The featured image depicts maternal tenderness, but Macaca thibetana is also a strikingly aggressive, opportunistic species.
Unsurprisingly, this species’ “near threatened” status is the result of pressure/competition from our own aggressive, opportunistic species!
Tibetan Macaques live in cool subtropical Asian forests at elevations between 800 and 2500 metres above sea level.
All photos are copyright Doug Spencer, taken October 2019 in Labahe Nature Reserve, Sichuan, China.
Macaca thibetana is the largest macaque, and one of Asia’s largest monkeys; females generally have much pinker faces and are much smaller than males.
Typically, an adult female weighs 9 to 13 kilograms, whilst most males weigh 13 to 20 kilos. (the largest recorded individual weighed 30 kilos).
A male in “aggro” mode looks like this:
…then, this:
Discover more about Tibetan macaques, here
No 1 in Pelican Yoga’s Sichuan series (see link beneath this 2nd chapter) will show you the forest in which this post’s monkeys live, and if you click here, blogger Mikhaelicus will show and tell you more about Labahe.
