Berenty Reserve is a small private reserve of gallery forest along the Mandrake river, set in the semi-arid spiny forest

Madagascar spiny thickets

The Madagascar spiny thickets is an ecoregion in Madagascar. The vegetation type is found on poor substrates with low, erratic winter rainfall. An estimated 14,000 to is covered with this habitat, all in the southwest of the country...

 ecoregion of the far south of Madagascar

Madagascar

The Republic of Madagascar is an island country located in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern coast of Africa...

. For more than three decades the primatologist Alison Jolly

Alison Jolly

Alison Jolly is a primatologist, known for her studies of lemur biology. She has written several books for both popular and scientific audiences and conducted extensive fieldwork on Lemurs in Madagascar, primarily at the Berenty Reserve, a small private reserve of gallery forest set in the...

 (who started the research at Berenty), researchers and students have visited Berenty to conduct fieldwork on lemur

Lemur

Lemurs are a clade of strepsirrhine primates endemic to the island of Madagascar. They are named after the lemures of Roman mythology due to the ghostly vocalizations, reflective eyes, and the nocturnal habits of some species...

s. The reserve is also a favourite for visitors who want to see some of Madagascar's endemic bird species, which include owls and Coua

Coua

Couas are large, mostly terrestrial birds of the cuckoo family, endemic to the island of Madagascar. Coua derives from koa, the Malagasy name for a cuckoo or coua, which is in turn an onomatopoeic of some species' call notes....

s.

The reserve has accommodation in the forest and a set of forest trails to explore. It attracts the most visitors of any Madagascar nature reserve. It is reached after a two hour drive from Tôlagnaro

Tôlanaro

Tôlanaro or Tolagnaro is a city in Madagascar. It is the capital of Anosy Region and of Tôlanaro District. It has a port of local importance, and a new port has been built at Ehoala...

 on the southeast coast.

List of lemur species found in Berenty Reserve

Viewing time	Species
Daytime	Ring-tailed Lemur Ring-tailed Lemur The ring-tailed lemur is a large strepsirrhine primate and the most recognized lemur due to its long, black and white ringed tail. It belongs to Lemuridae, one of five lemur families. It is the only member of the Lemur genus. Like all lemurs it is endemic to the island of Madagascar...  (Lemur catta) Verreaux's Sifaka Verreaux's Sifaka Verreaux's sifaka , or white sifaka, is a medium sized primate in one of the lemur families, Indriidae. It lives in Madagascar and can be found in a variety of habitats from rainforest to western Madagascar dry deciduous forests and dry and spiny forests...  (Propithecus verreauxi) hybrid Eulemur: E. rufifrons x E. collaris (introduced)
Nighttime	White-footed Sportive Lemur White-footed Sportive Lemur The white-footed sportive lemur , or white-footed weasel lemur, is a species of lemur in the Lepilemuridae family. It is endemic to Madagascar. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical dry shrubland. It is threatened by habitat loss....  (Lepilemur leucopus) Gray Mouse Lemur Gray Mouse Lemur The gray mouse lemur , or lesser mouse lemur, is a small lemur, a type of strepsirrhine primate, found only on the island of Madagascar. Weighing , it is the largest of the mouse lemurs , a group which include the smallest primates in the world...  (Microcebus murinus) Reddish-gray Mouse Lemur Reddish-gray Mouse Lemur The reddish-gray mouse lemur also known as the gray-brown mouse lemur or rufous-gray mouse lemur‎, is found in Western Madagascar in the region around Beza Mahafaly Reserve, north to Lamboharana....  (Microcebus griseorufus)

See also

• List of national parks of Madagascar
• Madagascar spiny thickets
  Madagascar spiny thickets
  The Madagascar spiny thickets is an ecoregion in Madagascar. The vegetation type is found on poor substrates with low, erratic winter rainfall. An estimated 14,000 to is covered with this habitat, all in the southwest of the country...
  
  ecoregion
• Birds of the Indian Ocean Islands, Sinclair and Langrand, 1998.