Animal Diversity Web

Ge­o­graphic Range

Cal­lithrix pyg­maea, known as the pygmy mar­moset, is a New World mon­key species na­tive to Bo­livia, Brazil, Colom­bia, Ecuador, and Peru. Its range stretches across the An­dean foothills of south­ern Colom­bia and south­east­ern Peru, and reaches east­ward through north­ern Bo­livia and into the Ama­zon Basin of Brazil. The taxon is di­vided into two sub­species: Cal­lithrix pyg­maea niveiven­tris and Cal­lithrix pyg­maea pyg­maea. East­ern pygmy mar­mosets, C. p. niveiven­tris, are re­stricted by the Rio Solimões, the Rio Purus, the Rio Madeira, and the Andes. West­ern pygmy mar­mosets (C. p. pyg­maea) are found be­tween the Rio Solimões and Rio Ca­quetá. (Cawthon Lang, 2005; de la Torre and Ry­lands, 2011; Cawthon Lang, 2005; de la Torre and Ry­lands, 2011)

• Biogeographic Regions
• neotropical
  • native

Habi­tat

Pygmy mar­mosets thrive in mul­ti­stratal river-edge forests at lower el­e­va­tions. They typ­i­cally dwell in the ver­ti­cal strata of the un­der­story rather than in the upper lay­ers of the for­est, avoid­ing both the for­est floor and heights greater than 18 m above ground. Pygmy mar­mosets have also been ob­served in­hab­it­ing sec­ondary forests. ("Great Apes & Other Pri­mates: Pygmy Mar­mosets", 2012; Cawthon Lang, 2005; Eisen­berg and Red­ford, 2000; de la Torre and Ry­lands, 2011)

• Habitat Regions
• tropical
• terrestrial

• Terrestrial Biomes
• rainforest

Phys­i­cal De­scrip­tion

Pygmy mar­mosets are the small­est ex­tant mon­keys, with an av­er­age body length of 13 cm. A coat of buff and grey fur is marked by yel­low, green, and/or black tick­ing on the head and back. In­fants ini­tially have grey heads and yel­low coats cov­ered with black tick­ing, but ex­hibit the adult pat­tern within the first month of life. Though pygmy mar­mosets are not con­sid­ered sex­u­ally di­mor­phic, fe­males may be slightly heav­ier than males. Longer hair around the face and neck gives C. pyg­maea the ap­pear­ance of a lion-like mane. Their hindlimbs are longer than their fore­limbs, and their dig­its have claws known as tegu­lae. The hal­luces are an ex­cep­tion, as they pos­sess flat nails known as un­gu­lae. The av­er­age adult tail, typ­i­cally marked with black bands, has a length of ap­prox­i­mately 20 cm. Pygmy mar­moset in­cisors are elon­gated and sharp, a likely adap­ta­tion to their diet of gums and sap. The sim­i­lar east­ern and west­ern sub­species are dif­fi­cult to dif­fer­en­ti­ate, but some­times ex­hibit dis­sim­i­lar ven­tral hair color. ("Great Apes & Other Pri­mates: Pygmy Mar­mosets", 2012; Cawthon Lang, 2005; De Ma­g­a­l­haes and Costa, 2009)

• Other Physical Features
• endothermic
• homoiothermic
• bilateral symmetry

• Sexual Dimorphism
• sexes alike

• Average mass

  124 g

  4.37 oz

• Average mass

  124 g

  4.37 oz

  AnAge

• Average length

  13 cm

  5.12 in

• Average basal metabolic rate

  0.599 W

  AnAge

Re­pro­duc­tion

Groups of C. pyg­maea often con­sist of 2 to 6 in­di­vid­u­als, com­monly an adult male and fe­male with their off­spring. Pygmy mar­mosets are gen­er­ally re­garded as monog­a­mous; dom­i­nant males have even been ob­served ag­gres­sively main­tain­ing ex­clu­sive ac­cess to re­pro­duc­tive fe­males. Polyandry has been ob­served, how­ever, in groups with mul­ti­ple males. Fe­males do not ex­hibit out­ward vis­i­ble signs of ovu­la­tion, but stud­ies of wild pygmy mar­mosets have sug­gested that fe­males may com­mu­ni­cate their re­pro­duc­tive state to males via ol­fac­tory cues and/or be­hav­ior. No cor­re­la­tion has been ob­served in pygmy mar­mosets be­tween num­ber of adult males and num­ber of off­spring. ("Great Apes & Other Pri­mates: Pygmy Mar­mosets", 2012; Con­verse, et al., 1995; Hey­mann and Soini, 1999; Soini, 1987)

