Aye-aye Pod

Forests are complicated places, and the species inhabiting forests are dependent on each other in a complex network that we call ecology. Camille Desisto is an ecologist and graduate student at Duke University, and she...

So how smart are lemurs, exactly? How do we even start to figure that out? Meet Ray Vagell, researcher and graduate student from Texas State University who uses SMARTA (a custom-designed touch screen system) to study...

Dr. Andrea Baden and her team have spent a lot of time in the rainforests of eastern Madagascar learning about the social lives of ruffed lemurs. In this episode, she shares why it takes a village to run a ruffed lemur...

This week, we’re chatting with one of our wonderful colleagues Madison Armand about her role as a primate technician (our version of a zookeeper here at the Duke Lemur Center). Madison shares what it takes to be a...

This season we’re leaping into the world of ruffed lemurs – beautiful lemurs with big personalities. In this episode, we discuss the basics of the two species in the Varecia genus – black and white ruffed lemurs and red...

We are wrapping up our sifaka season with Malagasy scientist and conservationist, Mamy Razafitsalama. Mamy’s work in and around Ankarafantsika National Park, which serves as critical habitat for Coquerel’s sifakas in...

Sifakas are beautifully adapted to their environment. Dr. Elaine Guevara studies the source of these adaptations in the genetic code of sifakas (and other primates). Elaine shares how she traveled a complex path to get...

Why don’t you see sifakas in most zoos across the US? How do we plan which sifaka have babies, and where those babies will live? DLC Animal Curator Britt Keith not only manages the sifakas living at the DLC, but also...

Lemurs can really move. Like jumping-dozens-of-feet-from-tree-to-tree move. Like Tigger on a trampoline move. Dr. Gabe Yapuncich is a researcher at Duke University who is fascinated by this feat of lemur feet. He’s...

Ever wondered what a lemur that is adapted to conditions across the world in Madagascar eats in the forests of North Carolina? Dr. Lydia Greene wondered that very same thing, and in this interview, she shares new...

Who better to open this season’s interviews than someone who has spent over a decade caring for Coquerel’s sifakas? Melanie Currie has been a primate technician (AKA animal keeper) at the Duke Lemur Center for 13 years...

Welcome to season three of Aye-aye Pod. We’re finally getting to the lemur that everyone falls in love with when they visit the Duke Lemur Center: sifakas! We’ll introduce you to these bouncy leaf-munchers who had a...

In the final episode of our season on ring-tailed lemurs, Matt and Megan are joined by biological anthropologist, paleontologist, and primatologist Dr. Laurie Godfrey. Laurie’s decades-long career searching for...

If you’ve read Allison Jolly’s quintessential book Lords and Lemurs , or perhaps you’ve watched the Island of the Lemurs IMAX film, then you already know this week’s guest. Matt and Megan had the...

What does it take to care for ring-tailed lemurs a world away from their native Madagascar? Lead Primate Technician Danielle Lynch joins us to discuss the complexities of caring for ring-tailed lemurs at the Duke Lemur...