Bush Baby's
...they’re food by jumping on top of them, bush babies are so fast that they can even catch mice and lizards. In the dry season the bush babies have to rely on the resin of acacia and albizzia trees. These trees are the vital to their survival because of the food they eat. This is the reason they can only live where these trees grow, if they don’t there is a good chance they will starve and die from lack of food and water. The Bush babies dig out the tree gum with their needle claws using them to scrap it out from the holes in the trees. They use their sharp front teeth to tear off the bark on the trees. Bush babies can’t dig deep so they dig in holes that have already been started on by bugs or squirrels. They eat at the thousands of holes that are made by these insects and squirrels digging in about 500-1000 of these every night with their family groups to check for vital food. The African tribes catch the bush babies because the tribes are very interested in the bush baby because of it’s shrill cries in the forest so the tribes leave saucers of palm wine out to drink for the bush babies. Breeding A bush baby begins sexual maturity within eight months after birth; a female bush baby will mate with six males during their mating cycle. The end of the rainy season is the beginning of their mating season, but the rainy season depends on what location they are in. There are only two breeding cycles in a year with two babies being born at a time; the breeding cycle is April to November. The offspring are carried in her stomach for 110-120 days. During the process of mating the male cups his hands and urinates into them. He then walks over to the female who is in heat; the male then will deposit the urine over the female and then he mounts her. While the bush baby is pregnant she will build a nest of twigs and leaves for her and her young babies. The female bush baby is very aggressive before and after she gives birth to her offspring. She attacks any animal that comes near her babies or her nest When the female is ready to give birth to her offspring she will go into hiding away from the male; so he doesn’t kill her young offspring. The newborn babies weigh only about half an ounce about the size of a newborn baby kitten. For the next three days she stays hidden with her newborn babies as they nurse. From the time her offspring are born she will carry them to different nests. She carries her young babies in her mouth by the nape of their neck or by them clinging to their mother’s fur. So they can be safe from danger, from predators that hunt them or if the mother doesn’t feel that her young are safe in that spot anymore. For the first two weeks of the offspring’s life they will cling to their mother’s fur. The mother bush baby will sleep with her young, some times a mated pair will sleep together, but usually the males keep in contact with the females outside of her nest. After two weeks the babies will begin to walk and they will begin to make short jumping leaps. The offspring are weaned from nursing when they’re six weeks old and t they begin to feed themselves by not having to nurse any more they can catch and eat caterpillars and dung beetles just like their family after they turn eight weeks old. When the offspring are four months old they are considered fully-grown. The males leave their mother’s territory after puberty, the female bush babies stay with their mother and her territory, forming a social group, which will consist of closely related females and their offspring. The adult male has a separate territory that overlaps the territories of the female social groups. A dominant male will mate with all of the females in the social groups within his territory. Physical Characteristics The bush baby is one of the smallest primates, about the size of an everyday squirrel. The bush baby is a very alarm-sounding animal that produces loud cries like a human baby, having at least eighteen different calls, they chatter to warn other bush babies of predators or other danger. The reason bush babies have such big eyes, is because their eyes can’t move around in their eye sockets. With this disadvantage their head is always active while they search for food, rotating one hundred and eighty degrees. They also have bat like ears that help them hear and to help them track down a live meal in the dark. They can jump through thorn bushes and the thick growth trees when they are hunting for their food, so they fold they’re fragile ears close to their head to protect them from damage. When Bush babies jump through the trees, they push off with their hind...