• Mating System
• monogamous
• polyandrous

Fe­male pygmy mar­mosets may give birth to 1 to 3 off­spring, but most fre­quently give birth to fra­ter­nal twins. Ap­prox­i­mately 3 weeks after giv­ing birth, fe­males enter a post­par­tum es­trus dur­ing which mat­ing oc­curs. With a ges­ta­tion pe­riod of about 4.5 months, this sys­tem pro­duces on av­er­age a set of twins from the dom­i­nant male and dom­i­nant fe­male every 5 to 6 months. Pygmy mar­mosets have an ex­tremely co­op­er­a­tive sys­tem of in­fant care, and only one dom­i­nant fe­male per group pro­duces off­spring. New­born pygmy mar­mosets weigh ap­prox­i­mately 16 g. After nurs­ing for ap­prox­i­mately 3 months and reach­ing sex­ual ma­tu­rity within a year to a year and a half, they reach their adult weight around age 2. Ju­ve­niles typ­i­cally re­main with their group until two sub­se­quent birth cy­cles have passed. Cal­lithrix pyg­maea is the only cal­litri­chine known to ex­hibit, in a sex­ual con­text, gen­i­tal pre­sent­ing among fe­males and tongue pro­tru­sion and vi­brat­ing among males. ("Great Apes & Other Pri­mates: Pygmy Mar­mosets", 2012; Con­verse, et al., 1995; De Ma­g­a­l­haes and Costa, 2009; Hey­mann and Soini, 1999; Soini, 1987)

• Key Reproductive Features
• iteroparous
• year-round breeding
• gonochoric/gonochoristic/dioecious (sexes separate)
• sexual
• viviparous

• Breeding interval

  Pygmy marmosets breed during the female’s postpartum estrus which occurs approximately 3 weeks after giving birth, producing offspring every 5 to 6 months.

• Breeding season

  Breeding in pygmy marmosets does not appear to be restricted to a season.

• Range number of offspring

  1 to 3

• Average number of offspring

  2

  AnAge

• Average gestation period

  125 days

• Average gestation period

  125 days

  AnAge

• Average weaning age

  91 days

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (female)

  684 days

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (female)
  Sex: female

  684 days

  AnAge

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (male)

  638 days

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (male)
  Sex: male

  638 days

  AnAge

Pygmy mar­mosets, like most cal­litrichines, are well known for shar­ing their parental du­ties. The fa­ther, the sib­lings of the new off­spring, and even un­re­lated male group mem­bers have been ob­served car­ry­ing, groom­ing, and pro­vid­ing food for new­borns. In fact, fol­low­ing the new off­spring’s first 24 hours, the fa­ther and sib­lings be­come more and more re­spon­si­ble for car­ry­ing all of the young as time pro­gresses, per­haps to re­lieve the stress of twins on the mother. In a study ob­serv­ing six groups of cap­tive pygmy mar­mosets, the fa­ther did the vast ma­jor­ity of the car­ry­ing in 5 of the groups within 4 weeks after birth. Ma­ter­nal du­ties were lim­ited to nurs­ing, anogen­i­tal lick­ing, and pro­tec­tive re­trieval in threat­en­ing sit­u­a­tions—new­born pygmy mar­mosets begin gain­ing in­de­pen­dence away from care­tak­ers around three weeks of age, though on av­er­age they are not weaned until 3 months of age. ("Great Apes & Other Pri­mates: Pygmy Mar­mosets", 2012; Wamboldt, et al., 1988)

• Parental Investment
• male parental care
• female parental care
• pre-fertilization
  • provisioning
  • protecting
    • female
• pre-hatching/birth
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • female
• pre-weaning/fledging
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • male
    • female
• pre-independence
  • provisioning
    • male
  • protecting
    • male
    • female

