Aye-aye (Daubentonia madagascariensis) close-up portrait
Madagascar’s Acoustic Tap Dancer
The Aye-Aye holds the title of the world’s strangest primate. With enormous leathery ears like a bat, constantly growing incisors like a rodent, and bushy black fur, it looks like a bizarre fantasy creature. It is the only primate on Earth that uses percussive tap-foraging to find food beneath solid wood.
Bio Fact: The aye-aye’s middle finger is drastically elongated, skeletal, and attached to a 360-degree ball-and-socket joint, allowing it to bend around tight internal wood tunnels to hook grubs.
The Midnight Percussionist
As it climbs through the dark canopy, the aye-aye rapidly taps tree trunks at up to eight taps per second with its skeletal finger. It swivels its giant ears forward to catch subtle echoes bouncing off hollow chambers. Once it pinpoints a beetle larva burrowed inside, it uses chisel-sharp teeth to rip open the bark and inserts its wire finger to fish out the prize.
