Animal Diversity Web

Ge­o­graphic Range

Golden mon­keys, Rhino­p­ithe­cus rox­el­lana, live in the moun­tain­ous re­gions of south­west­ern China, along the Ti­betan Plateau. The largest pop­u­la­tions are found in the Wo­long Nat­ural Re­serve in Sichuan Province, but the range of golden mon­keys ex­tends as far south as Gansu province.

(Emanoil, 1994; Kirk­patrick, 1995)

• Biogeographic Regions
• oriental
  • native

Habi­tat

Rhino­p­ithe­cus rox­el­lana is found in tem­per­ate broad leaf and conifer forests at el­e­va­tions rang­ing from 1,600 to 4,000 m above sea level. These mon­keys live in moun­tain forests all year long, but they may mi­grate to slightly lower el­e­va­tions dur­ing the win­ter. Golden mon­keys and other species in the genus Rhino­p­ithe­cus are among the few pri­mates who live in tem­per­ate zones.

(Emanoil, 1994; Kirk­patrick, 1995; Schaller, 1985)

• Habitat Regions
• temperate
• terrestrial

• Terrestrial Biomes
• forest
• mountains

• Range elevation

  1,600 to 4,000 m

  to ft

Phys­i­cal De­scrip­tion

These mon­keys are re­ported to range from 570 mm to 760 mm in head and body length. The tail is be­tween 510 and 720 mm. Coat color is sex­u­ally di­mor­phic. Males and fe­males have a golden belly, fore­head and neck. Males have gray­ish black on the nape, shoul­ders, arms, back, head and tail. In fe­males, these parts are brown­ish black.

The nose is flat­tened, with nos­trils fac­ing for­ward. Two flaps of skin on the widely opened nos­trils form peaks that al­most touch the fore­head.

(Nowak, 1999)

• Other Physical Features
• endothermic
• bilateral symmetry

• Sexual Dimorphism
• male larger

• Range length

  570 to 760 mm

  22.44 to 29.92 in

Re­pro­duc­tion

Within groups, the adult sex ratio of R. rox­el­lana is heav­ily bi­ased to­ward fe­males, with a 5:1 ratio ob­served in some groups. This is con­sis­tent with the polyg­y­nous so­cial or­ganzi­a­tion dis­played by the mon­keys. Dur­ing the mat­ing sea­son, cop­u­la­tion is usu­ally so­licited by the fe­male, who sig­nals her es­trus with pro­cep­tive be­hav­iors, such as es­tab­lish­ing eye con­tact with the male and then run­ning a short dis­tance away. The fe­male also sig­nals readi­ness via pros­tra­tion, which in­volves lying with the head hang­ing down, the fore­arms stretched out or bent, the legs curled up, and the tail an­gling freely. Often, the pros­trat­ing fe­male will point her anogen­i­tal re­gion to­ward the male. The male re­sponds ini­tially with a wide open­ing of his mouth, and if he is in­ter­ested (only about 50 per­cent of the time) he will mount the fe­male. Ejac­u­la­tion oc­curs in only a small per­cent­age of the unions dur­ing the mat­ing sea­son (and it never oc­curs out­side the mat­ing sea­son). For this rea­son, the se­quence of so­lic­i­ta­tion and mount­ing be­tween a male and a fe­male may occur sev­eral times a day dur­ing the three-month mat­ing pe­riod. Due to the scarcity of male ejac­u­late, a fe­male may try to thwart the so­lic­i­ta­tion of an­other fe­male to im­prove her chances for a suc­cess­ful cop­u­la­tion.

• Mating System
• polygynous

Golden mon­keys dis­play mat­ing be­hav­ior through­out the year, but they breed on a sea­sonal basis, with all con­cep­tions tak­ing place within a three-month pe­riod. This pe­riod may start as early as Au­gust or as late as No­vem­ber, de­pend­ing on the re­gion where the mon­keys live.

Once a fe­male be­comes preg­nant, ges­ta­tion lasts about seven months, with births oc­cur­ring be­tween April and Au­gust. Usu­ally, one off­spring is born.

(Kir­ck­patrick 1985, Ren et al. 1995, Schaller 1985)

Data are not avail­able on many of the re­pro­duc­tive pa­ra­me­ters of these mon­keys. How­ever, like-sized pri­mate typ­i­cally breed every year to two years, de­pend­ing upon food avail­abil­ity. Wean­ing usu­ally oc­curs around one year of age. In R. rox­el­lana nurs­ing may ex­tend for a longer pe­riod be­cause of the harsh cli­mate which these an­i­mals oc­cupy. Sex­ual ma­tu­rity is re­ported to be at 4 to 5 years of age for fe­males, and at 7 years for males.

• Key Reproductive Features
• iteroparous
• seasonal breeding
• gonochoric/gonochoristic/dioecious (sexes separate)
• sexual
• viviparous

• Breeding interval

  The interbirth interval of these animals is not known with certainty.

• Breeding season

  Golden monkeys breed between August and November.

• Average number of offspring

  1

• Average gestation period

  7 months

• Range age at sexual or reproductive maturity (female)

  4 to 5 years

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (male)

  7 years

Moth­ers pro­vide most of the care. Males have been ob­served groom­ing in­fants, how­ever. Be­cause of the so­cial struc­ture, which en­sures that one male breeds with a group of sev­eral fe­males, it is likely that this male, con­fi­dent of his pa­ter­nity, as­sists the fe­males in some ways, by pro­tect­ing off­spring as well as by groom­ing them. In most pri­mates, the pe­riod of de­pen­dence is fairly ex­tended, and it is likely that this is the case for R. rox­el­lana.

(Nowak, 1999)

• Parental Investment
• altricial
• pre-fertilization
  • provisioning
  • protecting
    • female
• pre-hatching/birth
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • female
• pre-weaning/fledging
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • male
    • female
• pre-independence
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • male
    • female
• extended period of juvenile learning

Lifes­pan/Longevity

Al­though the lifes­pan of these mon­keys has not been de­scribed, in­di­vid­u­als in the re­lated species, douc lan­gurs (Py­gath­rix nameaus) are re­ported to have lived about 26 years in cap­tiv­ity. (Nowak, 1999)

Be­hav­ior

Golden mon­keys are highly so­cial an­i­mals that dis­play a group be­hav­ior known as fis­sion and fu­sion. This be­hav­ior, un­com­mon in pri­mates, en­tails a sea­sonal for­ma­tion of large groups al­ter­nat­ing with a splin­ter­ing into smaller groups. In the case of R. rox­el­lana, sum­mer groups may con­tain as many as 600 in­di­vid­u­als-- an ex­tra­or­di­nary num­ber for any pri­mate ex­cept hu­mans. How­ever, when cold weather be­gins to set in, the large group breaks up into sub­groups of 60 to 70 in­di­vid­u­als. The sub­groups merge again in the spring. Pos­si­ble fac­tors in this phe­nom­ena in­clude human dis­tur­bance and sea­sonal changes in food avail­abil­ity. Gen­er­ally, sub­groups con­sist of sev­eral sin­gle-male/multi-fe­male fam­ily units, with the total num­ber of in­di­vid­u­als rarely falling below 40.

(Kirk­patrick 1995, Tenaza 1988)

• Key Behaviors
• arboreal
• motile
• social

Home Range

The typ­i­cal home range for the species is 15 to 50 square kilo­me­ters

Com­mu­ni­ca­tion and Per­cep­tion

Golden mon­keys are a highly vocal species, with males and fe­males spe­cial­iz­ing in cer­tain calls. Male vocal be­hav­ior is char­ac­ter­ized by whines (long, wa­ver­ing cries that ac­com­pany groom­ing and eat­ing) and bawls (short, ex­haled cries that are not sit­u­a­tion-spe­cific). Fe­male vocal be­hav­ior typ­i­cally con­sists of chucks ("ee-tcha" sounds that occur in highly stim­u­lat­ing con­texts) and shrills (squeaks and squeals ut­tered in re­sponse to male whines). Both sexes in­dulge in other vo­cal­iza­tions -- grunts, sighs, moans, belches -- but to a much lesser de­gree. An in­ter­est­ing as­pect of golden mon­key vo­cal­iza­tions is the ven­tril­o­quist-like ab­sence of any body or fa­cial move­ment. This is par­tic­u­larly true of whines and shrills, which are often ex­changed by males and fe­males while they are eat­ing. Cap­tive male-fe­male pairs of golden mon­keys often vo­cal­ize in duets, not un­like those ob­served in some species of monog­a­mous birds. In the wild, cho­rus-type vo­cal­iza­tions in­volv­ing groups or sub-groups are com­mon.

(Kirk­patrick 1995, Tenaza 1988)

In ad­di­tion to vo­cal­iza­tions, these mon­keys com­mu­ni­cate with body pos­ture (pre­sent­ing for mat­ing, etc.), and tac­tile com­mu­ni­ca­tion (mount­ing, mat­ing, groom­ing, nurs­ing). Chem­i­cal com­mu­ni­ca­tion has not been re­ported, but may be pre­sent.

