Daily activities and feeding behavior of a troop of Macaca fascicularis in Telaga Warna, West Java, Indonesia

Abstract

Long tailed macaque (Macaca fascicularis) has wide ecological plasticity to adapt and interact in various habitats. This ecological plasticity can be reflected on their daily activities and feeding behavior. This study aimed to analyze the daily activities and feeding behavior of Troop B of M. fascicularis in Telaga Warna. This troop is often seen to stay near by the big street and fed by human with provisioned food. We observed and recorded daily activity and feeding behavior of the troop. This study resulted that this troop spent most of their time on moving activity (35.85%), followed by feeding (25.41%) and resting (19.96%). We analyzed their daily activities both on weekdays and weekend plus holiday time to see the different frequencies of activity among those types of days. The macaques showed higher percentage on moving during the weekend (40.97%) compared with weekdays (30.74%). The high percentage of moving was related to their movement to find articifial food from people. The troop also showed high dependency to artificial food, by consuming provisioned food (68%). This study provide new data about a troop of macaques in Telaga Warna which can be used as a basic data for conservation management of long tailed macaque.