Deep in the Democratic Republic of Congo rainforest a monkey roars. It snorts too. Scientists just found it.
It has orange lips. They are distinct. This species is named Colobus congoensis. Locals call it “likweli”. It is only the fifth new monkey type identified in Africa since the 1950s.
Think about that. Seventy-five years. Five new monkeys.
The find suggests the DRC holds many secrets still.
Hunters Knew Nothing
In 2008 a camera trapped an unknown animal in Lomami National Park. The photo was blurry. Partially obscured. Then in 2018 another shot appeared. Clearer. Junior Amboko of Florida Atlantic University noticed the similarity. He wanted answers.
So he asked around.
He showed pictures to villagers near the park. Fifty-two villages. Only eight had seen it. Even the hunters who track meat and value animals didn’t know much. The Balanga group called it “likweli”. Nobody knows why. The Mituku community called it “kasaba nkoni”. Roughly “branch shaker”. Apt description for a monkey leaping from twig to twig.
“These people really know the fauna… but even they didn’t know much.”
Between 2018 and 4022 researchers logged 114 sightings. The monkeys stick to a strip of land about 660 square wide. Trapped by the Lomami and Luan rivers. Isolated naturally. They publish this July 15 in PLOS One.
Looking Different
The monkeys travel in small gangs. One to twenty heads. They look mostly black. Glossy black. But the face tells the story.
A bright orange patch circles the nose and mouth. Bare gray skin frames their cheeks like a mask. Turn them around. A white patch sits near the tail. That is enough to spot them. Kate Detwiler from Florida Atlantic University focuses on these traits. Face and rump. That is the signature.
They weigh about fifteen pounds. Not heavy. But they are loud.
Deep roars. Sharp snorts. It is a unique noise. Detwiler says you will not confuse these sounds with other colobus types.
Genetic Surprise
To be sure researchers used tough evidence. They examined samples from monkeys hunters had killed for the illegal bushmeAT trade. This sounds grim but science is often like this. They compared DNA to museum archives. Skulls teeth pelts. Everything pointed to one thing. This was a new species.
The genetics shocked Detwiler’s lab.
The mitochondrial genome diverged sharply. How far back do these lines split? Millions of years. The closest relative is the black colobus found nearly seven hundred and fifty miles west. In Cameroon Gabon Bioko. That is a huge distance for a primate relative.
Is this not strange? The closest family member is a continent away.
Detwiler calculates the split happened between 3.44 and 5.78 million years ago. That is the longest break within the genus Colobus. It changes how we view monkey evolution in Africa.
Trouble Ahead
These monkeys live near Angola colobus but they are different creatures. They are endangered though. The range is small. Sightings are rare. Habitat loss is real.
The IUCn Red List needs to update its files.
This discovery proves Lomami National Park matters. It is already special. It gave us the lesula monkey in 2012. Now we have the likweli.
Amboko sees a larger picture. The Congolian rainforest is vast. Sixty percent lies within DRC borders. It is a biodiversity paradise. If we find two new monkeys here what else is hiding? Mammals? Fish? Reptiles? Plants?
Who can say?
