Tech

Lemurs are watching 4K TV to prepare for their reintroduction to the wild

Danielle Muoio

2015-12-12T19:17:13Z

4K televisions are known for providing crystal clear images — but did you know they're so good that they can even help animals get a glimpse of their future home?

Port Lympne Reserve, a wildlife park in Kent, United Kingdom, is using Sony 4K TVs to let lemurs and langurs see their natural habitats.

The reserve is streaming images of their natural habitats in Java (for the langurs) and Madagascar (for the lemurs) so the animals can familiarize themselves with their homes before being reintroduced to the wild.

Here's a closer look at the program:

The Port Lympne Reserve introduced Sony BRAVIA 4K TVs into lemur and langur enclosures this week. The images are four times the clarity of HD Tvs.

The idea is to let the langurs and lemurs familiarize themselves with images of their natural habitats prior to their reintroduction into the wild. Langurs will be reintroduced in 2016, but there's no timeline on when the lemurs will head back home.

“While our large enclosures are designed to resemble the animals’ natural habitat as closely as possible, we decided to give our langurs and lemurs an actual peek of areas in the wild that could, potentially, become their new homes," Simon Jeffery, animal manager at the reserve, wrote in a press release.

Port Lympne Reserve is part of the Aspinall Foundation, an animal conservation charity, which is dedicated to protecting rare and wild animals and returning them to protected areas of the wild.

Lemurs are the most threatened mammal group on earth. Of the 101 lemur species, 22 are critically endangered, 48 are endangered, and 20 are vulnerable, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species.

Of the eight langur monkey species, one is endangered, two are vulnerable, and two are near threatened.

This makes conservation efforts that much more important.

Slash-and-burn agricultural techniques and illegal logging in Madagascar have destroyed lemurs' natural habitats, leading to their demise.

And langur monkeys are disappearing due to a mix of habitat loss and being captured by humans to become pets.

But hopefully conservation efforts, such as this one, can help save the beloved lemurs and langurs.

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