A story or two about Baboons.

We came across this troop of Yellow baboons on our last day in Tsavo West. This Mother and her young baby where casually chilling on one of the park road signs and I was struck by how beautiful they looked together with the baby playing around and its mother sternly watching over it.

I always enjoy watching baboons, but I am often suspicious of them too. They have a well-earned reputation for thievery all over Africa, especially when they regularly come into contact with humans. They are also highly intelligent and can be very cunning.

There are few animals in the world that have the mentally capability to tell a lie and baboons are one of them. The best example of this was made by a naturalist who was studying a group of baboons. The troop had gone into feeding mode and where foraging in a patch of bush. One young male had found a plant that it knew produced a large and edible tuber. It was hard work to get the tuber out and the male had to dig at the soil for some considerable time to get it loose. As he was digging one of the youngsters of the troop wandered over and sat by him to watch. Just as the male managed to get the tuber out the youngster suddenly began to shout using a call that young baboons use when they are being attacked. The mother who was sitting nearby rapidly ran over to investigate and seeing her child next to the male quickly put two and two together and proceeded to attack the male. Taken completely by surprise the male dropped his hard earned tuber to rush away from the attacking mother and in the scramble the young baboon grabbed the tuber and trotted off to eat his prize!

Another story I was told opened my eyes to the unique characters of baboon. A scientist was studying baboons in South Africa. He spent nearly every day with the troop and carefully noted down all his observations. It was a reasonably large group of mostly females ruled over by and Alpha male and his cronies. The alpha male jealously guarded his females from any other male who showed interest in them. Then one day the scientist noticed a new young male had appeared and was following the troop. The Alpha male quickly noticed him and after a short while went to go show him who was boss. He attacked the newcomer and the young male quickly submitted himself to show he was not going to put up a fight making the right sounds and gestures. He was only lightly beaten and the alpha male left him alone after he felt sure the newcomer knew who was in charge. After that the troop accepted his presence but the new baboon kept to himself. He stayed with the troop but was always the first to leave early in the morning and the last to return to the roost at night. For two whole years this baboon kept himself out of the way and did little to socialise with the rest of the group. Instead he stayed on the edges and watched. Whenever he was confronted by the other males he showed he was submissive and generally they just left him alone. Then one day, out of the blue, he simply got up from where he was sitting and casually strolled over to the alpha male and attacked! The fight was savage but the young male was quick and strong and in a short space of time he had beaten the alpha male who ran off into the bush to escape him. He then quickly capitalised on his advantage by challenging all the other males of the troop. They all submitted. In the space of just a few minutes he had gone from a lonely and insignificant member of the group to the top ranking spot and the troop was now his! I can’t help but wonder if the young male had planned it all along and simply bided his time for two years waiting for his opportunity to take control of the troop.