By Kamanthi Wickramasinghe

Due to deforestation in urban areas, Western purple-faced langurs also known as purple-faced leaf monkey are forced to use rooftops for travel in search of food and resting places, putting them at risk of encounters with dogs, people, and vehicles which can be fatal for the animals, a primatologist and behavioral ecologist said.

A recent post on social media revealed that three purple-faced langurs near Thalangama Lake were shot at, resulting in two animals succumbing to their injuries

Speaking to the Daily Mirror, Smithsonian primatologist and behavioral ecologist Prof. Wolfgang Dittus said that the purple-faced langur is highly arboreal and that they come to the ground only under extreme circumstances when their arboreal pathways have been blocked by the removal of trees.

It is in this backdrop that people in urban settings now perceive Purple-faced langurs as a pest.

The Western purple-faced langur is a species protected under Section 30 of the Flora and Fauna Protection Ordinance (FFPO). It is also a subspecies assessed Internationally by the IUCN as Critically Endangered.