(lemur vocalizing)
(dramatic music)
- [Narrator] These are the ring-tailed lemurs of Berenty.
- Hi, welcome! My name is Jolene.
I'm a production and social media coordinator
here at Love Nature.
Today I'm going to watch a fascinating story
of lemur island with you guys,
and we're gonna talk about all things lemurs.
I'm also very interested to hear from you guys
since you'll be watching with me.
If you have any question or interesting observation
that pop up, please feel free to comment below.
All right, let's jump in!
- [Narrator] In a fragment of forest in southern Madagascar,
two troops of ring-tailed lemurs
are locked in a rivalry over land.
(lemurs vocalizing)
The disciplined ruins gang,
and the laid-back museum gang.
Their feud over territory and resources
has reached a stalemate.
As the punishing dry season shrinks the food supply--
- Aww, poor baby, it's so hungry it's eating the sand!
- [Narrator] The birth of new infants raises the stakes.
Invaders now threaten the fragile peace.
(lemurs vocalizing angrily)
The cold war is heating up,
and personal grudges are boiling over
with bitter consequences.
- I love how all the lemur moms just fight
with their babies on their backs.
The babies just like, try so hard
to grab onto mom's neck for dear life.
And just look at those death glares from those lemur moms.
They make it clear, don't mess with mama.
And can you believe those babies clinging onto mom's back
for, I think five month, until they can properly walk.
(lemur vocalizing)
(dramatic music)
- [Narrator] These are the ring-tailed lemurs of Berenty.
Four gangs
fighting for territory.
Leaders,
- Whoa, there's a lot of estrogen here,
I gotta tell you that.
I love how these powerful leaders of each gang
are all females and they're all mothers.
There's no kings, there's only queens.
So I guess in lemur's world, queens call the shots.
I think most of the common animals we know like
lions, baboons, or bison,
they're all strong and powerful male rule the pack,
but not in lemur's world.
I bet not only queens, the queen's daughters,
probably granddaughters even,
rank higher than their brothers, uncles, or grandpas.
I guess we're all officially entered girl's world.
- [Narrator] And losers.
- We know that at the bottom of the society,
male lemurs are losers,
but Pam, what did you do, Pam?
What did you do?
You're a female and you're a mother.
What happened to you?
- [Narrator] Their world is shrinking
and their future's at stake.
(upbeat music)
Who will survive the battles ahead?
In one of southern Madagascar's last forests,
a white wall stands,
marking the boundary between two warring tribes.
On one side,
the museum gang,
an easygoing troop of 14. (lemur vocalizing)
led by their inexperienced queen, Kati.
On the other, the ruins gang.
For them, order and discipline are a way of life
under the rule of battle-hardened Crystal.
Between them,
the barren sand of no man's land.
Across the divide, the rivals strut and stare.
(lemurs vocalizing)
It's September, near the end of a long dry season.
Food is getting scarce.
Tension is rising.
But neither troop wants to risk a fight.
For now
an uneasy truce holds.
- Okay, at this point, if I had to choose
which gang to join, I would probably choose
Crystal's gang over Kati's.
Just because Kati is so laid back, and she's so battle-shy
and she just kind of don't care, doing my own thing.
I doubt it that she's gonna lead us to success.
Even though Crystal is
kinda like a strict tyrant,
life might be a little hard under her control,
but I have faith in her that she can find us
reliable food sources.
What do you guys think?
Which one would you be part of?
You have to think about it like your life depends on it,
because your life depends on it.
- [Narrator] Every tree,
road,
garden, and building has been claimed.
Stepping into the wrong territory,
that's a declaration of war.
(dramatic music)
The best territory in Berenty is the ruins.
(bell ringing)
The remains of an abandoned restaurant
are the home base for the 15-strong ruins gang.
And the headquarters of their leader, Crystal.
She's a tyrant with a temper
who's held power for five years.
But Crystal's also a good mother.
