CERCOPAN

Category: CERCOPAN staff fighting to save rainforest and endanger, CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Environmental education saving endangered primates, Nigeria, Orphaned baby monkeys, Saving endangered monkeys, love and friendship in monkeys | Date: Oct 10 2009 | By: cercopan

by Amy Baxter, Temporary Office and Finance Manager

CERCOPAN is pleased to announce that we now have two new additions to our monkey residents!  Saved from an uncertain fate, two young putty-nosed guenons, Flexy and Delight, were rescued by staff and brought to our Calabar compound.  We had a tip-off from a secondary school teacher who visited CERCOPAN with his class not long a go.  While he was here we explained to the class why primates shouldn’t be kept as pets and told them that it was even against the law in Nigeria.  After this short visit to our site, he walked past a compound where he could see two young putty-nosed guenons and he immeditely came to CERCOPAN to inform us.  We were very pleased that our educational messages were successfully absorbed and it gives us great hope for the future that we can continue to change the opinions of Nigerian residents!

His information indicated that the owner sold monkeys commercially and so we were even more concerned and determined to rescue the pair and to stop any more trade.  Our Education Assistant, Martina, stopped by the compound on the way to work to investigated the situation further.  She was very concerned upon arrival about the number of ‘area boys’ close by, a group known to be involved in criminal activities and often very dangerous.  She left without entering the compound but could see one putty-nosed guenon from where she stood.  Our bravest lads decided they would all go together to confiscate the putties, feeling strength in numbers was the best pproach on this occasion. They had expected a long debate with the owner to persuade him to give up the pair, but the whole situation turned out to be much easier than expected…….

Vet nurse Austin with Flexy and Delight

The owner knew CERCOPAN and had visited in the past as he loved monkeys.  He recognized Martina immediately and said he had expected to receive a visit from us at some point.  Our staff asked him is he knew keeping monkeys was against the law and he did, as did his wife who had been nagging him to take them to CERCOPAN for some time!  He had planned to go but had become so attached to the pair, that he had been postponing the visit.  He admitted that had previously  traded in monkeys, selling them for about 8000 naira each (approximately ₤30) but had often kept them for a while before selling them to enjoy their company.  When our team had arrived the monkeys were running around the compound, having escaped from their enclosure, but were quite happy to stay around the family home.  They were playing in the trees and climbing on the roof, not a bit disturbed by this large group of people watching their antics.

While arranging the hndover of the monkeys with the owner, we discovered one of them didnt actually belong to him. They had been placed together by the two separate owners to keep each other company.  He was very hesitant to give up the second animal, explaining that the other owner would think he had sold the monkey to make money. The next hour was spent trying to contact the other owner and then negotiating with him and his family. Eventually, our staff finaly talked him into releasing the monkey into our care and Flexy nd delight were brought home to CERCOPAN. They are a friendly and confident pair, even around humans.  So much so that they didn’t even need a travel box on the car journey home, cheerfully clinging to each other and Egu, our head keeper’s, arm.

Now they are waiting at CERCOPAN for their medical tests so they can be moved in to a big group with other puttys.  We have 3 other young puttys and 1 slightly older individual already waiting to move out from quarantine and they will form one big happy group once Flexy and Delight are ready.  They won’t be without their guardian though, making sure they all stay in line; Double Chief, an old male, with be put in charge of the nursery group and will make sure no one misbehaves!

Tags: African Wildlife, Cercopan, Conservation, Orphan monkeys, Primate rehabilitation, putty-nosed guenon

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Category: CERCOPAN staff fighting to save rainforest and endanger, CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Conservation, Monkeys, Nigeria, Rain Forests, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Oct 04 2009 | By: cercopan

On the 30^th September, one of our youngest mangabeys found his adventurous streak and took a trip to the ‘outside world’.  Despite being in a large 1 hectare, semi-free ranging forest enclosure Judim, approximately 6 months old, decided he was ready to explore a bit further afield.  The primate keepers at our Rhoko forest site were very surprised when they arrived one morning to discover the small mangabey climbing the trees outside the enclosure.  It is particularly rare that we have mangabey escapes at our forest site, mainly as their enclosure is so large they are usually quite happy inside, and also because we have an electric fence running around the outside making it particularly difficult to climb out without a little buzz!  The only time we worry about escapes is when a storm has caused a tree to fall on the fence and we have some teenage males looking to find exotic girls from another troop!

Judim our little adventuror!