• Communication Channels
• visual
• tactile
• acoustic

• Perception Channels
• visual
• tactile
• acoustic
• chemical

Food Habits

Rhino­p­ithe­cus rox­el­lana is a largely ar­bo­real species. The diet varies ac­cord­ing to the sea­son. Dur­ing the warm weather months, R. rox­el­lana feeds pri­mar­ily on leaves from broad-leaf trees and fir and pine nee­dles. Buds, bark, and fruit seeds pro­vide sup­ple­men­tary nu­tri­tion. Dur­ing the win­ter, how­ever, these mon­keys switch to a more lim­ited diet of bark and lichen. Al­though the species feeds largely from ar­bo­real sources, it will de­scend to the ground to feed on grasses and wild onions.

(Emanoil, 1994; Kirk­patrick, 1995; Schaller, 1985)

• Primary Diet
• herbivore
  • folivore
  • lignivore

• Plant Foods
• leaves
• wood, bark, or stems
• seeds, grains, and nuts
• lichens

Pre­da­tion

It is not known whether other an­i­mals prey upon these pri­mates.

Ecosys­tem Roles

To the ex­tent that these an­i­mals are prey for car­ni­vores, they may play a part in local food webs. It is likely that they af­fect plant growth through their her­bivory.

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Pos­i­tive

Golden mon­keys are hunted by hu­mans for fur and meat. The fur is sold for med­i­c­i­nal prepa­ra­tions and the meat is sold for food. The il­le­gal trade of golden mon­key fur makes in­signif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tions to local economies, how­ever, and the mon­key's meat pro­vides lit­tle pro­tein for local diets.

(Kirk­patrick 1995)

• Positive Impacts
• food
• source of medicine or drug

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Neg­a­tive

These an­i­mals have no known neg­a­tive ef­fects on hu­mans.

Con­ser­va­tion Sta­tus

De­ter­min­ing the con­ser­va­tion sta­tus of these an­i­mals is dif­fi­cult be­cause of the nomen­clat­ural prob­lems as­so­ci­ated with them. They are listed by IUCN as vul­ner­a­ble. CITES lists all Rhino­p­ithe­cus species on Ap­pen­dix I. Golden mon­keys are also listed as en­dan­gered by the U.S. en­dan­gered species act.

• IUCN Red List

  Endangered
  More information

• IUCN Red List

  Endangered
  More information

• US Federal List

  Endangered

• CITES

  Appendix I

Other Com­ments

Golden mon­keys are elu­sive pri­mates which have es­caped close, ex­tended study by human sci­en­tists. Most re­search on the species has cen­tered on cap­tive spec­i­mens or on lim­ited ob­ser­va­tions of wild pop­u­la­tions. Much about the be­hav­ior of these pri­mates is yet to be dis­cov­ered, which makes con­ser­va­tion all the more es­sen­tial for this species. Hunt­ing pro­hi­bi­tions are a step in the right di­rec­tion, but more must be done to pre­vent fur­ther frag­men­ta­tion of this­mon­key's habi­tat.

Con­trib­u­tors

Nancy Shef­ferly (ed­i­tor), An­i­mal Di­ver­sity Web.

Peter Munoz (au­thor), Uni­ver­sity of Michi­gan-Ann Arbor.

Ref­er­ences

Emanoil, Mary ed., 1994. En­cy­clo­pe­dia of En­dan­gered Species. Gale En­vi­ron­men­tal Li­brary: De­troit, Michi­gan. xvii, 1230 pp.

Kirk­patrick, R.C., 1995. "The Nat­ural His­tory and Con­ser­va­tion of the Snub-Nosed Mon­keys (Genus Rhino­p­ithe­cus)," Bi­o­log­i­cal Con­ser­va­tion 72: 363-369.

Ren, R., K. Yan, Y. Su, H. Qi, B. Liang, W. Bao, and F.B.M. De­Waal, 1995. "The Re­pro­duc­tive Be­hav­ior of Golden Mon­keys in Cap­tiv­ity (Rhino­p­ithe­cus rox­el­lana)," Pri­mates 36 (1): 135-143.

Schaller, R., 1985. "China's Golden Trea­sure," In­ter­na­tional Wildlife 15 (1): 29-31.

Nowak, R. 1999. Walker's Mam­mals of the World, Sixth Edi­tion. Bal­ti­more and Lon­don: The Johns Hop­kins Uni­ver­sity Press.