Brown Capuchin Monkey

Marla Lise

Brown Capuchin Monkey

Scientific Name: Cebus apella

Capuchin monkeys are one of the most widely used primates in television and movies from all over the world. Remember Ross’s little monkey, Marcel, in the series, Friends and Captain Barbossa’s monkey, Jack, in the Pirates of the Caribbean movie? Those were both species of Capuchin monkeys.

These monkeys are highly intelligent and they’ve shown their ingenuity through their use of tools, using rocks to break open fruit. Unfortunately though, their intelligence has caused them to be used in many experiments in laboratories all around the world.

Brown Capuchin Monkey. Photo by Rhett A. Butler
They are found in most forested areas around Central and South America. And they actually got their name, ‘Capuchin’, from a group of monks known as the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin, who used to wear brown robes with a large hood to cover their heads.

Although this species is not listed on the IUCN Red List of endangered animals, they have a few relatives that are listed as Critically Endangered, such as the Blonde Capuchin, found in Brazil. Everyday, they are losing more and more of their forest habitat as the forest gets cleared to make way for other human uses, which could mean that these brown monkeys could share the same fate as their blonde monkey relatives in no time.


FAQs

  • May I use graphics from mongabay.com for my projects? Yes, you may provided that you don't remove the mongabay label from the images. You may use information from the site for class projects and can cite mongabay as the source.
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