The Makassar tarsier (''Tarsius fuscus''), also known

locally In mathematics, a mathematical object is said to satisfy a property locally, if the property is satisfied on some limited, immediate portions of the object (e.g., on some ''sufficiently small'' or ''arbitrarily small'' neighborhoods of points). P ...

as Balao Cengke, is a species of

tarsier Tarsiers ( ) are haplorhine primates of the family Tarsiidae, which is the lone extant family within the infraorder Tarsiiformes. Although the group was prehistorically more globally widespread, all of the existing species are restricted to M ...

. Its range is in

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Pacific oceans. Comprising over List of islands of Indonesia, 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, ...

in the southwestern peninsula of the island of

Sulawesi Sulawesi ( ), also known as Celebes ( ), is an island in Indonesia. One of the four Greater Sunda Islands, and the List of islands by area, world's 11th-largest island, it is situated east of Borneo, west of the Maluku Islands, and south of Min ...

South Sulawesi South Sulawesi () is a Provinces of Indonesia, province in the South Peninsula, Sulawesi, southern peninsula of Sulawesi, Indonesia. The Selayar Islands archipelago to the south of Sulawesi is also part of the province. The capital and largest ci ...

, near

Makassar Makassar ( ), formerly Ujung Pandang ( ), is the capital of the Indonesian Provinces of Indonesia, province of South Sulawesi. It is the largest city in the region of Eastern Indonesia and the country's fifth-largest urban center after Jakarta, ...

. At one point the taxon was downgraded to a junior synonym of the

spectral tarsier Spectral tarsier or Selayar tarsier (''Tarsius tarsier'', also called ''Tarsius spectrum'') is a species of tarsier found on the island of Selayar in Indonesia. It is apparently less specialized than the Philippine tarsier or Horsfield's ta ...

(''T. tarsier''). However, when that species' range was restricted to the population on a single island near Sulawesi, this nomen was resurrected to contain the remainder of that species.

Taxonomic confusion

The taxonomy of the tarsiers from Sulawesi has long been confused. ''T. fuscus'' was initially described by Fischer in 1804. The species was subsequently renamed twice inadvertently, as ''T. fuscomanus'' in 1812 by Geoffroy and as ''T. fischeri'' in 1846 by Burmeister. In 1953

William Charles Osman Hill William Charles Osman Hill FRSE FZS FLS FRAI (13 July 1901 – 25 January 1975) was a British anatomist, primatologist, and a leading authority on primate anatomy during the 20th century. He is best known for his nearly completed eight-volume ...

concluded that the type locality of ''T. spectrum'' was actually Makassar, although it was stated to have come from Ambon. As a result, Hill concluded that ''T. fuscus'' was a junior synonym of ''T. spectrum''. ''T. spectrum'' was later determined to be a junior synonym of ''T. tarsier''. In 2010, Groves restricted ''T. tarsier'' to just those tarsiers on the island of Selayar, making the name ''T. fuscus'' valid once again for the tarsiers near

Description

The Makassar tarsier has generally reddish-brown fur. The hair at the end of the tail is black. It has shorter

skull The skull, or cranium, is typically a bony enclosure around the brain of a vertebrate. In some fish, and amphibians, the skull is of cartilage. The skull is at the head end of the vertebrate. In the human, the skull comprises two prominent ...

and shorter toothrows than most other tarsiers. It also has shorter hind feet than other tarsiers. The tail is shorter relative to body size than most tarsiers, representing 143% to 166% of the body length.

Natural history

All ''Tarsius'' species 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 ...

. Like all ''Tarsius'', ''T. fuscus'' is exclusively

carnivorous A carnivore , or meat-eater (Latin, ''caro'', genitive ''carnis'', meaning meat or "flesh" and ''vorare'' meaning "to devour"), is an animal or plant whose nutrition and energy requirements are met by consumption of animal tissues (mainly mu ...

and

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 ...

, generally capturing prey by leaping on it.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q7686752 Tarsiers Endemic fauna of Indonesia Mammals of Sulawesi Primates of Indonesia Mammals described in 1804 Taxa named by Gotthelf Fischer von Waldheim