My First Day with the Monkeys

Today was my first day on the island!! It was actually quite impressive – overwhelming and enjoyable… and hot.

We woke up at 6:20 this morning, quickly dressed and packed up (backpacks with water, notebooks, pens, grapes, special fanny pack (I know, I know…. nerrrd!), video camera and tripod), grabbed a bite of breakfast, and hustled out the door. We met the other researchers on the dock at 6:50. There appear to be a group of 3 researchers here from the Max Planck Institute in Leipzig, 3 research assistants and a postdoc from UChicago, and then the staff, who are primarily based out of UPR. By tomorrow, the Yale group should also be on board, so it should be quite the excursion in the mornings.

The boat is just a little white, flat dingy, but the trip is quite short and peaceful, so it doesn't matter all that much. We lucked out this morning, since it wasn’t nearly as hot yesterday, and by starting so early, we were able to get in the bulk of our basic training done by the time the lunch boat left the island at 11:30AM. (A lunch boat leaves the island at 11:30AM and returns at 12:30PM. The final boat leaves at 2:30PM.) This may sound like a short day, but I assure you, the oppressive heat, occasional mental frustration, and mini treks up the islands are enough to tire you out right quick. Furthermore, by the time 11:30AM rolls around, the sun is in its primo-heat locale, and that, dear readers, is bloody hot.

The tasking is actually pretty easy. It involves identifying a ready subject (a non-eating, non-drinking, non-fighting, non-skittish, non-obscured or arboreal monkey). Once identified, we then have to set up the video camera and tripod in such a way that it can pick up our approach and our presentation, as well as the monkey’s reaction. This is actually not terribly difficult. Once tested, however, we must then record the monkey’s ID number. This is definitely the most trying part of the experiments. 

The monkeys are regularly tracked and trapped for censuses. As a result, every monkey has both ear notch IDs and an alphanumeric combination tattooed on his or her chest and inner left leg. The ear notch tags are very easy to read for the most part, but skirmishes lead to other tears and tissue loss, so the ear notches alone are not reliable enough for our purposes. As a result, we must always get the tattoo number. This is far more easily said than done.  The males are very hairy, meaning their chest tattoos are often illegible, and the monkeys love to sit in such a way that their left legs are scrunched up to their bodies or blocked by their arms. Furthermore, the number and letter shapes are not consistent and sometimes a nine on one individual looks entirely different from a nine on another individual. Similarly, the number patterns are not consistent. One cannot always look for ##letter, since older monkeys may have letter## and juveniles may have #letter#. This means ID number retrieval can often entail 10+ minutes of watching and tracking a monkey, in order to catch an angle at which the ID is legible.  I am certain that this will prove the most difficult part of the work.

The monkeys are, on the whole, pretty amazing. It is currently breeding season, so the males are constantly rushing one another and asserting their dominance. This means the islands are often noisy with screaming and breaking branches. (FYI: Cayo Santiago is composed of Big Cay and Little Cay, which connect via rocky sand bridge.) The island also has a distinct smell, kind of like an acidic horse barn. The staff has told me that the unusual after-smell is actually seasonal and due to the ejaculate of the males, which contains an albumin-like protein that helps it congeal into the sperm plug. It’s not a pleasant smell, but any one who can handle the smell of a barn in summer would be fine here.

There are also a ton of babies and very young juveniles out right now. I have some great photos of young’uns clinging to their mothers’ bellies and of little juveniles sitting in trees and cooing for mommy.  I have also begun to identify some defining physical characteristics of some of the monkeys.  There are a number of highly humpbacked or scoliosis ridden individuals (mainly elderly) on the island, as well as a few nose-less monkeys, who appear to have lost their noses in particularly violent battles. Interestingly, the nose-less monkeys are not all males.  I'm sure that after a month, I will find these markers of familiar faces. 

The females are significantly smaller than the males and have very pronounced breast/nipples on their chests. They don’t test particularly well, since the moment you approach them, either they puff up and get angry with you for threatening their babies or they run away. The male sub-adults, on the other hand, are the most interested in the buckets and can be quite ballsy. In fact, while I was attempting to record the ID of another individual, I had a young sub-adult male sneak up behind me and attempt to take grapes from my pouch. Luckily Brian warned me before the monkey jumped on my back, but it was pretty close. I guess that’s the rookie mistake… Unfortunately, we can't use trial of sub-adults really, since they aren't old enough.

The monkeys are not alone on the island, by the way. The islands are swarming with geckos and other blue-bellied lizards (skinks, perhaps?). There are also iguanas creeping around wherever you look. The most impressive other creatures I saw, however, were the hermit crabs. They are absolutely everywhere on the island, some larger than my fist, and crawl up and down the hills for no apparent reason. You have to watch your feet for sure.

Anyway, now we have to go through and analyze the data we collected today. This involved going back over all of the video of the trials we ran today and deciding whether or not all of the “successes” were indeed successful and not “aborts” in disguise. I will write more tomorrow, but remember to send along questions and comments. I will answer you as best I can!

Much love!

B

P.S. - Please don't laugh at the doofy photo of me. :P