Loris is the

common name In biology, a common name of a taxon or organism (also known as a vernacular name, English name, colloquial name, country name, popular name, or farmer's name) is a name that is based on the normal language of everyday life; and is often con ...

for the

strepsirrhine Strepsirrhini or Strepsirhini (; ) is a suborder of primates that includes the lemuriform primates, which consist of the lemurs of Madagascar, galagos ("bushbabies") and pottos from Africa, and the lorises from India and Southeast Asia. Colle ...

mammal A mammal () is a vertebrate animal of the Class (biology), class Mammalia (). Mammals are characterised by the presence of milk-producing mammary glands for feeding their young, a broad neocortex region of the brain, fur or hair, and three ...

s of the subfamily Lorinae (sometimes spelled Lorisinae) in the family

Lorisidae Lorisidae (or sometimes Loridae) is a family of strepsirrhine primates. The lorisids are all slim arboreal animals and comprise the lorises, pottos, and angwantibos. Lorisids live in tropical, central Africa as well as in south and southeast A ...

. ''Loris'' is one genus in this subfamily and includes the

slender loris The slender lorises (''Loris'') are a genus of loris native to India and Sri Lanka. The genus comprises two species, the red slender loris found in Sri Lanka and the gray slender loris from Sri Lanka and India. Slender lorises spend most of the ...

es, ''Nycticebus'' is the genus containing the

slow loris Slow lorises are a group of several species of Nocturnality, nocturnal Strepsirrhini, strepsirrhine primates that make up the genus ''Nycticebus''. Found in Southeast Asia and nearby areas, they range from Bangladesh and Northeast India in the ...

es, and ''Xanthonycticebus'' is the genus name of the

pygmy slow loris The pygmy slow loris (''Xanthonycticebus pygmaeus'') is a species of slow loris found east of the Mekong, Mekong River in Vietnam, Laos, eastern Cambodia, and China. It occurs in a variety of forest habitats, including Tropical and subtropical d ...

Description

Lorises are

nocturnal Nocturnality is a ethology, behavior in some non-human animals characterized by being active during the night and sleeping during the day. The common adjective is "nocturnal", versus diurnality, diurnal meaning the opposite. Nocturnal creatur ...

and

arboreal Arboreal locomotion is the locomotion of animals in trees. In habitats in which trees are present, animals have evolved to move in them. Some animals may scale trees only occasionally (scansorial), but others are exclusively arboreal. The hab ...

. They are found in

tropical The tropics are the regions of Earth surrounding the equator, where the sun may shine directly overhead. This contrasts with the temperate or polar regions of Earth, where the Sun can never be directly overhead. This is because of Earth's ax ...

and woodland forests of India, Sri Lanka, and parts of

southeast Asia Southeast Asia is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, southeastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of China, east of the Indian subcontinent, and northwest of the Mainland Au ...

. Their locomotion is a slow and cautious climbing form of

quadrupedalism Quadrupedalism is a form of locomotion in which animals have four legs that are used to bear weight and move around. An animal or machine that usually maintains a four-legged posture and moves using all four legs is said to be a quadruped (fr ...

. Some lorises are almost entirely

insectivorous A robber fly eating a hoverfly An insectivore is a carnivorous animal or plant which eats insects. An alternative term is entomophage, which can also refer to the human practice of eating insects. The first vertebrate insectivores we ...

, while others also include

fruit In botany, a fruit is the seed-bearing structure in flowering plants (angiosperms) that is formed from the ovary after flowering. Fruits are the means by which angiosperms disseminate their seeds. Edible fruits in particular have long propaga ...

s, gums,

leaves A leaf (: leaves) is a principal appendage of the stem of a vascular plant, usually borne laterally above ground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", while the leaves, stem, ...

, and

slug Slug, or land slug, is a common name for any apparently shell-less Terrestrial mollusc, terrestrial gastropod mollusc. The word ''slug'' is also often used as part of the common name of any gastropod mollusc that has no shell, a very reduced ...

s in their diet. Lorises, like most strepsirrhines, have a special adaptation called a "

toothcomb A toothcomb (also called a tooth comb or dental comb) is a Dentition, dental structure found in some mammals, comprising a group of front teeth arranged in a manner that facilitates grooming, similar to a hair comb. The toothcomb occurs in Lem ...

" in their lower front teeth, which they use for grooming their fur and even injecting their venom. Female lorises practice ''infant parking'', leaving their infants behind in trees or bushes. Before they do this, they bathe their young with

allergen An allergen is an otherwise harmless substance that triggers an allergic reaction in sensitive individuals by stimulating an immune response. In technical terms, an allergen is an antigen that is capable of stimulating a type-I hypersensitivi ...

saliva Saliva (commonly referred as spit or drool) is an extracellular fluid produced and secreted by salivary glands in the mouth. In humans, saliva is around 99% water, plus electrolytes, mucus, white blood cells, epithelial cells (from which ...

that is acquired by licking patches on the insides of their elbows which produce a mild toxin that discourages most

predator Predation is a biological interaction in which one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common List of feeding behaviours, feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation ...

s, though

orangutan Orangutans are great apes native to the rainforests of Indonesia and Malaysia. They are now found only in parts of Borneo and Sumatra, but during the Pleistocene they ranged throughout Southeast Asia and South China. Classified in the genus ...

s occasionally eat lorises.

