tag:news.mongabay.com,2005:/xml/living%20fossils1 2012-02-13T20:58:43Z tag:news.mongabay.com,2005:Article/9094 2012-02-13T19:57:00Z 2012-02-13T20:58:43Z <table align="left"><tr><td><img src="http://photos.mongabay.com/j/tarsiersound.40441_web.150.jpg" align="left"/></td></tr></table>The Philippine tarsier (Tarsius syrichta), a 5-inch tall Southeast Asian primate, has long resembled a ventriloquist's doll. It would open its mouth as though chattering away, but researchers heard nothing. Now, a new study in Biology Letters has found out why: the Philippine tarsier communicates ultrasonically, surpassing all other primates, and nearly all terrestrial mammals, in its ability to create sounds in the upper registry. Jeremy Hance tag:news.mongabay.com,2005:Article/8382 2011-09-11T19:34:00Z 2011-09-11T20:10:44Z Although they are little-known, the hutia and solenodon are some of the last surviving mammals of the Caribbean. A hefty rodent, the hutia spends its time grazing in trees like a giant arboreal hamster. While, the solenodon may be one of the world's oddest creatures: a 'living fossil', the solenodon's evolutionary origins goes back all the way to the time of dinosaurs. Jeremy Hance