Cottontop Tamarin

Cottontop Tamarin

Canon 20D
Taken at Busch Gardens in Tampa, Florida.

The cotton topped tamarin is strikingly marked with the long back fur dark brown, the fur on the underside pure white and the face black with a collar of rufous fur. “Cotton-topped” refers to the prominent crest of white hair that extends back over the head and from ear to ear. They are considered one of the bare-faced tamarins because of the lack of facial hair. Their lower canine teeth are longer than their incisors, so it seems as if they have small tusks. These monkeys are about the size of a squirrel and weigh 10-18 ounces. The males are only slightly larger than females. A medium cotton-top tamarin weighs 432 gms. Tamarins are among the smallest of the primates. Head body length of this species is 17 cm and tail length is 25 cm. Forelimbs are shorter than the hind limbs.

The cotton-topped tamarin are found from southeastern Costa Rica in Central America to northwestern Colombia, South America. They prefer dense vegetation with lots of vines where insects are numerous, tropical forests, open woodlands, dry tropical, dry thorn forest savanna, scrub and edge forests.

Tamarins main diet consists of insects, ripe fruit, seeds, nectar, and gum from trees that has oozed out. Other foods include some tender vegetation, spiders, small vertebrates, and birds’ eggs. Mice, frogs, birds and lizards are skillfully killed by a quick head bite, a learned behavior.

Life span in captivity has been as high as 25 years whereas life span in the wild is about 13 – 16 years. The population is less than 1000 in the wild and about 1800 in captivity, and is continuing to decline. This species is endangered, having lost three-quarters of its original habitat to deforestation. Clearing of forest habitat by people is the main problem and populations also were depleted by taking them for the pet trade and for scientific research. They are now protected by international law, although they are numerous in captivity, they are still critically endangered in the wild.

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