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 "Proejcts Featuring "Tarsier Products"

A cuddly looking creature with soft grayish-fur, about 100 milimeters in height with rat-like tail which is longer than the body and bat-like ears. Tarsier is commonly called the "world's smallest monkey" for its physical similarities to that primate. Tarsier (Locally called the maomag). It thrives mostly in secondary dense forests with a diet of crickets, beetles, termites and other insects as well as small animals like lizards, frogs, and even small birds but has almost no natural enemies in the wild. This nocturnal creature has the unique ability of being able to turn its head 180 degrees as well as to jump backward with precision. The tarsier is listed as one of the country's threatened species.  Four species of tarsiers have been classified: The Bornean tarsier (Tarsius bancanus) of Borneo and Sumatra, the Spectral tarsier (Tarsius spectrum) and another dwarf species (Tarsius pumilis) of Sulawesi, and the Philippine tarsier (Tarsius syrichta). The last is endemic to the southern Philippine islands of Bohol, Samar, Leyte and Mindanao, where it thrives mostly in secondary forests and dense patches or thickets of bush, tall grass and bamboo and is variously known to the natives as mamag, mago, magau and magatilok-iok.  

The Philippine tarsier possesses various distinctive characteristics and habits that have made it an object of both scientific research and popular curiosity. On average, it weighs only about 120 grams, and in height measures no more than 100 millimeters, but has a tail considerably longer than its body (189 to 293 millimeters for males). The tail is an integral component of the animals locomotive system, functioning as a kind of fifth limb. The tarsier normally sleeps during the day and wakes up at sundown. Like the tree shrew and the slow loris, it has low basal rate and temperature and an insectivorous diet. It feeds on crickets, beetles, termites and other insects as well as on vertebrates lizards, small fishes, young birds, frogs and mice crabs, ingesting them live. The tarsier locates its prey visually, aided by its heightened sense of hearing, but probably for protection keeps its eyes closed until the of the prey is inside its mouth. Ten (10) to twelve (12) grams of food are thus consumed in a single day. A pregnant female eats double that amount. Tarsier is extremely shy and nervous. Despite its cuddly looks and proportions, it does not like to be touched. Those taken in captivity seldom survive or reach full maturity. Fifty years of attempts to breed the specie under controlled conditions locally and abroad have thus far met very little success. In addition to foreign tourists and collectors have persisted in smuggling them home as pets.  Only several hundred of the species remain in Bohol, where the Philippine tarsier has been most closely identified. After many years of environmental  neglect and ignorance as to its importance for the island's ecosystem and the country's biodiversity, help is finally underway to protect and revive this unique and living treasure.