When baboons have a party at your house.
Now that it is winter, the baboons come through the staff village every day… There is always a dustbin that isn’t closed properly or a garden with some sausage fruit lying around. So the staff village has a few easy sources of food they just cannot resist. Unlike their monkey counterparts, these baboons are actually still scared of humans. So when they pay too much attention to our dustbin, I can quickly chase them away.
That is, if I am home… When the baboons come around and we are not home, well then it is a whole different story: Madness and mayhem in the garden, and lots of cleaning up when we do get home.
We were in Nelspruit for a few days last winter. On the morning we were supposed to return to Letaba, one of the neighbours sent me a message. She said, sorry, the baboons have been at the house… Immediately I thought they had broken in. A horrible image of baboon pee and poop all over our furniture was forming in my mind… Luckily they did not manage to get inside. But judging by the pictures our neighbour sent, it looked like they had a massive party on the stoep. With an after party on the shade cloth at the sliding door!
My oh my were we shocked when we got home… The baboons had had a part all right! The shade cloth was in tatters. That was the third one that got destroyed: One by an elephant, and the other one also by the baboons. I think it was like the perfect trampoline for them! My scatter cushions were scattered all over the yard. I even found one on the other side of the fence! Is that why they call them ‘scatter’ cushions? I wonder…
The baboons had left ‘party favours’ everywhere. Probably to say thank you for letting them use our house as a venue. It looks like they had a fantastic time. Next time just I wish they would invite us to the party too!
In another blog, I write about the Vervet monkeys in the staff village. You can find it here.
Thank you so much
Huge pleasure! Thank you for taking the time to read my story!!