sure, mostly in Ghana (Oates, Gip­politi, and Groves 2011). The re­cent ad­di­tion of the AGEREF/Co­moe-Ler­aba Re­serve to the Comoe Na­tional park could sub­stan­tially in­crease the like­li­hood of this sub­species’ sur­vival (Galat and Galat-Lu­ong 2006). This park, how­ever, is cur­rently threat­ened by civil con­flict and hunt­ing (Oates, Gip­politi, and Groves 2011). The West African Pri­mate Con­ser­va­tion Ac­tion (WAPCA) has high­lighted white-naped mangabeys as one of two pri­mate species to save in West Africa and hopes to em­ploy hunters of the mon­keys as game war­dens to en­sure its preser­va­tion (Dale 2001). (Dale, 2001; Galat and Galat-Lu­ong, 2006; Oates, et al., 2011)

Cap­tive breed­ing pro­grams in Eu­ro­pean zoos also hope to in­crease pop­u­la­tion num­bers (Oates, Gip­politi, and Groves 2011). (Oates, et al., 2011)

The US Fish & Wildlife Ser­vice (USFWS) re­stric­tions cur­rently make con­tin­ued re­search on cap­tive sooty mangabeys and SIV chal­leng­ing. The Yerkes fa­cil­ity is work­ing with col­lab­o­ra­tors from other in­sti­tu­tions to en­sure the pro­tec­tion of wild sooty mangabeys, while using colony bred an­i­mals to learn more about the basic bi­ol­ogy of this species. These in­sti­tu­tions hope that their ef­forts will en­cour­age the USFWS to ease re­stric­tions on the re­search of the cap­tive colony and SIV (Else et al. 2006). (Else, et al., 2006)

• IUCN Red List

  Endangered

• CITES

  Appendix II

Other Com­ments

Sooty mangabeys are nat­ural hosts of SIV-2, mean­ing they ac­quire the in­fec­tion but never show any symp­toms for it. The cap­tive colony of sooty mangabeys at the Yerkes fa­cil­ity are all in­fected with SIV-2 and have pro­vided an im­por­tant study op­por­tu­nity for HIV re­searchers. SIV-2 is non-path­o­genic in sooty mangabeys (Rid­dick et al. 2010). One pos­si­ble route of ex­po­sure be­tween these mon­keys is through groom­ing, where blood suck­ing par­a­sites are re­moved using the mouth (San­ti­ago et al. 2005). The human genome se­quenc­ing cen­ter at the Bay­lor Col­lege of Med­i­cine is cur­rently se­quenc­ing the genome of sooty mangabeys to un­der­stand their “AIDS re­sis­tance” fac­tors ("Sooty Mangabey" 2011). ("Sooty Mangabey", 2011; Rid­dick, et al., 2010; San­ti­ago, et al., 2005)

Sooty mangabeys are the only pri­mates other than hu­mans known to ac­quire lep­rosy from their own species (Rowe 1996). Lep­rosy in wild sooty mangabeys, and sub­se­quently in the cap­tive Yerkes sooty mangabey colony, even­tu­ally led re­searchers to dis­cover that Rhe­sus mon­keys in­fected with SIV were more sus­cep­ti­ble to also being in­fected with lep­rosy; con­versely this led to the dis­cov­ery that lep­rosy may pre­vent AIDS in­duced mor­tal­ity (Hamil­ton et al. 2008). (Hamil­ton, et al., 2008; Rowe, 1996)

Sooty mangabeys are often con­sid­ered a sub­species of Cer­co­ce­bus torqua­tus as Cer­co­ce­bus torqua­tus atys (Nowak 1991). Cer­co­ce­bus lunula­tus has been pro­posed as a sep­a­rate species rather than its cur­rent sta­tus as a sub­species of Cer­co­ce­bus atys (Smith 2012). (Nowak, 1991; Smith, 2012)

Con­trib­u­tors

Scar­lett Lee (au­thor), Yale Uni­ver­sity, Eric Sar­gis (ed­i­tor), Yale Uni­ver­sity, Rachel Raci­cot (ed­i­tor), Yale Uni­ver­sity, Tanya Dewey (ed­i­tor), Uni­ver­sity of Michi­gan-Ann Arbor.

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