New Data on the Current Distribution of Barbary Macaque Macaca sylvanus (Mammalia: Cercopithecidae) in Algeria

Abstract

The Barbary macaque, Macaca sylvanus (Linnaeus, 1758), is the only species of non-human primate living in Morocco and Algeria, North Africa. It is classified as Endangered on the IUCN Red List and listed in Appendix I of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES 2018). Algeria is a country with a singularly complex topography, the vegetation falls into three zones which correspond to the three major physical zones: the forested Tell Atlas Mountains, the Highlands, and the Saharan Atlas. The Barbary macaque was only found on the northeastern part of the forested Tell Atlas Mountains a massive area extensively dissected into mountains, plains, and basins. Its population was fragmented to nine small subpopulations in three regions (Chiffa, Grande Kabylie and Petite Kabylie) but disappeared from six localities. The geographical distribution of the three remaining three subpopulation established in 1984 shows that the numbers vary from 3400 to 5100 individuals but these later years, few studies on population dynamics and the distribution of the species have been conducted in Algeria. Here we present the updated data that which show that the monkey tends to move from West to East (probably depending on food availability, or repeated fires) from Chiffa (36°44’9680’’N 2°74’0872’’E) in Chrea national park to Salah Bouchaour locality (36°59’8668’’N-6°85’3913’’E) in the wilaya of Skikda, with an estimated population of individuals varying from 3229 to 3888 in the national parks and from 186 to 200 individuals in the new localities studied. Better monitoring of the populations of this emblematic species and especially the monitoring of its movements is strongly recommended because by occupying new regions they could be victims of attacks from residents, especially since the monkey feeds on their crops and orchards.