Brown Spider Monkey

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The Brown Spider Monkey, Ateles hybridus, is a species of spider monkey, a type of New World monkey, from South America. It is found in Colombia and Venezuela. Like all spider monkeys, it has very long, spindly limbs and a lengthy prehensile tail which can almost be called a fifth limb. The tail is made up of highly flexible, hairless tips with skin grooves which improves grip on tree branches and is adapted to its strictly arboreal lifestyle. It is currently critically endangered, with few examples of them remaining in the wild.

Analogous structure

The Brown Spider Monkey has many different features. One specific feature it has that is analogous with many other species would be its tail. Species that the Brown Monkey is not related to but yet share the common feature of the tail would be cats, dogs, giraffe, elephant, kangaroos etc. The difference is the Brown Spider Monkey uses the tail as an extra limb as it is very flexible.

Homologous structure

A homologous structure which Brown Monkeys share with other closely related species is their hands. They contain increased thumb mobility which allows primates to manipulate objects (they also contain fingers). This allows them to be able to do activities such as search for fleas on their offspring and siblings, eat and pick at their food etc.

Phylogeny

The species Brown Spider Monkey is very closely related to the woodley monkey but also related to the howler, uakaris sakis, plus plenty more. These all come under the catagorie New World Monkeys (platyrrhines).

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