What was even more surprising about Judim’s escape was that usually he was such a quiet, nervous infant! It is very rare to see him away from his mum, so where this daring notion came from is anybody’s guess!  We think he must have crawled under the electric tape to where the normal metal fence is and then started to climb up, being small enough to not touch the electric tapes about 25cm away.  Once he got to the top I don’t think he realised he would be separated from his mum if he played in the ‘adventure playground’ the other side of the fence. Once he was on the other side and this separation dawned on him he wasn’t too happy, nor was mum for that matter! Both mum and infant started to get distressed, and Judim tried several methods to try to get back in with the other mangabeys.  The CERCOPAN workers who had gone to help tried to reduce their stress by not getting too close and attempting to distract the rest of the group with food.  It would be impossible to pick up the infant and return him to the enclosure without being mobbed by the group, so everyone was forced to wait while Judim worked out a method to return himself.  Eventually, after several different tactics had failed, Judim cimbed a tall tree over-looking the enclosure.  Here he weighed up his options and chances of leaping back in to the enclosure and, with baited breath, the staff looked on. With every other possibility exhausted and now clearly desperate, Judim took the death-defying leap and luckily landed safely in his mother’s arms.  Both mother and Judim were extremely relieved and joyful about being united, but I’m pretty sure Judim got a serious telling off when these emotions wore off!

Tags: African Wildlife, baby monkey, Cercopan, Conservation, Red-capped mangabey, Wildlife Rehabilitation

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Category: CERCOPAN battles illegal loggers, CERCOPAN helping communities in Nigeria, CERCOPAN staff fighting to save rainforest and endanger, CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Communities, Conservation, Education, Environmental education saving endangered primates, Monkeys, Nigeria, Orphaned baby monkeys, Rain Forests, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Oct 01 2009 | By: cercopan

 The October edition of the CERCOPAN monthly newsletter can be dowloaded from the link below

cerconews-october-2009-edition.pdf

Hope you enjoy it! Look out for the next issue on the 5th November.

Tags: African Wildlife, Cercopan, Community Conservation, Conservation, Endangered monkeys, environmental education, Guenons, Mangabeys, Newletter, rehabilitation

2 responses so far

Category: CERCOPAN staff fighting to save rainforest and endanger, CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Conservation, Life, Monkeys, Nigeria, Rare monkey babies born, Saving endangered monkeys, love and friendship in monkeys | Date: Sep 17 2009 | By: cercopan

Back in June Peace, a female mangabey from Callistus’ group, had her first ever infant, Pica.  Pica, a beautiful baby girl, arrived just 2 weeks after the birth of Marvelous; a bouncing baby boy, born to Mercy.  As Peace’s first infant, she was rather unsure how to look after Pica and seemed confused as to what her motherly duties involved.  As the first few weeks passed, her mothering instincts began to develop and improved somewhat, but unfortunately, as we carefully observed the pair we could see that Peace was still not fulfilling some of the important jobs she needed to do.

Peace and Pica: at times her mothering instinct kicked in. 

Peace easily lost interest in Pica, and so Pica spent a lot of her time riding around on the back of her older brother, Marley.  These two got on famously and Marley was always there to lend a helping brotherly hand!  She really enjoyed playing with him and he enjoyed playing with her, unless he wanted to play-fight with some of his older friends!  When Marley was not around though and Peace wasn’t interested, we had the problem that, in this prolonged wet season we are experiencing here in Cross River State, Nigeria, there was no-one to shelter Pica from the elements.  Being so small she felt the cold easily and when there was no-one to cuddle up to when she was wet, the staff at CERCOPAN began to worry.  In addition to this we had noticed that Pica was not putting on weight like Marvelous, who was only 2 weeks older.  As we continued to pay close attention to Peace and Pica’s relationship, and the nursing behaviour of the pair, we eventually came to the conclusion that the best course of action was to remove Pica from the group and hand-rear her until she was strong enough to return.  It was a tough decision and always a last resort here at CERCOPAN.

  Despite the vast experience CERCOPAN volunteers have in hand-rearing rescued, orphaned infant monkeys, Pica proved to be somewhat more difficult.  Never before had we had the problem of the mother still being in the vicinity and in ear-shot of the infant.  Pica refused to eat while she could hear her mother, and the two were continually trying to communicate with each other.  Our best option was to take Pica to our volunteer living-quarters two doors down the road and here she became much more settled.  Now she is a happy little monkey who loves lots of attention when she’s fed. She runs around the room where her travel box is being kept, climbing and jumping off the furniture.  She is putting on plenty of weight and we are really happy with the progress she is making.  We can’t wait for the time when we can reunite her with her mother, her brother and the other members of her group.

By Amy Baxter, Mangabey Research Coordinator, temporary Finance and Office Manager

Photographs by Sam Trull

Pica, after having rolled in either mud or food!

Tags: africa, animal, Cercopan, Conservation, endangered species, monkey, Monkeys, Nigeria, Nigerian wildlife, primates, rainforest, rare species, threatened species, volunteers, wildlife

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Category: CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Monkeys, Nigeria, Orphaned baby monkeys, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Aug 22 2009 | By: cercopan

Exactly a week ago, CERCOPAN staff rescued an as yet un-named infant putty nosed monkey female (see previous blog) with a seriously injured left hand.  In only a week, this young monkey has transformed from a traumatized little girl, into a confident and adventurous individual!  Not wanting to encourage too much movement of her hand she stays in a travel box most of the day, but does come out for play sessions around the volunteer office and living room, stopping occasionally to rest on the back of one of our chairs (see picture below). 

