Baboons are generally found amongst other animals, especially antelope. This helps increase each species awareness to possible danger.
The canine teeth of a fully grown male baboon are larger than those of a cheetah and constitute a formidable defensive and offensive weapon.
They have a wide and varied diet. This includes, but is not limited to, insects, fruit and birds eggs. They will not eat decayed meat, but have been known to supplement their food supply with freshly killed antelope when necessary.Their life span is approximately forty years, but this age is based on observation in captivity, and is considered to be somewhat less in the wild where predators, shortage of food and water and other adverse conditions diminish their chance of survival.
When little ones are seen among a troop, it is possible to determine their approximate ages at a glance: up to one month old the babies cling to the bottom of their mothers belly; from two to three months old, they sit on her back in front of her tail; after three months they travel independently with the troop.
One distinguishable feature which differentiates between the sexes is that the female lacks the long mane of hair at the back of the neck which is notable on the male.
Because of the strong attachment between females and their off-spring, a mother can sometimes be seen carrying around young which have died a few days previously.
6 comments:
Seeing that you are in Addo. One of the tour guides mentioned that they have been seeing chacma baboons in the southern section of the park which they never really saw before. The said that they hope having baboons around the park will also attract leopard down from the mountains.
Although notoriously obnoxious still very interesting to watch.
Double bonus if the baboons attracted leopards into Addo.
very nice!
Although you might not see them Jonker, I am sure there are leopard here as there are many other species to attract them to this area such as the warthogs, rabbits, smaller buck species and the babies of things like zebra.
See my comment to Jonker Gaelyn. I must say baboons are not on my list of favourites. :)
Thanks for visiting my site and commenting Patrick.
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