The Aye-Aye or finger animal (Daubentonia Madagascariensis) takes a special position under the lemurs of Madagascar: it is nocturnal, has a unique teeth and extremely long fingers-especially the middle finger stands out. With this, the semi -monkey not only pulling maggots out of the wood of trees: they also use the limbs to drill extremely deep in the nose. This is shown by a study by Anne-Claire Fabre from the University of Bern and her team.
The fingers of the aye-ayes occupy 65 percent of the total length of the hand and make up 40 percent of the anterior limb. And you can shove large parts of this finger into your nose, as Fabre and Co have observed and filmed. They then recreated this with museum specimens and placed them in computer tomographs: this also allowed them to reveal in which area of the head the aye-ayes land when they pop.
Almost eight centimeters of their finger push the lemurs into the nasal cavity and thus almost reach the back of their throat - without having to choke or show other body reactions.
When you pull your finger out, lick it.
It is unclear what the purpose of this has: the animals may want to remove mucus, similar to people dried up - or it simply prepares them.
Some studies also indicate that bacteria of the nasal mucosa have positive consequences in the oral cavity, others indicate that this could spread dangerous pathogens.
The team then compared this behavior with other species in which nasal drilling was detected. Not surprisingly, it occurs mainly in animals that can skillfully grasp and handle objects with their fingers. "We have found that this behavior is more likely to occur in animal species that have a high degree of dexterity with their fingers," says the curator Roberto Portela Miguez from the Natural History Museum, who participated in the study. Non-primates may not have the same dexterity to drill in the nose, and so it could be a phenomenon that occurs exclusively in humans and closely related species.
The long middle finger is not only conducive to the Aye-Ayes. In some regions of Madagascar, they are considered a messenger of misfortune: their long finger would pick people who are supposed to die soon. Therefore, many Aye-Ayes are killed immediately when you are seen. In other parts of the island, on the other hand, they are considered lucky charms. Because of the hunting and the strong deforestation, the species is considered endangered.
