Independent: [2] A species of now-extinct monkeys made a “remarkable” journey across the Atlantic Ocean from Africa to South America on a natural raft about 34 million years ago, according to a study of fossilised teeth.
[3] It is thought that the prehistoric monkeys (Ucayalipithecus perdita) made a journey of more than 900 miles — when the two continents were much closer together — on floating islands of vegetation that broke off from coastlines.
[4] Professor Erik Seiffert, the lead author of the study, said the trip would have been “extremely difficult” but easier for the small monkeys than it would have been for other animals.
[5] “Very small animals the size of Ucayalipithecus would be at an advantage over larger mammals in
such a situation, because they would have needed less of the food and water that their raft of vegetation could have provided,” Professor Seiffert, from the University of Southern California, told CNN.

In the study, which was published on Thursday in the journal Science, researchers looked at fossilised teeth discovered in the Peruvian Amazon.