Lifes­pan/Longevity

Data con­cern­ing the longevity of wild pygmy mar­mosets is lim­ited; how­ever, birds of prey, small fe­lids, and climb­ing snakes are com­mon preda­tors. The lym­pho­cytic chori­omenin­gi­tis virus (LCMV), car­ried by the com­mon mouse, has re­sulted in mul­ti­ple deadly out­breaks of cal­litrichid he­pati­tis (CH) among cap­tive pygmy mar­mosets across North Amer­ica since the 1980s. ("Great Apes & Other Pri­mates: Pygmy Mar­mosets", 2012; Cawthon Lang, 2005; De Ma­g­a­l­haes and Costa, 2009; Mon­tali, et al., 1995)

• Range lifespan
  Status: captivity

  18.6 (high) years

• Average lifespan
  Status: wild

  11-12 years

• Average lifespan
  Status: captivity

  18.6 years

  AnAge

Be­hav­ior

Cal­lithrix pyga­maeus has an ar­bo­real and di­ur­nal lifestyle. In­di­vid­u­als are known to groom each other, likely as a form of bond­ing. While such docile and friendly in­ter­ac­tions are com­monly ob­served, pygmy mar­mosets are also very ter­ri­to­r­ial, using scent glands to mark ter­ri­to­ries of up to 100 acres in area. Pygmy mar­mosets choose sleep­ing sites prox­i­mate to their feed­ing source at the time, and all group mem­bers awake and exit shortly after sun­rise. So­cial ac­tiv­i­ties are promi­nent be­tween two feed­ing peaks—one after wak­ing up, and the other in the late af­ter­noon that leads into re­tire­ment to the sleep­ing site. Stud­ies of wild pygmy mar­mosets in Bo­livia sug­gest that they pre­fer cling­ing to ver­ti­cal strata with their sharp claws while feed­ing, whereas quadrupedal­ism ap­pears to be the pre­ferred form of lo­co­mo­tion for travel. ("Great Apes & Other Pri­mates: Pygmy Mar­mosets", 2012; Cawthon Lang, 2005; Jack­son, 2011)

• Key Behaviors
• arboreal
• scansorial
• diurnal
• motile
• sedentary
• territorial
• social

Home Range

Pygmy mar­mosets gen­er­ally ex­hibit a home range of ap­prox­i­mately 0.1 to 1 hectares. (de la Torre and Snow­don, 2002)

Com­mu­ni­ca­tion and Per­cep­tion

Pygmy mar­mosets com­mu­ni­cate via vi­sual cues, scents, and vo­cal­iza­tions. White mark­ings on the cheeks and a ver­ti­cal stripe on the nose likely fa­cil­i­tate vi­sual com­mu­ni­ca­tion. Pygmy mar­mosets use scents to mark areas rang­ing from 25 to 100 acres. To the human ear, pygmy mar­moset vo­cal­iza­tions re­sem­ble bird calls, and can even enter the ul­tra­sonic spec­trum. Loud, open mouth trills sig­nal alarm, such as in the case of an en­croach­ing preda­tor. Squeaky, closed mouth trills are used for con­tact calls which allow pygmy mar­mosets to rec­og­nize each other. Soft twit­ter­ing is a sign of sub­mis­sion. Stud­ies on wild mar­mosets have sug­gested that pygmy mar­mosets vo­cal­ize in such a man­ner as to ap­pro­pri­ate the ef­fects of the acoustics of their lo­cal­ity. Fur­ther stud­ies have shown the pygmy mar­mosets even alter their trills when paired with a new mate. ("Great Apes & Other Pri­mates: Pygmy Mar­mosets", 2012; Cawthon Lang, 2005; Snow­don and Elow­son, 1999; de la Torre and Snow­don, 2002)

• Communication Channels
• visual
• acoustic
• chemical

• Other Communication Modes
• scent marks

• Perception Channels
• visual
• tactile
• acoustic
• chemical

Food Habits

Cal­lithrix pyg­maea is pri­mar­ily a gum­ni­vore or ex­uda­ti­vore—it feeds mostly on the gum, sap, resin, and other ex­u­dates from trees. Spe­cial­ized elon­gated lower in­cisors allow in­di­vid­u­als to drill an al­most per­fectly cir­cu­lar hole into trees. Most groups ex­hibit a typ­i­cal feed­ing pat­tern, as it ap­pears that the old­est holes cre­ated by pygmy mar­mosets in any given tree are the low­est. They then move up the tree, cre­at­ing more holes until the tree no longer yields sat­is­fac­tory ex­u­dates. The group then re­lo­cates to a new pri­mary feed­ing source. This species likely re­lies heav­ily on gums due to its small home range, as it would not be able to rely solely on fruit. Ob­ser­va­tion of wild pygmy mar­moset pop­u­la­tions has sug­gested that these ex­uda­ti­vores do not ran­domly choose ex­u­date species for feed­ing, nor do they sim­ply choose the most com­mon ex­u­date species in their home range. In­sects, par­tic­u­larly grasshop­pers, are the most cov­eted source of food fol­low­ing ex­u­dates. Pygmy mar­mosets are also known to con­sume small lizards, some fruit, flow­ers, and spi­ders. ("Great Apes & Other Pri­mates: Pygmy Mar­mosets", 2012; Cawthon Lang, 2005; Yépez, et al., 2005)

