Males carry glands on the inner wrist, including a small horny spur, and another patch on the chest near the shoulder. In a stink fight a male draws his tail between the wrists to charge the fur with secretion, raises it in a quivering arc and wafts the scent forward. Bouts can last several minutes, and the loser withdraws without contact.
The striped tail is display equipment rather than a climbing aid. It is not prehensile, and its main functions are visual signalling within a moving group and the scent theatre of male contests.
The social arrangement is worth stating plainly, because it is frequently reversed in popular accounts. In ring-tailed lemurs, as in most lemur species, adult females take priority over adult males in feeding and movement, and a female can displace any male in the group. The male hierarchy operates below that.