Geographical distribution: These are found outside Madagascar and specially in India and Sri Lanka. Pliocene to Recent.
Habit and habitat: Loris is solitary, nocturnal and arboreal primate.
Comments:
1. Body is covered with brownish fur with a silver look. Fur is thick and woolly.
2. Body divided into head, trunk, abdomen and tail. Head contains snout, nostril, large eyes and ears.
3. Head small and produced into snout.
4. Eyes are closely placed. They are very distinct and bulging. Orbit is forwardly directed.
5. External ear or pinna is conical.
6. Nostrils in the form of small apertures.
7. Teeth thecodont and heterodont.
8. Tail long but not prehensile.
9. Limbs elongated. Some toes clawed, others with flat nails. Locomotion remarkably slow. It is often found hanging upside down.
10. They seem to be survival of an earlier stock.
Special features: In Lorises traces of very early features remain, including a transverse fold of skin on abdomen of the female, which is considered by some to represent a marsupium. They show some features that recall the higher primates. For example, the tympanic rings are fused to the petrosal bulla. The face in some is shorter and brain rounder than in true lemurs.
Source:
1. Practical Zoology Vertebrates by S.S.Lal. 2. A Manual of Practical Zoology Chordates by Dr. P.S. Verma.
