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Little is known about the mandrill Mandrillus sphinx in the wild. It is an elusive primate and thus difficult to study in its rain-forest habitat in equatorial Africa. As human pressure on its habitat grows it has become increasingly urgent to discover more about the species so that appropriate conservation measures can be planned. The author made a 15-month study of the mandrill in Gabon and discovered that it was not as widely distributed as had been believed. Although it is threatened by hunting pressure and habitat disruption, populations still remain and five reserves protect some of these.

A new species of African forest monkey has been discovered in the lowland tropical rainforest of central Gabon. The previously undescribed monkey is a guenon, a member of the widespread African genus Cercopithecus. and belongs to the Cercopithecus lhoesti superspecies, whose two previously recognized species live in widely separated populations, C. preussi in Cameroon, and C. lhoesti east of the Zaire basin. The new guenon occurs as a small isolated population separated by 600 km and 1600 km, respectively, from the other two. Distinctive external characteristics are its white throat‐ruff, extensive chestnut‐orange saddle, and yellow‐orange tip to the tail. Chromosomal analysis confirms its close phylogenetic affinities with C. preussi and C. Ihoesti, but reveals a unique karyotype. The guenon is described as a new species, Cercopithecus solatus, the sun‐tailed monkey.