Taxonomic classification

The family Lorisidae is found within the

infraorder Order () is one of the eight major hierarchical taxonomic ranks in Linnaean taxonomy. It is classified between Family_(biology), family and Class_(biology), class. In biological classification, the order is a taxonomic rank used in the classific ...

Lemuriformes Lemuriformes is the sole extant infraorder of primate that falls under the suborder Strepsirrhini. It includes the lemurs of Madagascar, as well as the galagos and lorisids of Africa and Asia, although a popular alternative taxonomy places the ...

and superfamily

Lorisoidea Lorisoidea is a superfamily of nocturnal primates found throughout Africa and Asia. Members include the galagos and the lorisids. As strepsirrhines, lorisoids are related to the lemurs of Madagascar and are sometimes included in the infraorder ...

, along with the family Galagidae, the

galago Galagos , also known as bush babies or ''nagapies'' (meaning "night monkeys" in Afrikaans), are small nocturnal primates native to continental, sub-Sahara Africa, and make up the family Galagidae (also sometimes called Galagonidae). They are ...

s. This superfamily is a sister taxon of Lemuroidea, the

lemur Lemurs ( ; from Latin ) are Strepsirrhini, wet-nosed primates of the Superfamily (biology), superfamily Lemuroidea ( ), divided into 8 Family (biology), families and consisting of 15 genera and around 100 existing species. They are Endemism, ...

s. Within Lorinae, there are ten species (and several more subspecies) of lorises across three genera: * Family

** Subfamily

Perodicticinae Perodicticinae is a subfamily of the family Lorisidae. It includes five species of African primates as shown under taxonomy below. They have a vestigial tail and index finger. The snout is pointed and the ears and eyes are large. The fur, coat ...

** Subfamily Lorinae *** Genus ''

Loris Loris is the common name for the strepsirrhine mammals of the subfamily Lorinae (sometimes spelled Lorisinae) in the family Lorisidae. ''Loris'' is one genus in this subfamily and includes the slender lorises, ''Nycticebus'' is the genus cont ...

'' **** Gray slender loris, ''Loris lydekkerianus'' ***** Highland slender loris, ''L. lydekkerianus grandis'' ***** Mysore slender loris, ''L. lydekkerianus lydekkerianus'' ***** Malabar slender loris, ''L. lydekkerianus malabaricus'' ***** Northern Ceylonese slender loris, ''L. lydekkerianus nordicus'' **** Red slender loris, ''L. tardigradus'' ***** Dry Zone slender loris, ''L. tardigradus tardigradus'' ***** Horton Plains slender loris, ''L. tardigradus nyctoceboides'' *** Genus ''

Xanthonycticebus The pygmy slow loris (''Xanthonycticebus pygmaeus'') is a species of slow loris found east of the Mekong, Mekong River in Vietnam, Laos, eastern Cambodia, and China. It occurs in a variety of forest habitats, including Tropical and subtropical d ...

'' ****

Pygmy slow loris The pygmy slow loris (''Xanthonycticebus pygmaeus'') is a species of slow loris found east of the Mekong, Mekong River in Vietnam, Laos, eastern Cambodia, and China. It occurs in a variety of forest habitats, including Tropical and subtropical d ...

, ''X. pygmaeus'' *** Genus ''

Nycticebus Slow lorises are a group of several species of nocturnal strepsirrhine primates that make up the genus ''Nycticebus''. Found in Southeast Asia and nearby areas, they range from Bangladesh and Northeast India in the west to the Sulu Archipelago ...

'' **** Bangka slow loris, ''Nycticebus bancanus'' ****

Bengal slow loris The Bengal slow loris (''Nycticebus bengalensis'') or northern slow loris is a Strepsirrhini, strepsirrhine primate and a species of slow loris native to the Indian subcontinent and Indochina. Its geographic range is larger than that of any oth ...

, ''N. bengalensis'' **** Bornean slow loris, ''N. borneanus'' ****

Sunda slow loris The Sunda slow loris (''Nycticebus coucang''), or greater slow loris, is a Strepsirrhini, strepsirrhine primate and a species of slow loris native to Indonesia, West Malaysia, southern Thailand and Singapore. It measures from head to tail and w ...

, ''N. coucang'' **** Javan slow loris, ''N. javanicus'' **** Kayan River slow loris, ''N. kayan'' **** Philippine slow loris, ''N. menagensis'' **** Sumatran slow loris, ''N. hilleri'' **** † ? ''N. linglom'' (fossil,

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first epoch (geology), geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and mea ...

)

References

External links

{{Authority control * Taxa named by John Edward Gray