• Primary Diet
• carnivore
  • insectivore
• herbivore
  • eats sap or other plant foods

• Animal Foods
• reptiles
• insects
• terrestrial non-insect arthropods

• Plant Foods
• fruit
• nectar
• flowers
• sap or other plant fluids

Pre­da­tion

The yel­low, green, and brown pelage of pygmy mar­mosets pro­vides a means of cam­ou­flage in their for­est habi­tat. Pygmy mar­mosets have also de­vel­oped a means of com­mu­ni­ca­tion to alarm one an­other of po­ten­tial threats. Their small body size, how­ever, makes them po­ten­tial prey for birds of prey, small fe­lids, and climb­ing snakes. (Cawthon Lang, 2005)

• Anti-predator Adaptations
• cryptic

• Known Predators

  • birds of prey (Falconiformes)
  • small felids (Felidae)
  • climbing snakes (Serpentes)

Ecosys­tem Roles

It ap­pears that the largest role these tiny pri­mates play in their ecosys­tem in­volves their pri­mary feed­ing mech­a­nism, so they may im­pact the health of trees that they are feed­ing on. Larger, com­pet­ing cal­litrichines such as sad­dle­back and mus­tached tamarins, which also feed on ex­u­dates, may dis­place groups of smaller pygmy mar­mosets from the tree that their home base is cen­tered around in order to take ad­van­tage of the pre­vi­ously drilled holes. Ex­clud­ing such in­ter­ac­tions, con­tact be­tween C. pyg­maea and other pri­mates is typ­i­cally un­event­ful. Ad­di­tion­ally, ants may in­vade pygmy mar­moset ex­u­date trees, forc­ing re­lo­ca­tion. Pygmy mar­mosets are sus­cep­ti­ble to the par­a­site Tox­o­plasma gondii, which is known to lead to fatal tox­o­plas­mo­sis in cap­tive groups. (Cawthon Lang, 2005; Dietz, et al., 1997)

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Pos­i­tive

Pygmy mar­mosets have been pop­u­lar as pets, and in­ter­na­tional trade re­sulted in their place­ment in CITES Ap­pen­dix I in the late 1970s. (de la Torre and Ry­lands, 2011)

• Positive Impacts
• pet trade

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Neg­a­tive

There are no known ad­verse ef­fects of C. pyg­maea on hu­mans.

Con­ser­va­tion Sta­tus

Cal­lithrix pyg­maea was in­cluded in CITES Ap­pen­dix I in 1977-1979 as a re­sult of in­ter­na­tional trade, but it is now listed on Ap­pen­dix II. It is a species of least con­cern on the IUCN Red List. The species cur­rently faces no major threats, al­though some local pop­u­la­tions may suf­fer from habi­tat loss. (de la Torre and Ry­lands, 2011)

• IUCN Red List

  Least Concern
  More information

• IUCN Red List

  Least Concern
  More information

• CITES

  Appendix II

Other Com­ments

Cal­lithrix pyg­maea may also be re­ferred to as Ce­buella pyg­maea. Mor­pho­log­i­cal and mol­e­c­u­lar stud­ies have fu­eled con­tin­ued de­bate over whether the pygmy mar­moset rightly be­longs to Cal­lithrix or Ce­buella. (de la Torre and Ry­lands, 2011)

Con­trib­u­tors

Ed­ward Wade (au­thor), Yale Uni­ver­sity, Eric Sar­gis (ed­i­tor), Yale Uni­ver­sity, Rachel Raci­cot (ed­i­tor), Yale Uni­ver­sity, Tanya Dewey (ed­i­tor), Uni­ver­sity of Michi­gan-Ann Arbor.

