Learning about vervet monkey behaviour and conservation
On Saturday we were lucky enough to visit the Vervet monkey foundation where the volunteers were taken on a tour of the sanctuary. They were told about the conservation issues and learned a lot about the behaviour of the vervet monkeys in the troops. They also saw a baby monkey who had been unfortunate to have a small disability of his legs, but had been able to adapt well to his environment and was a very happy monkey. This was helpful for the volunteers to learn about another species of primates that can also have disabilities which would relate back to the children we are working with and how they have managed to adapt to their surroundings without the aid of external help. Many of the children at the school have disabilities such as having no arms or no legs, and have been given no support for this, but like this monkey, are able to adapt their disability into their independent life.
We also learned about cases of rescued monkeys and the impact that this has now had on their lives. Some of them have not been able to be introduced to other monkeys easily due to their inability to recognise themselves as a monkey. This may be due to the fact they were kept as pets and have never seen another monkey before.
There were other cases where the monkeys had had very successful releases and they were able to form stable troops. This taught the volunteers, not just about vervet monkeys but that they could relate this back to the children they are working with, knowing that monkeys who would have been rescued or abused can now live happy and social lives.
The vervet monkey foundation take in abused, orphaned, rescued and injured monkeys. Another of Yebo’s main aims is to support primate conservation so we will take this opportunity to inform you of the great work they are doing and the help they are needing from people around the world.
The Vervet Monkey Foundation, Tzaneen, South Africa, are in urgent need of a new enclosure for this year’s orphaned vervet monkeys to grow up in. Some of the orphans that came in this year have a past of their mum being hit by a car or shot due to unnecessary human vervet conflict.
Sadly, they are struggling for funding for a new enclosure for them which they plan to be the size of 1-2 hectares and will cost around R75,000 ($10,000, 7300 Euros or £6700) which they cannot afford. They desperately need to get them into a natural enclosure where they can climb trees, eat grass and be monkeys.
The monkeys depend on public donations as they are non-profit and non-government funded and have over 500 vervets to look after which alone has astronomical food bills of approximately R2000 (£200) a day! Without help and support, the centre and the orphans simply cannot survive. The Vervet monkey foundation are working hard everyday to get funding to help each monkey in their care. They re in the process of setting up an online contribute regulary food store and the opportunity to adopt a monkey.
The orphans which will go into the enclosure are called: Mamba, Precious, Ash, Forest, Jessie, Chane, Skollie, Phylis. There are also 3 juveniles called Hoppy, Scritch and Mistletoe that will help to look after them with the plans of more monkeys being integrated with them as they come in.
If you would like to help monkeys like Forest, Precious and Jessie reach their new enclosure You can read more about it on their fundraising page on their website:
http://www.vervet.za.org/how_help/fundraising.asp
or e-mail info@vervet.za.org
As well as other primate sanctuaries, Yebo will continue to support the Vervet monkey foundation with awareness through therapeutic primate-based education activties with children in the UK, South Africa and Uganda.