Folly Farm's zoo manager is hand-rearing a rare red ruffed lemur, rejected by its mother. The 'critically endangered' primate is the first of its breed to be born at Folly Farm Folly Farm announced last Thursday the arrival of a male red ruffed lemur which is being hand-reared by zoo manager, Tim Morphew. The lemur, which weighed just four grams above the 85g survival threshold, was born to Folly Farm resident Nell, who unfortunately struggled with her new role as a mother. Tim has now taken on the role of surrogate mother and is hand-feeding the baby lemur every two hours with human infant formula milk throughout the day and night. Tim will continue to feed the baby in this way for the next three months and will begin the process of re-introducing him to his family at around six months. "The baby lemur is now feeding well," enthused Tim. "So well, in fact, he has been named Mikaly, which in his native Madagascan tongue means 'eating'. "It's very tiring having to look after a baby 24/7, as every mother can testify, but it's also hugely rewarding for myself and the zoo staff to be involved in successful breeding." The red ruffed lemur is part of the European Endangered Species Breeding Programme, of which Folly Farm is an active member. Classified as 'critically endangered', it is estimated that there are between just 1,000 and 10,000 of these primates in the wild, compared to 95,000 Western lowland gorilla and over 50,000 Bornean orangutan. Good news for visitors is that another of Folly Farm's red ruffed lemurs has given birth to twins and as their mother, Arena, has taken well to motherhood, they can be seen out on the zoo. When fully grown, Mikaly will weigh between 4.5 and 5 kilos, roughly about 10llb. Mikaly's bed is a hot water bottle wrapped in a fluffy towel and for comfort he snuggles up to a toy red ruffed lemur. Tim explained: "Like a newborn human baby, Mikaly doesn't do much other than sleep and feed, but in a couple of weeks he will become much more playful and we will begin a series of enrichment activities to keep him stimulated. "As a hand-reared lemur, Mikaly is likely to remain friendly, so we hope to use him as an ambassador for the species to educate and entertain Folly Farm's visitors. Having unrelated females on the zoo, we also hope to use him to continue our lemur breeding programme," he continued. Folly Farm is open every day from 10 am until 5.30 pm until September 30. For more information on Folly Farm, its special events and the latest news, please visit http://www.folly">www.folly- farm.co.uk