primatesperu

Under the spell of the Basterd

The rain today is strange, because the sun hasn’t stopped shining all through this storm.  The grass is drenched, forming hidden puddles that I will step in when I go out to hunt for bugs for the Master soon.  Work has stopped on the cement dormitories, which are getting new roofs of aluminium, or calamina, as it is called in Peru.  The five guys putting up the roof are sprawled in five identical chairs in front of the comedor, enjoying a respite from the sun and the heavy hammering of nails into metal. The whole field station is quiet now, and I’m leaning back, enjoying the natural noises of the jungle when I hear Him.

Lifting my head I look out the window and Erin is back with Him. He’s begun to protest already, although it might just be that he’s excited to be back. They are both wet from head to toe and in his ruffled state of indignation he can barely sit still for a second without expostulating at his terrible morning.  “Work is hell,” he squeals, “I got wet and there were hundreds of glider ants all over my cage. I had better have a veritable buffet for lunch or I’m really going to snap!”

Gulp. There are two tired crickets (caught last night) in the bug store and it is still so wet outside that we aren’t going to be able to hunt until it dries up a little.  I spy a butterfly that has unknowingly entered the mouth of hell and is perched on the windowsill next to His cage. I bag it quietly, hoping that three crickets should calm him down a little and buy us some time.

Gideon, our top-most bug hunter, is out in the field.  So it’s up to us, three scraggly women, who don’t really relish the thought of feeding the voracious appetite of this 175gm primate.  But, it will have to be done and so we get on with it.

Chiky has really made an impact on camp and since I’m not sure if I will be able to send you pictures with this write-up, I’ll try to explain what I mean by that.

When he first came to us, he was a groggy little chap, having recently been under the influence of a little anesthesia in a vain attempt of the rehabilitation center’s vet (and mine) to collect blood. However, weighing in at about 120g, he really is a very tiny animal…even though his personality is larger than life. He warmed up to us instantly and began to be explicit about what his preferences.

He liked to be by the fan in our room, and especially by somebody sitting near a fan. He really hated being alone and especially being alone while his cage was on the floor. He liked bananas alright but not papaya and he just loved, especially adored, and could consume endless amounts of bug.

After we brought him back to CICRA and introduced him to his new home, he made sure we learned a few more things to add to the list of Dos and Don’ts. He likes his orange and blue towels to smell of him and just him, and he likes a big red towel on top of him at night. He prefers to sleep in his hammock on warmer days but invariably uses his little dustbin-home at night. He is a late riser, making a fuss only at about 6:30am and given the right amount of bug, he’ll go to bed quite happily with an hour or more of daylight still left.

On the subject of bugs he is most specific:  bugs must be presented head first, bug heads and bodies are ideal, wings he could pass on, and legs are merely an afterthought. He will accept pretty much any cricket except, as we recently discovered, some really big ones.  He will eat butterflies, oblivious to the harm they do the interior décor of his home, until the bottom of his cage is a gory mix of cricket-legs and shredded wings of a multitude of colours.

Poo-ing occurs all through the day but he’s kind enough to keep his tail out of the way and aim for the floor. Unless stressed he manages to also steer clear of any little poops that have lingered in his cage without dropping to the floor two feet below.

If we are lucky, he will make it through the day without spilling his water bowl and therefore, leaving the poo to get nice and dry, facilitating easy pick-up. Those of you who have ever nursed a young one, be it a kitten or a baby human, will agree with me that it is these little things that count towards making a day bearable.

When he has knocked over his bowl, however, he will drink directly out of a squirt bottle when pumped gently through his cage, drenching himself and uttering little gurgles of happiness. Eventually though, someone has to untie all the strings on his cage door and dive in there to right the water bowl.

He is, overwhelmingly, an incredibly hungry and thirsty individual. In fact, I would go as far as to say that these two words – hungry and thirsty – should figure at the very top of his bio.  He reminds me of my sister’s beagle, Penny, whose entire life revolves around food.  Coming to think of it, I know quite a few humans who aren’t that different from Penny and Chiky either!

In between typing I have managed to spend about an hour in the gardens around CICRA, collecting bugs for him. Every so often I hear an excited snarl as someone gives him a bug and dutifully records it in The Chiky Logbook. This is not starving animal – he has put on a fair amount of weight and now clocks a lovely 175gms.

Oh, and he has managed to help us trap our first unhabituated group of four tamarins in 5 mornings of being out in the jungle with him.

Not bad, I say, for a week’s work.