Don 39;t Feed The Monkeys 2
Fatima Teem
With their beguiling eyes and swift movements, Rhesus Macaques can be commonly spotted swinging from one branch to another in the wild, surrounded by their troop. However, when they are driven out of their natural habitat and put in urban spaces, they are spotted jumping from one building to another, breaking into houses in hunger and exhaustion and becoming victims of vilification by humans. Indian mythology associates the Rhesus Macaque with Hindu God of strength, intelligence and loyalty, Hanuman, yet they find themselves in an increasingly disadvantageous position.
The increasing interaction between humans and monkeys does not bode well, which is why when you see a monkey, kindly refrain from feeding them for all the right reasons. As big an animal lover as you may be, when you feed wild animals, you risk their lives and increase their codependency on humans, diminishing their natural survival instinct. By law, it is a punishable offence to feed a wild animal which is why when you feed a monkey (for any reason whatsoever!), you are directly inviting a hefty fine and risking the life of an animal.
2. By feeding monkeys, you lure them out of their natural habitat into the cities. This directly increases their chances of becoming victims of roadkill by speeding vehicles on roads and highways. Injured monkeys are banished from their troops and most of the times, do not receive proper medical care. They end up with permanent injuries and disabilities, making survival difficult all alone. Dead mothers leave behind orphaned baby monkeys that are barely a few weeks old and are unable to survive on their own. They either end up getting attacked by other animals or falling prey to ruthless accidents.
5. Taking advantage of the Gray Langurs and the Rhesus Macaques age-old rivalry, poachers capture Gray Langurs so they can be used to chase away Rhesus macaques. Since the Langur is protected by the law, it is a punishable offence to use them for any commercial purpose.
6. Once driven out of their natural habitat, monkeys are abused for the entertainment industry as well and you will spot them along the roads, tethered at the end of a two-foot-long rope. They will be seen performing tricks that are unnatural to them, while wearing heavy adornments such as costumes and make-up.
7. The constant interaction between humans and monkeys also increases the risk of disease transmission from one species to another. This, not only, puts humans at a serious risk but also dwindles the population of monkeys in the wild.
I liked feeding monkeys because I thought I was helping people solve problems. Over time, I learned my good intentions were actually handicapping my employees from learning how to solve their own problems, resulting in me being overloaded with work.
I really like your point 3 about facilitating self reliant problem solving. One, it makes people feel empowered to be able to make decisions that have an actual impact on their environment. Two, it highlights the future leaders of a company, the problem solvers.
How can I save the monkeys?
Leave them alone.
Watch them from a distance and respect their natural diet and their natural role in our forests by not feeding them.
Be a responsible visitor to our wild places
Behavioural ecologists compared the health of two groups of wild Barbary macaques in Ifrane National Park in the Atlas Mountains, Morocco; one which spent nearly 50 per cent of their feeding activity eating food provided by humans, and another which rarely encounter tourists and instead relied on natural food resources.
All the females in the non-fed group gave birth, but only a third of females in the groups of Barbary macaques frequently fed by tourists had babies. The monkeys which relied on natural food were observed to only suffer one incident of a stomach upset, while the group which received large amounts of food from tourists had 32 bouts of illness.
The study also found that the effects of feeding by tourists were different depending on sex; while males did not differ between groups in body size and fur quality, the females fed by tourists had larger body sizes, but better coat quality. However, the males suffered more from alopecia and higher stress levels. The findings are published today in the prestigious journal, PLOS ONE.
The study was led by Dr Latitia Marchal as part of her PhD at the University of Roehampton. Dr Marchal, now a post-doctoral fellow in the School of Psychology, University of Lincoln, UK, said: "Barbary macaques are an endangered species and recently tourism was proposed as a potential tool for the conservation of this species in Morocco. But such tourism is currently unregulated, and feeding is a common practice; therefore regulating tourist provisioning may improve animal welfare.
"We assessed the primates' health using a range of non-invasive measures, such as birth and survival rates, the quality of their fur, body size, occurrence of injury and disease, and stress hormone levels in faecal samples. Our findings support previous research which indicates that wildlife tourism, and particularly so-called 'tourist provisioning', has negative impacts on the health of wild animals.
