Lion-tailed macaque (Macaca silenus).
Image: Another one of my pictures: This photograph was taken by Medium69 (William Crochot) and re, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
At a glance
- IUCN category
- EN · Endangered
- Animal group
- Mammals
- Population trend
- Decreasing
- FaunaHub record reviewed
- Checked against IUCN
- Matches source — IUCN's 2020 global assessment of Macaca silenus says EndangeredChecked 2026-10-09 against IUCN's Red List export published 2026-07-28 · assessment
Conservation overview
The lion-tailed macaque is a striking monkey with a silver-grey mane and a tufted, lion-like tail, found only in India's Western Ghats. It is assessed as Endangered.
It is shy, lives high in the forest canopy, and avoids open ground.
Range & habitat
Rainforests of the Western Ghats in southern India.
Major threats
Threats below are drawn from the authoritative sources listed on this page. For the current, complete assessment, see the IUCN Red List.
- Fragmentation of rainforest
- Roads and human disturbance
- Small, isolated populations
Why it matters
A canopy specialist of one of the world's biodiversity hotspots, the lion-tailed macaque is a flagship for the threatened rainforests of the Western Ghats.
Gallery
Lion-tailed macaque (Macaca silenus).
Image: Another one of my pictures: This photograph was taken by Medium69 (William Crochot) and re, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Sources
Sources for Lion-tailed Macaque
- IUCN Red List — look up Lion-tailed Macaque (authoritative status)
- Animal Diversity Web