Week 11: Final Conclusions Part 2

In last week’s blog post, I talked about the preliminary data that I had collected on the lemurs’ behavior. This week, I am showing the final data after both rounds of changes had been made to their exhibits.

The first factor I looked at to determine the success of the changes made was the lemurs’ time spent on the ground. For Ally, there was a clear decrease in time spent on the ground, which was what I had initially expected from all the lemurs. As it turns out, this was not the case but not for the reasons you might suspect. Razoky’s lack of change in that regard may seem concerning, but I believe that it has nothing to do with a lack of positive response to the changes. As some food in the exhibit is still on the ground in addition to their water, the lemurs do have to spend a certain percentage of time on the ground no matter what. Razoky had already hit that minimum before the changes had even happened, so it makes sense that there would be no noticeable difference. On initial observation, it does appear that Meva has made significant improvements, but unfortunately, that is not the case. This is revealed by the next set of graphs showing a greater breakdown of where their time is spent.

Left: Before, Right: After

First: Ally, Second: Razoky, Third: Meva (for some reason it cut off the titles on some of the graphs)

By looking at where they spend their time more specifically, Meva has replaced her time on the ground with time in the tunnel connecting their night house to the exhibit. This is not an improvement as remaining in the tunnel actually requires less activity than being on the ground. However given Meva’s age, this is expected and an unfortunate side effect of getting older. With Ally and Razoky, they seemed to embrace the new additions to the exhibit and spread their time relatively evenly. You might be wondering then if Ally’s time in the tunnel is a sign of low activity, but with Ally it is not the case. Ally enjoys lying down and the tunnel is one of the few places that has enough room, so it is more a case of personal preference.

The final factor that I looked at was how the lemurs spent their time. With Ally and Razoky, there was a clear increase in activity. Meva’s results were again expected given her age. Overall, given the huge increase in activity for the other two lemurs, the changes made to the exhibit seemed to make a legitimate difference.

After almost three months, my senior project finally comes to an end. I hope that you all enjoyed following my progress as much I as did working on this project.