摘要
This article provides information on the phenomenon of alopecia in Japanese macaques, Macaca fuscata, in various environments and proposes a 3-step scoring system for a quantitative assessment of hair loss. Results suggest that alopecia is commonly observed in Japanese macaques, with 20.5% of individuals showing head alopecia and 4.7% showing back alopecia across eight study groups. Alopecia was more commonly observed in adult females （30.8% individuals showing head alopecia and 15.3% showing back alopecia） than in other age-sex classes. Seasonal variation of back alopecia was noted, in particular, in- dividuals with patchy back hair were more frequently observed in winter than in summer. Seasonal variation was not observed in head hair. The distribution of alopecia was also different among study groups. The wild population generally had better hair con- dition than provisioned populations and captive populations. The present study used a non-invasive alopecia scoring system which can be a useful, rapid and non-invasive tool to monitor animal health and well-being at a population level
基金
Acknowledgments The study was supported by the Hun- dred Scholar Program （090013） of Sun Yat-sen University in China, Fund-In-Aid of JSPS （P09103） and National Natural Science Foundation of China （31000175）. I am grateful to the Choshikei Monkey Park, the Takasakiyama Monkey Park, Jigokudani Monkey Park and Kyoto University for granting permission to carry out this research. I thank Mr Sam Hodgson from Tigress Productions for revising English. I thank all members of the Social Ecology Department and Center for Human Evolution Modeling Research at the Primate Research Institute, Kyoto University who gave helpful comments on the manuscript.