Ref­er­ences

2012. "Great Apes & Other Pri­mates: Pygmy Mar­mosets" (On-line). Smith­son­ian Na­tional Zo­o­log­i­cal Park. Ac­cessed April 08, 2012 at http://​nationalzoo.​si.​edu/​Animals/​Primates/​Facts/​FactSheets/​PygmyMarmosets/​default.​cfm.​.

Cawthon Lang, K. 2005. "Pri­mate Fact­sheets: Pygmy mar­moset (Cal­lithrix pyg­maea) Tax­on­omy, Mor­phol­ogy, & Ecol­ogy" (On-line). Ac­cessed April 08, 2012 at http://​pin.​primate.​wisc.​edu/​factsheets/​entry/​pygmy_​marmoset.

Con­verse, L., A. Carl­son, T. Ziegler, C. Snow­don. 1995. Com­mu­ni­ca­tion of ovu­la­tory state to mates by fe­male pygmy mar­mosets, Ce­buella pyg­maea. An­i­mal Be­hav­iour, 49(3): 615-621.

De Ma­g­a­l­haes, J., J. Costa. 2009. A data­base of ver­te­brate longevity records and their re­la­tion to other life-his­tory traits. Jour­nal of Evo­lu­tion­ary Bi­ol­ogy, 22(8): 1770-1774.

Dietz, H., P. Hen­rik­sen, V. Bille-Hansen, S. Hen­rik­sen. 1997. Tox­o­plas­mo­sis in a Colony of New World Mon­keys. Vet­eri­nary Par­a­sitol­ogy, 68: 299-304.

Eisen­berg, J., K. Red­ford. 2000. Mam­mals of the Neotrop­ics, Vol­ume 3. Chicago: Uni­ver­sity of Chicago Press.

Hey­mann, E., P. Soini. 1999. Off­spring num­ber in pygmy mar­mosets, Ce­buella pyg­maea, in re­la­tion to group size and the num­ber of adult males. Be­hav­ioral Ecol­ogy and So­cio­bi­ol­ogy, 46(6): 400-404.

Jack­son, C. 2011. The po­si­tional be­hav­ior of pygmy mar­mosets (Ce­buella pyg­maea) in north­west­ern Bo­livia. Pri­mates, 52: 171-178.

Mon­tali, R., B. Con­nolly, D. Arm­strong, C. Scanga, K. Holmes. 1995. Pathol­ogy and im­muno­his­to­chem­istry of cal­litrichid he­pati­tis, an emerg­ing dis­ease of cap­tive New World pri­mates caused by lym­pho­cytic chori­omenin­gi­tis virus. The Amer­i­can Jour­nal of Pathol­ogy, 147(5): 1441-1449.

Snow­don, C., A. Elow­son. 1999. Pygmy Mar­mosets Mod­ify Call Struc­ture When Paired. Ethol­ogy, 105: 893-908.

Soini, P. 1987. So­cio­sex­ual be­hav­ior of a free-rang­ing Ce­buella pyg­maea (Cal­litrichi­dae, platyrrhini) troop dur­ing post­par­tum es­trus of its re­pro­duc­tive fe­male. Amer­i­can Jour­nal of Pri­ma­tol­ogy, 13(3): 223-230.

Wamboldt, M., R. Gel­hard, T. Insel. 1988. Gen­der dif­fer­ences in car­ing for in­fantCe­buella pyg­maea: The role of in­fant age and re­lat­ed­ness. De­vel­op­men­tal Psy­chobi­ol­ogy, 21: 187-202.

Yépez, P., S. de la Torre, C. Snow­don. 2005. In­ter­pop­u­la­tion dif­fer­ences in ex­u­date feed­ing of pygmy mar­mosets in Ecuado­rian Ama­zo­nia. Amer­i­can Jour­nal of Pri­ma­tol­ogy, 66(2): 145-158.

de la Torre, S., A. Ry­lands. 2011. "Ce­buella pyg­maea" (On-line). IUCN Red List of Threat­ened Species. Ac­cessed April 08, 2012 at http://​www.​iucnredlist.​org/​apps/​redlist/​details/​41535/​0.

de la Torre, S., C. Snow­don. 2002. En­vi­ron­men­tal cor­re­lates of vocal com­mu­ni­ca­tion of wild pygmy mar­mosets, Ce­buella pyg­maea. An­i­mal Be­hav­iour, 63(5): 847-856.