Anecdotic observations of homosexual behaviour among male capuchin monkeys (Sapajus sp.)

Many species were reported engaging in homosexual behaviour among mammals, birds, reptiles and insects. In primates, this behaviour seems to be much more frequent among apes and Old World monkeys than in New World monkeys, where only a few species, like squirrel monkeys, tamarins, marmosets, and capuchins, have been observed engaging in same-sex mounts. In capuchin monkeys, homosexual mounting has been rarely reported, with a few observations in Cebus capucinus and captive Sapajus groups. However, homosexual behaviour between males of the genus Sapajus has never before been reported outside captivity. Our observations are the first made with a semi free-ranging group living in the Tiete Ecological Park (São Paulo, SP, Brazil), during an experimental study. Four events of male-male mounts were observed, involving six individuals — two juveniles and four adults, which do not seem related to hierarchical or age group factors, but could be related to getting access to our experimental apparatus.

Association rules mining applied in the animal movement exploratory analysis

The animal movement analysis determines the animal behavior, which is the basis for understanding the interaction between species and the environment and to guide actions of preservation and conservation. The challenge is how to explore this movement data, getting indications about how the animal behaves over time and space. In this sense, a framework to animal movement exploratory analysis is presented, that combines algorithms for spatiotemporal data analysis and association rules mining, as a first step to answer questions related to animal behavior. We performed the framework’s evaluation in the exploratory analysis of monitored monkeys (Cebus capucinus) in the Panamá.