Two tiny new arrivals have been making a big impression in Dublin Zoo’s South American House, home to the world’s smallest monkey. The pygmy marmoset has large eyes, tiny sharp teeth and claws and when fully grown only measures 14-16 centimetres in length, so it’s easy to see why the furry little South American primates are often known affectionately as gremlins or pocket monkeys.
Male marmoset Mr Big has been living in Dublin Zoo since he arrived from Slovakia in 2007, but when Teeny the female marmoset arrived from Belfast Zoo last year, tiny hearts began to flutter and the couple soon formed a close bond. Love took its course, and only 5 months later zookeeper Susan O’Brien was delighted to discover the proud parents scrambling about their habitat with newly born twin babies clinging to their backs.
Pygmy marmosets usually give birth to twins and, if you thought mum and dad were tiny, the babies are almost impossibly small. "They’re really amazing creatures," said zookeeper O’Brien, "and so tiny. At this stage the babies aren’t much bigger than a human thumb!."
In Marmoset society it’s usually the males who carry the offspring, and with the two babies clinging to Mr Big’s back, the proud pygmy marmoset parents clamber around their habitat together foraging for food.
"They’re omnivores, meaning their food comes from both plants and animals", explains Susan, "and we like to let them forage for insects and grubs here in their habitat in Dublin Zoo the same way they would in the South American rainforest. But you could really call them gumnivores, because their favourite food is the gum they get from the bark of trees. They scrape it with their teeth and nails and then lick up the sweet sap that the tree produces to protect the wound in its bark."
The Zoo TV series have been capturing the whole story on camera from start to finish, and you can watch it unfold this Friday at 7.30 pm on RTÉ 1.
