Philippine Tarsier

The Philippine tarsier is one of the smallest primates, about the size of a human fist. The fur is thin and rough, grey to dark brown, and the long narrow tail is bare except for a tuft at the tip. The eyes are fixed in the skull and are huge: no mammal has a larger eye relative to its body weight, and a flexible neck lets the head turn about 180 degrees. The large, membranous ears move almost constantly. The fingers are very long and the name comes from the elongated ankle bone, the tarsus (Wikipedia, general species account; Handbook of the Mammals of the World).

It is a shy, nocturnal animal that eats mainly insects. A study on Leyte found it leaps for more than half of its movement, forages alone and travels and hunts mostly within two metres of the ground; sleeping sites are low in dense vegetation around fig and other large trees. Females can breed throughout the year and bear one young after about six months of gestation (Handbook of the Mammals of the World, via GBIF species account).

Until 2010 all tarsiers were placed in one genus; the Philippine tarsier now has its own, Carlito, and its three island subspecies are of doubtful validity. Several isolated island populations, including Dinagat and Siargao, may prove to be distinct. On this guide it is a night-walk species on Bohol, Leyte, Samar and Mindanao, and a tarsier sanctuary is run at Corella on Bohol (Wikipedia, citing published sources).