She dotes on her week-old infant, Tommy,
carrying him with her wherever she goes
as she roams her domain.
Mid-morning, the ruins gang assembles around her.
Five adult males, four juveniles,
and five adult females,
each with a week-old infant on board.
If Crystal wants to stay on top,
she has to keep everybody well-fed and safe.
But she also has to keep them in line.
And she didn't become boss by playing nice.
(lemur vocalizing)
She impatiently rounds them up
before leading them out on an important daily mission;
Territory patrol.
(lemurs vocalizing)
The troop members call to stay in contact
as they tag every landmark with a strong smell
from glands on their rear ends.
It sends a stark warning to any other ring-tail;
This is ruins land, keep out.
- Does that mean lemurs from different gangs
smell different on their rear ends?
How do you identify how you and your gang-mates
rear ends smell like?
I mean, do you just go around sniffing trees and,
"Oh, that's Tony from ruins."
"Oh, that's Alex from raiders."
How do you know?
But I know that lemurs have great sense of smell,
so I guess it makes sense for animals
living in such a complex social group
to remember the smell of their king and gang-mates.
(dramatic music)
- [Narrator] That message is meant
for one bunch in particular.
Just 50 yards away, the museum gang
claims its own piece of real estate.
(bell ringing) The museum gang;
Their hangout is the Berenty Museum
and the old water tower in the backyard.
At the helm is Kati, their chilled-out queen.
(upbeat music)
She's only worn the crown for two years and doesn't seem
too concerned with keeping her gang in line.
Her main preoccupation is Maya,
her week-old infant.
Taking a cue from their leader,
the museum gang lemurs aren't so serious about politics.
There's less patrolling or squabbling about status,
and more time spent relaxing.
No one is more relaxed than adult male Morris.
(dramatic music)
In the museum gang hierarchy, Morris is near the bottom
because he's male.
- Well, Morris, look on the bright side;
At least you don't have to raise a kid on your own.
- [Narrator] Ring-tailed lemur society
is strictly matriarchal.
The lowest-ranking female
is still above the highest-ranking male.
And Morris is the lowest of the low.
Like all males, he's supposed to be guarding the territory.
Instead, he's showing off.
He smears his tail with smelly secretions
from his wrist glands, then wafts it at whoever's nearest.
If it's a male, it's known as stink fighting.
If it's a female, it's stink flirting.
But when Morris does it, it's just irritating.
- Stink flirting is such a funny concept to me
because imagine us humans do that.
We all walk into the bar and
just do this, and like, everybody smell our stink.
Well actually, we're actually not so different.
What we do is, we put cologne or perfume on ourself.
On our wrists, behind the ear, and armpits,
to cover up our stink so when we walk into the bar
people don't smell our stink.
Instead they smell the perfume.
Well, I guess we're not so different after all.
- [Narrator] While Kati's reign might seem carefree,
she's under the same pressure as Crystal.
Her museum gang needs food.
It's five months into the dry season.
Rain's at least four more weeks away,
and forest food is in short supply.
For the adult lemurs, it's the toughest time of year.
Mothers have it especially hard;
They must suckle their babies
through these weeks of scarcity.
But by synchronizing their births to the season,
they guarantee their youngsters will wean
just as the rain comes and the trees bear fruit.
- Wait, what?
Synchronizing their birth time
to the season?
Oh my god, that sounds a little weird.
But so brilliant.
We all know climate change has made life harder
for all animals, in this case, lemur moms.
So what they do is they manipulate their birth time
to avoid harsh seasons,
to ensure their baby's survival.
These intelligent creatures really know
how to plan out parenthood.
- [Narrator] Right now,
Kati needs to find food for her museum gang
to ensure the infants' survival.
If she fails, she won't be queen for long.
- Thank you guys for watching with me,
I hope you all enjoyed it.
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And if you enjoyed this commentary video,
please comment below to let me know,
and we'll try to make more content like this in the future.
All right, team Crystal, out!
(lemur vocalizing) (upbeat music)