Anthropology Zoo Assignment(BIOANTHROPOLOGY)

Common Name	Orang Utan	Siamang	Gorilla	Ring tailed lemur	Humans
Kingdom	Animalia	Animalia	Animalia	Animalia	Animalia
Phylum	Chordata	Chordata	Chordata	Chordata	Chordata
Class	Mammalia	Mammalia	Mammalia	Mammalia	Mammalia
Order	Primates	Primates	Primates	Primates	Primates
Family	Hominidae	Hylobatidae	Hominidae	Lemuridae	Hominidae
Genus	Pongo	Symphalangus	Gorilla	Lemur	Homo
Species	Pongo Pygmaeus	Symphalangus Syndactilus	Gorilla Gorilla	Lemur Catta	Homo Sapiens
Weather or other environmental conditions	Sunny	Sunny	Cloudy	Partially Sunny	-
Primary Locomotor Patterns	Arboreal quadruped	brachiator	Knuckle walker	leaper	bipedal
Anatomical Features that enable movement	Strong and long radius and humerus	Long radius and flexible shoulder joints	Radius and wrist locked together	Powerful hind limbs and elongated metatarsals	Longer legs than arms for walking
Primary Behavior Patterns	Sitting and relaxing	Moved swiftly and making loud noises	Being cautious and walking around slowly	Energetic and being playful with each other	Walking in a moderate speed
Anatomical Features that enable behavior	Big body size and long arms making it easy to relax	Strong and long arms to move from branches to branches easily	Large body size and strong knuckle	Light body weight and small body size	Strong legs to walk far
Social Interaction	Little social interaction but stayed together	Interact with each other by howling	Stay in groups with little interaction	High Social interaction, playing with each other	Varies each other

WOODLAND PARK ZOO, 19 FEB 2020

In this reflection essay, I would like to discuss 2 specific species that I saw on the zoo, Ring tailed lemur and Gorilla. The discussion is not only mainly related about their differences and similarities, but also their behavior and Social interaction. First of all, the most visible difference among them would be their body size. Gorillas have large and strong body structure, whereas the lemurs have light and weak body type. Secondly, the locomotion is different between the two. While gorilla is considered a Knuckle Walker, the ring-tailed lemur is a leaper, meaning they jump and leap from trees to tress. Furthermore, their primary behavior is also differed. Gorilla tends to move slowly but also cautious due to their large body. On the other hand, with its lightweight body size, Lemurs are usually energetic and move very quick. Moreover, it is not rare to see lemurs to play with each other by leaping around. In addition, while the gorilla depends primarily on their strong wrist and knuckle, ring tailed lemur depends more on their hind limbs to reduce impact. Lastly, the only similarities that I realized was they tend to stay with their groups, even though the gorillas have little to no interaction with each other.

I personally have learned so many things from this assignment. I have now realized that even though two species could be in the same Kingdom, Phylum, Class, and order, they still have a lot of differences. Furthermore, I also believe that every part of the anatomical features of a species has it own reason and purpose. Anatomical features also effect significantly on locomotion pattern. For instance, Gorillas have strong knuckle to walk while the lemurs have powerful hind limb to leap from trees to trees. Locomotion itself has also affected the behavior from the species. For instance, the leaping lemur tends to be energetic and playful, whereas the slow and knuckle walking gorilla usually has low interaction due to their speed and body size. Same thing with humans, our strong legs help us to walk bipedally and interact with each other. However, even though humans have a similar DNA to primates, humans are of course different from other primates. Our body size and anatomical doesn’t really impact our behavior and social interaction. A person with huge body can interact as good as a person with small body structure.