{"id":16660,"date":"2018-11-07T09:00:31","date_gmt":"2018-11-07T17:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/?p=16660"},"modified":"2018-11-05T12:06:44","modified_gmt":"2018-11-05T20:06:44","slug":"primatologist-who-discovered-mouse-lemur-to-speak-in-victoria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/2018\/11\/07\/primatologist-who-discovered-mouse-lemur-to-speak-in-victoria\/","title":{"rendered":"Primatologist who discovered mouse lemur to speak in Victoria"},"content":{"rendered":"

As a young girl, Mireya Mayor was told it was too dangerous to join the girl scouts. Today, she has claimed the title \u201cthe female Indiana Jones.\u201d Mayor is now a primatologist, correspondent for National Geographic<\/i>, and a mother of six kids.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I decided to head off on my first expedition, I had never left the country,\u201d says Mayor, who is a former NFL cheerleader. \u201cI didn\u2019t even have a passport and had never been camping, so it was all very much trial and error, and a brand new experience.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Before realizing she wanted to be a primatologist, Mayor was focusing on her studies in pre-law. She was required to take a science class, so she chose anthropology. Little did she know her life was about to take a huge detour.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we got to the section on primates, I started learning about how many species were on the verge of extinction, and many that had never been studied before,\u201d she says. \u201cI had always loved animals and it really piqued not just my curiosity but the urge to try and make a difference so these amazing creatures would not go extinct.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Primatologist Mireya Mayor is known as \u201cthe female Indiana Jones” (photo courtesy of National Geographic Wild<\/em>).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

On one of her expeditions, Mayor made a co-discovery with a geneticist, revealing the smallest primate in the world\u2014a mouse lemur.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHim and I were on an expedition together, and, lo and behold, one very rainy morning, there it was,\u201d says Mayor. \u201cWe looked at it and it didn\u2019t look like any of the species that had been described, and certainly not in that area. We decided to collect more genetic samples to prove our suspicion that, in fact, this was a new species to science.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

After going through many adventures, Mayor decided to write a book, Pink Boots and a Machete<\/i>, to share her stories about the science and wonders of nature. Mayor says the book\u2019s title refers to how she was among male explorers and she felt they only saw her as a former NFL cheerleader. She found herself playing down her femininity, which didn\u2019t last long. Instead, she did the opposite by wearing pink boots out in the field.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI thought the book could help inspire people to care more about the planet and hopefully motivate them to follow their dreams as well,\u201d she says. \u201cBecause that\u2019s also a big component of the book\u2014to never give up, and pursue your passion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mayor also lives a life of being a mother to five girls and one boy.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMy first-born went with me to Madagascar when she was just a few months old, and my 10-year-old came with me last summer,\u201d she says. \u201cWhile it would seem once you have kids, you sort of need to stop doing this kind of thing, my motivation for protecting these places and animals has gone up because I want them to be around for them. I want to hopefully inspire them in trying to make the planet a better place for everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mayor hopes that by learning about animals\u2019 biological importance, people will come to appreciate their beauty, intelligence, and compassion, and become motivated to help them. She says that massive crises like the ones happening with jaguars being poached in Suriname and Latin America are issues that people need to be educated on.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn an age where it\u2019s so technology driven, people have sort of lost touch of the things around them,\u201d she says. \u201cI find that to be one of the more rewarding experiences about going out and giving these live lectures, and one of the reasons I\u2019m so excited [about] coming to Victoria is getting people excited, not just about places around the world, but even locally; there\u2019s so much people can do.\u201d<\/p>\n

National Geographic Live\u00a0<\/i>with Mireya Mayor
\n7 pm Tuesday, November 13
\nStudent tickets $32.50 and up, Royal Theatre
\nrmts.bc.ca<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As a young girl, Mireya Mayor was told it was too dangerous to join the girl scouts. Today, she has claimed the title \u201cthe female Indiana Jones.\u201d Mayor is now a primatologist, correspondent for National Geographic, and a mother of six kids.\u00a0 \u201cWhen I decided to head off on my first expedition, I had never […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16661,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,222],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-life","category-november-7-2018"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16660"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16660\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16662,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16660\/revisions\/16662"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16661"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}