Scientists have just confirmed the existence of an entirely new monkey species in the Congo rainforest. The monkey, for its part, looks like it would have preferred to stay undiscovered.
Meet Colobus congoensis, now officially the newest primate species on record, confirmed this week in the journal PLOS One by a team of researchers from institutions across the Democratic Republic of Congo and the United States. The Bangala people who share its territory in east-central DRC have long called it “Likweli.” The Mituku had another name—”kasaba nkoni,” meaning branch-shaker—which is frankly a better name than most species get. It’s only the fifth new monkey species identified in Africa in the last 75 years.
The monkey is so unique-looking that the oversight feels almost embarrassing in hindsight. Likweli has sleek black fur, a long drooping tail, and a shock of spiky hair radiating outward from its face like it got some bad news and hasn’t recovered. The face is the real kicker—dark curious eyes, impressive cheekbones, and a pinkish-orange mouth that researchers describe with clinical restraint as “pale markings around the muzzle.” It weighs about 15 pounds and stretches around four feet from nose to tail.
The first photographic evidence was documented in 2008, when conservationists from the Lukuru Wildlife Research Foundation caught a partial glimpse in what would later become Lomami National Park. Then nothing for a decade. A clearer sighting came in November 2018, when researcher Jean Pierre Kapale led a surveillance patrol and photographed a black monkey with distinctive pale facial markings—unlike anything previously documented in the area. Over the next four years, his team and others logged 114 field observations across roughly 1,700 square kilometers, enough to make the case for an entirely new species.
Discovering a Primate Species Is Exceptionally Rare
“Discovering a primate species is exceptionally rare, especially from populations previously unknown to science,” said Julia Arenson, a postdoctoral fellow at Yale’s Department of Anthropology and coauthor of the study, in a statement to Yale News. The genetic evidence added another dimension—C. congolensis is most closely related to Colobus satanas, a species found over 1,200 kilometers away in west-central Africa, with the two having diverged around 4 to 5 million years ago. Its deep roaring calls carry a unique acoustic signature as well, distinct from every other member of its genus.
The discovery also arrived at a precarious moment. Likweli’s range covers only around 650 square miles—roughly two-thirds the size of Luxembourg—and the species faces mounting pressure from habitat loss and hunting. Researchers are recommending it be classified as Endangered on the IUCN Red List. “Some of Earth’s rarest creatures may vanish before the world even knows they exist,” said anthropologist Kate Detwiler of Florida Atlantic University, who co-led the research.
The branch-shaker made it, just barely, into the scientific record.
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