[imagesource:TikTok Screenshot/@fabianmartin1608]

The feisty cape baboons are leaving residents reeling with what to do about keeping them contained.

The tension between humans versus baboons is “the highest it’s ever been”, said ecologist Justin O’Riain, who directs the Institute for Communities and Wildlife in Africa at the University of Cape Town.

A baboon on the edge of a wild and an urban area is “the most difficult animal in the world to manage”, he said, noting how they are strong climbers and excellent learners.

“There’s no landscape that they can’t conquer.”

As human development of the Cape expands, so the baboons get “pushed higher and higher up the mountain” where foraging conditions are harder, O’Riain added. Therefore, naturally, people’s lush gardens with fruit trees and swimming pools are tempting alternatives.

“They’ve become so bold now. They’re more domesticated than they should be,” said Duncan Low, 60, who runs an ice cream shop.

The intruders have even started raiding kitchens and grabbing food from plates in restaurants. “They’re on a sugar and fast-food rush,” Low said.

The City of Cape Town, working hand-in-hand with park authorities, has been running a programme for years to tackle the troublemaking monkeys, relying on teams of baboon monitors to keep things in check.

According to O’Riain, their approach is mostly non-lethal, aiming to handle the situation with minimal harm. However, some methods, like using paintball guns to chase off the troops or culling a particularly troublesome animal, have come under heavy fire.

Amid growing outrage, the vocal campaign group Baboon Matters announced in May that they were taking legal action against the city and parks authorities for not implementing what they consider more humane control measures, like baboon-proof fencing and bins.

Under increasing pressure and with funding running low, the authorities revealed that the baboon management programme would be phased out by year-end as they look into other “more sustainable urban solutions.”

The programme will continue until December — a busy time for tourists — but with fewer rangers on the ground, they said.

“We’re going to lose our first line of defence,” O’Riain said, with more baboons already entering urban areas often at risk to their lives.

Around 500 chacma baboons — some of the largest monkeys, weighing up to 40 kilos— roam the peninsula south of Cape Town, according to the South African National Biodiversity Institute.

In 2021, the city put down a notorious alpha-male baboon who had terrorised residents, staging over 40 raids for food from rubbish bins, lawns, and porches — sometimes even entering homes while people were inside.

Meanwhile, 33 baboons were known to have died between July 2023 and June 2024, the highest number in 10 years, city authorities say. Nearly half the deaths were caused by human factors, including shooting with pellet guns, collisions with vehicles and dog attacks.

According to conservation activist Lynda Silk, head of the Cape Peninsula Civil Conservation group, coexisting with baboons should come with “a degree of human compliance,” starting with better management of food waste.

“We don’t need to be in competition with our natural resources: there can be ways that we can manage our lifestyles to minimise the negative impacts,” she said.

For O’Riain, the only real solution to the baboon dilemma is to put up fencing in key areas, built with electric wires and underground mesh to stop the animals from digging their way in.

“Baboons can come and forage right up to the edge of the fence and no one will disturb them,” said O’Riain. “It’s a completely peaceful interaction, a win-win for people and for baboons.”

A prototype installed 11 years ago had shown impressive success, with nearly no baboons managing to get through, he said. A 2023 report has already pinpointed where the fencing should go.

Humans and baboons simply have to coexist, so solutions like this seem to be the best bet.

[source:barrons]