Proboscis Monkey

When the Dutch first arrived in the East Indies they must have seemed strange creatures to the native inhabitants. One of the most abnormal features of Europeans must have been their comparatively long noses. Now Westerners are commonplace in Borneo but that first fascination lives on in the local nickname for the nasally super-endowed proboscis monkey (Nasalis larvatus): they call it the belanda, which means Dutchman. Young proboscis monkeys have a pointed, forward-growing nose. The females remains like this but the male's gets bigger and bigger until it becomes a pendulous blob hanging down below its mouth. This large, specialized plant eater seems pot-bellied because of its huge, chambered stomachs containing a bacterial soup which digests seeds, leaves and green fruits. It is under extreme threat from habitat destruction by agriculture, settlement, drainage, mining, hunting and shrimp farming. Fewer than 8000 remain.