Leaping Lemurs Play Shell Game at Indianapolis Zoo

Why did the turtle stop in the road?

It had nothing to do with the chicken... but the lemurs are another story.

It might not have the drama of, say, bear vs. gorilla or Jay vs. Conan, but a lone tortoise recently faced off with a group of lemurs at the Indianapolis Zoo.

"The turtle was blocking the bridge that leads to the lemurs' indoor habitat," photographer Cindy Bendush, who snapped the pictures, told the Rex photo agency. "Within minutes, one of the lemurs strolled about half way out towards the turtle, stopped and turned around."

It seems like the lemur didn't know how to handle the roadblock. So it went back to its fellow lemurs.

"They seemed to be having a debate about how to handle the turtle and whether or not to cross the bridge," she said. "The lemurs certainly did not want to touch the turtle and not one harassed it in the least."

Of course not -- turtles bite, and if anyone knows that it's these lemurs.

So they began walking back out to the turtle and going over their options.

"It was almost as if they were daring each other to make the first jump," Bendush said.

And once a lemur lept, the rest quickly followed... and so they went, back and forth, hopping over the turtle whenever they needed to get from one end of the habitat to the other.

"They were still jumping back and forth when we left," she said.

In case you're wondering, these are ring-tailed lemurs. Yes, the "I like to move it, move it" creatures of the "Madagascar" films.

And while they appear to be as comical in real life as they are in cartoons, there's not a lot of humor in their plight.

The ringtailed lemur population has suffered a 25 percent loss over the past 24 years, largely due to a loss of habitat as well as hunting for their meat and sale as pets. They're now listed as "near threatened" by the IUCN Red List, which says the species' habitat continues to shrink as Madagascar's farmers clear more land for cattle.

Zoos such as the one in Indianapolis are participating in a species survival plan, operating what's described as a "computer dating service" for lemurs in hopes of ensuring that the animals breed.