Barbary macaque
Macaca sylvanus
Seen by the oracleIts power
The only monkey in North Africa that can cope with snow. And in its family, it’s the males who carry the babies.
Estimated wild population
Fewer than 8,000 adults
Trend
Declining (50% in Algeria)
Range
Morocco / Algeria / Gibraltar (introduced)
Main threat
Habitat fragmentation, hunting, illegal capture of young animals for trade
Meet it
It really exists. It is waiting for you at the Parc Animalier d’Auvergne.
Apart from humans, the Barbary macaque is the only wild primate in mainland Europe. Tough and stocky, it can live as high as 2,600 metres in the cedar forests of Morocco’s Atlas Mountains. It is very social and lives in mixed groups of 10 to 100, where males play an active part in caring for the babies. It makes a rich variety of calls. In Algeria, its numbers have halved in a few decades, and it has disappeared from Tunisia. Its main threats are habitat fragmentation and hunting, made worse by young animals being captured for illegal trade.
What the Park does
Tazekka National Park (Morocco), protection programmes in Gibraltar, genetic studies under way