{"id":560275,"date":"2026-07-26T11:59:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-26T11:59:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/560275\/"},"modified":"2026-07-26T11:59:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-26T11:59:13","slug":"researchers-identify-new-monkey-species-orange-lipped-likweli-monkey-in-drc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/560275\/","title":{"rendered":"Researchers identify new monkey species, orange-lipped Likweli monkey in DRC"},"content":{"rendered":"

International scientists, including researchers from Florida Atlantic University (FAU) and Yale, have identified a new species of monkey<\/a> with a silky black coat and orange cream skin around its mouth in the rainforest of the Democratic Republic of the Congo<\/a>.<\/p>\n

While the monkey has been seen before, both by locals who call it \u201cLikweli\u201d in one local dialect and \u201cbranch shaker\u201d in another and by conservation field scientists who took a photo in 2008, it was not declared a new species until a paper published July 15 in the journal PLOS One determined they were distinct from other monkeys and named the species Colobus congoenisis.<\/p>\n

Co-author of the paper Junior Amboko chose the name to recognize \u201cthe Congo Basin\u2019s remarkable natural heritage and, we believe, marking the first primate named after the Democratic Republic of Congo<\/a> itself – underscoring both its global importance and local pride,\u201d Amboko said in a statement.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The photo in 2008 was far from enough to study the species, not even containing the whole animal, and the Likweli monkey was not seen again until 2018, when field researcher and co-author of the paper, Jean Pierre Kapale, managed to photograph one, according to Smithsonian.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kapale and his team spent the next 10 months conducting dedicated surveillance patrols and had seven more sightings. More researchers joined in the attempt to discover more about the Likweli, and between 2018 and 2022, researchers recorded 114 field observations of the monkeys.<\/p>\n

\"TwoTwo ‘Likweli’ monkeys of a newly-identified species of Colobus monkey, discovered in Lomami National Park, sit on a tree branch, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, in this undated handout image. (credit: Daniel Rosengren, Frankfurt Zoological Society\/Handout)Researchers describe monkeys as watchful<\/p>\n

The monkey has a \u201cquiet and watchful nature,\u201d Kate Detwiler and Junior Amboko, two other coauthors of the paper, told BBC’s Discover Wildlife.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we encounter a group, the monkeys don\u2019t usually flee as many other primates do. Instead, they climb higher into the canopy and simply watch us. It often feels as though we\u2019re studying each other,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n

Researchers also examined skin, skeleton, and tissue samples from three dead monkeys that had been confiscated from hunters.<\/p>\n

An FAU statement described the monkey as \u201cdraped in glossy black fur with cape-like shoulders, a long sweeping tail and a vivid orange-cream patch around the mouth and nose,\u201d with a \u201cstriking, mask-like appearance unlike any known colobus monkey.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is also smaller than the other species, weighing only about 15 pounds, about as much as a small dog.<\/p>\n

Monkeys provide new insight into monkey evolution<\/p>\n

While genetic studies proved that the Likweli monkey was part of the genus Colobus, they also provided new insights into African primate evolution<\/a>, according to Kate Detwiler, Ph.D., co-author and associate professor at FAU.<\/p>\n

\u201cIts closest known relative is Colobus satanas, found more than 1,200 kilometers away in west-central Africa. Yet our genetic evidence shows the two species diverged roughly 4 to 5 million years ago, marking one of the oldest known evolutionary splits within the Colobus lineage,\u201d Detwiler said.<\/p>\n

The Environment and Climate Change portal is produced in cooperation with the Goldman Sonnenfeldt School of Sustainability and Climate Change at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. The Jerusalem Post maintains all editorial decisions related to the content.<\/p>\n

\"Ben-Gurion<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"International scientists, including researchers from Florida Atlantic University (FAU) and Yale, have identified a new species of monkey…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":560276,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[1914,242,85,46,70029,141,23953,386],"class_list":["post-560275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-democratic-republic-of-the-congo","tag-environment","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-monkey","tag-science","tag-scientific-research","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/560275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=560275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/560275\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/560276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=560275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=560275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=560275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}