"The study suggests that measures need to be taken to avoid causing more harm to an already endangered species. We are confident that changes will soon be made to regulate wildlife tourism in Morocco, as the Moroccan authorities and the local community have supported our study. Now tourists who encounter wildlife need to be informed that feeding wild animals is harmful, and so they should not do it."
Thanks to folks like Curious George, we're all prone to believe that monkeys' favorite food in the entire world is bananas. I mean, even Ben & Jerry's came up with the name of "Chunky Monkey" for their nutty banana flavor because they assumed monkeys were fans of the fruit, right? But that begs the question: Do monkeys eat bananas? Or is this just a lie we all believe to be fact?
Turns out, monkeys actually do not eat bananas, as we know them, at least. According to Dr. Katharine Milton, a professor of physical anthropology at UC Berkeley who has spent decades studying how primates eat, it's a "total fabrication."
Actually, the edible banana that we all like to mix with peanut butter is a cultivated domestic plant that monkeys would never even encounter in the wild unless they're around human habitations where bananas have been planted.
Apparently, bananas are like a highly-coveted treat for our monkey friends, similar to kids craving a slice of chocolate cake (aka my sister). Monkeys do actually eat fruits similar to the bananas we know and love, but they're quite different than the grocery store-kind built for humans to consume. Wild bananas contain a lot of hard seeds and little fruit one could actually eat.
Unfortunately, bananas from the local Trader Joe's are just too sweet for primates. Some zoos have even banned feeding monkeys bananas because they can cause damage to their teeth and lead to diabetes.
Generally, they do eat fruits, like figs, but also seeds, leaves, flowers, insects, and nuts. Gelada monkeys prefer to munch on grass and baboons even eat meat when they catch it such as young antelope, rabbits, and birds like guinea fowl. Personally, I'd prefer bananas.
When given a choice for their diets, monkeys will certainly choose bananas as a snack, but only second to grapes. Lately though, zoos like Paignton Zoo in Devon, U.K. have started to ween monkeys off their banana affinity to instead incorporate more leafy greens and vegetables into their diets. Promoted by the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria, these vegetables are just as nutritious as the fruit monkeys consume in the wild and are much healthier options for their diets.
A digital voyeur simulator where you watch strangers through surveillance cameras. Invade their privacy and witness their most intimate moments, but don`t interact with the subjects - anything could happen if you dare feed the monkeys!
Although guides are rarely eaten sometimes other people are. The most frequent victims of Crocodile attacks in Costa Rica are fishermen and specifically hand net shrimp fishermen who wade the shallows at night.
In the past few years there have been a handful of attacks on tourists and one death when a surfer was attacked off the popular beach at Tamarindo. There has also been an increase of sightings offshore and even on other beaches including Dominical, Esterillos and near Puerto Viejo on the Caribbean side. Normally crocs are not found in the open ocean but in the rainy season sometimes they leave the mouths of the estuaries possibly to seek new territory.
The laws against feeding crocodiles have never been enforced but even if they were there might not be much impact. Although it may be legitimate to claim that feeding accustoms them to humans and makes them unafraid, the more significant problem is the increasing encroachment of development on habitat and the increasing numbers and size of crocs due to protected status.
The eyes were separated by at least a foot which equates to a twelve foot long croc. Judging from the slope of the beach he was probably about striking distance when Sue spotted him and I skedaddled away from the water.
Later when we were watching the sunset from a house high above on the ridge at Ojochal our host said there had been a couple of attacks and a death earlier that year but the fishermen stick to tradition and clean their fish at the shore.
Stories abound of monkeys on the beach stealing backpacks and sitting in the treetop tossing out the contents searching for Doritos. The unfortunate tourists can only look up and hope that the little primates drop the keys to the rental car and maybe their passports before they get bored and go looking for a purse to snatch.
The wildlife is even heading indoors. At the same hotel I left the balcony where I had been bird watching to use the bathroom and when I walked back into my room there was a Capuchin monkey on top of the television reaching across towards the bowl of sugar packets next to the coffee maker.
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