We, in the LHF compound, have been recently joined by a new friend. I am not talking about our new Maasai buddy Kadeghe, who has started to teach us Swahili. Habari za leo?
No, this friend is much more exciting… The near accomplishment of a very old dream. The more responsible/animal rights minded of you should stop reading now - we don’t want no trouble with no hippy tree huggers.
We have a monkey in the compound. What we had supposed to be a permanently peripatetic and vagrant monkey has turned into a good friend. How did this take place? Well…
Having seen a monkey in the trees, and bearing in mind that it is highly irresponsible to feed wild animals we went and got some bananas – which it turns out monkeys do really like. This was in the hope that it would stay.
The appearance of the monkey did spark a sharp argument. Having almost immediately disregarded the identification of the locals (Colobus – pfft), Ed identified it as a Sykes monkey – subsequently issuing a swift denial when Sykes didn’t appear in the index to the book of African mammals. Sadly, the monkey disappeared after a day, but was soon back for more grub and who are we to disoblige? Especially when it is such a gentle monkey!
Now, it is a regular fixture, and having been thoroughly corrupted will take food out of ones hand.
The Abwehr thinks it ist ein pSykes' Monkey (Cercopithecus albogularis), also known as the White-throated Monkey or Samango monkey, which has been considered conspecific with the Blue Monkey (which in turn has included the Golden and Silver Monkey), but has a large white patch on the throat and upper chest und ein grizzled (not blackish) cap
ReplyDeleteYou are indeed right, but you missed all the refences. Go back and try again...
ReplyDeleteBut seriously, the speed at which this monkey has become tame is scary. It shall be stones next week...