Painting Simone
By Safina Center Fellow Alain Rasolo
A painting of Simone, the last greater bamboo lemur (Prolemur simus) in Ranomafana National Park. ©Alain Rasolo
Simone is the last known greater bamboo lemur (Prolemur simus) in Ranomafana National Park’s 41,600 hectares (416 km2) of tropical rainforest. Normally, her family group would have around 30 individuals but after her aging father passed in 2022, she is now the only one left in the park. She mainly feeds off of bamboo shoots, the daily amount of which contains enough cyanide to kill humans.
In the past, there were attempts to relocate individuals living in degraded fragments to Ranomafana’s large and lush rainforest. Unfortunately, they were unsuccessful due to poaching, predation and group dispersal.
Simone’s closest relatives live about 25 km away from her due to habitat destruction and fragmentation. Unlike her, they live in a much more anthropized area in the commune of Tsaratanana and inhabit areas close to rice fields, the crops of which are included in their diet. They are part of a research and conservation program, led by an NGO called Helpsimus, which saw their number triple to 650 individuals in ten years.
For now Simone is the sole individual of her species in the park. But she’s not alone—a group of neighboring golden bamboo lemurs (Hapalemur aureus) adopted her. They fought at times but she also found in them a semblance of a family and a much-needed comfort to cuddle with when it’s cold and rainy.
As an artist I am often driven by a need to express the beauty of Madagascar’s wildlife into paintings. While that remains true when I painted Simone the resilient lemur, it was also an experience colored with sadness and dread that she could be the last of her kin in Ranomafana’s rainforest. Her gaze felt like a call, a stark reminder of how her species is still considered as Critically Endangered, and the need for us to keep the effort of protecting her species from extinction.
Find more information about the organizations working to protect this species at the links below: