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Summary Gorgeous animal has blond mane, bright red patch on lower back and, for guys, blue rump.
A shy, brightly colored monkey species has been found living in the lush rain forests at the heart of the Democratic Republic of Congo, a find that utterly surprised the researchers who came upon it.When I first saw it, I immediately knew it was something new and different — I just didnt know how significant it was, said John Hart, a veteran Congo researcher who is scientific director for the Lukuru Wildlife Research Foundation, based in Kinshasa.In fact, the find was something of a happy accident. Hart first spied the suspect monkey in 2007 while sifting through photographs brought back from a recently concluded field expedition to a remote region of the central Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly known as Zaire). It was a gorgeous animal, Hart said, with a blond mane and upper chest, and a bright red patch on the lower back. Id never seen that on any animal in the area, so right away I said, Hmmm, he told OurAmazingPlanet.Hart decided to get to the bottom of the mystery. Fast forward through five years of field work, genetic research and anatomical study, and on Wednesday, Hart and a list of collaborators formally introduced to the world a new primate species, dubbed Cercopithecus lomamiensis, and known locally as the lesula. Their work is announced in the online journal PLOS One.It turned out that the little monkey that hung around Georgettes house had been brought to the area by the girls uncle, who had found it on a hunting trip. It wasnt quite a pet, but it became known as Georgettes lesula.The young female primate passed its days running in the yard with the dogs, foraging around the village for food, and growing up into a monkey that belonged to a species nobody recognized.
