The Aye-Aye

"In the gloom it came along the branches towards me, its round, hypnotic eyes blazing, its spoon-like ears turning to and fro like radar dishes, its white whiskers twitching and moving like sensors; its black hands, with their thin fingers, the third seeming terribly elongated, tapping delicately on the branches as it moved along."

The aye-aye is the only living representative of its family, Daubentoniidae. It is also known as the Hay-Hay, Ahay and Aiay among the Malagasy (the people of Madagascar). The aye-aye is a primate, much like we are. It was classified as a rodent in the 18th century. It is very similar to the Madagascar lemur but unusual enough to be given its own family. For those of you interested in the scientific terms the aye-aye belongs to the Order Primates, the Suborder Prosimii, the Family Daubentoniidae, the Genus Daubentonia, and the Species madagascariensis.

The aye-aye is between 30 - 40 inches in length from the tip of their nose the end of their long bushy tail, about the size of your average house cat. Aye-ayes have short white hairs along with long white-tipped black hairs. They also have a pale face. They weigh about 7 pounds (2 - 3 kilograms).

The aye-aye is a very adaptable creature. It lives in rain forests, deciduous forest as well as scrub. The aye-aye is found sparsely through eastern, northern and northwest Madagascar. The exact number of aye-ayes is unknown but it is thought to be between 1000 - 2000. Once it was thought that anyone who harmed an aye-aye would die within a year. Today, the aye-aye is thought among Malagasy to be not only vermin, but a bad omen. They are effectively reducing the number of aye-ayes. Habitat destruction is also helping to reduce the number of aye-ayes.

The aye-aye reaches sexual maturity around 2 years of age and mates all year long. The gestation period is about 160 days. The aye-aye will give birth at any time of the year. It will have only one offspring and will not have another for 2 - 3 years. The mother will wean the offspring around 7 months (when in the wild). The aye-aye will live for about 26 years in captivity although it lifespan in the wild is unknown.

The aye-aye has a highly specialized third finger that is long and thin. It uses this extremely long third finger to remove grubs from rotting wood and to find the level of milk in coconuts. It has teeth that continuously grow much like a rodents do. The ears of the aye-aye are also very large.

The aye-aye is nocturnal which means it is active at night. During the night, the aye-aye is very active. They move over very large distances of land and almost never stop to rest. Another unusual thing about the aye-aye is that it is a very large nocturnal animal; most nocturnal animals are about the size of a mouse.

During the day, the aye-aye sleeps in nests made in trees. Depending on what day it is, a different aye-aye sleep in the nest.

The diet of the aye-aye includes grubs, insect larvae, ramy nut interiors, nectar, coconut and fungi. In captivity, the aye-aye will eat sugar, mangoes, bananas and eggs. The aye-aye searches for food by tapping on branches and listening to the reverberations through the wood. Then they crack in the wood and bite through the outer layers of the bark. They then use their long, bony finger to pull out the grubs.

It is believed that the aye-aye is a relatively solitary animal. Eleanor Sterling studied the aye-aye in Madagascar for 2 years. She saw what seemed like aye-ayes moving in pairs. The pair of aye-ayes would feed in trees next to one another. One aye-aye would then call to the other one before it moved to another tree. Then the second aye-aye would follow the first one. It is believed that this behavior showed that the aye-aye sometimes searchers for food together and has a pattern to this searching.

Some social interaction does occur when a male is trying to court a female, since the females are dominant to males. Social interactions also occur when a female is rearing her young.

To help protect the aye-aye, at least 16 reserve areas have been set up throughout Madagascar, although these reserves need to be better protected. A program to compensate farmers for damaged crops from the aye-aye would greatly help aye-aye conservation. There are 6 different captive aye-aye programs in the United States. These include the Duke Primate Center, the Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust and the San Francisco Zoo. Elsewhere, captive breeding programs can be found at the Vincennes Zoo in Paris, the Zoo Ivoloina and Parc Tsimbazaza in Madagascar.

LINKS TO SEE THE AYE-AYE AT:

The Aye-Aye and I by Gerald Durrell

Duke University Primate Center committed to research, education, and conservation of prosimian primates

Send someone a digital postcard of an aye-aye from Duke University

Center for Biodiversity and Conservation

"Until we have the courage to recognize cruelty for what it is--whether its victim is human or animal--we cannot expect things to be much better in this world... We cannot have peace among men whose hearts delight in killing any living creature. By every act that glorifies or even tolerates such moronic delight in killing we set back the progress of humanity."