Truly a character, this monkey knows no fear!  She leaps around so happy to be free! Climbing everywhere and trying to use her broken hand.  She is also very vocal, and makes it known to me frequently when I am not paying her enough attention.  Enjoying the reassurance that my arms provide, she jumps into my chest every time something scares her or I call her back from a dangerous feat!  I can tell already, her progress is going to be interesting, and we will surely keep everyone posted!  Thanks to all for helping to support CERCOPAN, because of people like you we are able to take care of little monkeys like her. 

Tags: Cercopan, Conservation, Nigeria, Orphan monkeys, putty-nosed guenon, rehabilitation

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Category: CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Conservation, Monkeys, Nigeria, Orphaned baby monkeys, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Aug 18 2009 | By: cercopan

Fantasic news…thanks to our wonderful readers out there, we only have $1182 left to raise towards our rent!!! Recent donations from Kathy S, Kevin C, James M, Brenton H, Mark H, Ji-in L, Harry V, James M, Julie T, Jennifer S, Wanda H and Christine C have brought us so close to our target and there are still 14 days to go. When we started this appeal with $3333 to raise in little over a month, it seemed almost impossible…..but now we are almost 2/3 of the way there. Thanks very much from everyone at CERCOPAN for getting us here.

For all of you wishing to help our cause, you can now also support CERCOPAN by using ‘everyclick’ as your search engine. Simply add everyclick to your favourites or as your home page (http://www.everyclick.com/cercopan) and then each search you undertake raises money for our organisation. Even if you only search a couple of times a day every click counts.  Encourage your friends to participate too!

Little Ema eating orange

Tags: African Wildlife, Cercopan, Conservation, Monkeys, Nigeria, Orpahan baby monkeys, rehabilitation

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Category: CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Conservation, Monkeys, Nigeria, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Aug 13 2009 | By: cercopan

Apologies to all of you for not giving an update on our situation for a few days….I know many of you are following our struggle to raise funds and are almost as worried as me about it! Sadly I haven’t been able to spend much time at my computer as I’ve been pretty unwell so have been trying to work on other things that don’t involve staring at a screen! I was hoping it was just a headache or cold, but I am now pretty sure I have malaria, so I will take some drugs today and hopefully be back to my normal self in the next 2 or 3 days …

We received disheartening news yesterday that two further sources of funds that I had been desperately awaiting news on are no longer a possibility for this year. I don’t think there has ever been a more difficult time for small charities to raise operational funds. In this global crisis, multinational companies, banks, foundations and individual donors have all been hit and are these are precisely the avenues we utterly rely on for funds. Im trying to stay hopeful though,  Im sure if we just keep trying every single available option, eventually our hard work and effort will pay off.

We still need to raise i$1742 and there are 20 days left to go. Huge thanks to Mr G, Kathy, Christine, Pirjo, Samantha and Bryony for their support. I can’t emphasise enough how much we all appreciate your efforts. The amount of work it takes to make a project like this run day to day can be exhausting for the volunteers and staff; and a crisis like this only serves to make the days longer and harder. To know that there are people in our corner who really care makes all the difference and your support is invaluable in so many ways. A massive thank you to all of you for everything you are doing!

Some of the CERCOPAN staff posing for a photo on George (our vet interns last day)

Bottom Left: Martina, me, Glory, George, Amy, Sam

Top left: Joshua, Austin, Egu, Richard, Matthew, Etan, Abakum

Tags: , African Wildlife, Appeal, Bushmeat trade, Cercopan, Crisis, Monkeys, Nigeria, rehabilitation

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Category: CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Conservation, Monkeys, Orphaned baby monkeys, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Aug 04 2009 | By: cercopan

So many of you have contacted me asking how the appeal is going and how much we have left to raise. Although there is still a way to go, I am happy to tell you that thanks to the generosity of Wildlife direct readers…. we now have $1395 of the $3333 we must find in order to pay our rent by September 1st! We are almost half way there and it really is down to all of you…your help could not have come at a better time.

Once again, I must say a huge thank you to everyone who has given their support so far and to Jennifer S, Karen M, Kristine K, Brigitta S, Carol Z, Mary H all of whom have recently given to our appeal. Every donation brings us closer to our target and we are really starting to feel like we may get there in time!

For those of you following Ikom and Okon’s progress, I also have fantastic news! Both babies returned to their groups today in full health. As you can see below..they are already fitting back in very nicely with their families

Okon being groomed moments after entering the group

Austin and Joshua opening the encosure to return Ikom to his family

Ikom clearly relaxed back with his friends

Tags: African Wildlife, baby monkeys, Cercopan, Monkey appeal, Nigerian wildlife, Orphan monkeys, rehabilitation, Wildlife rescue

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Category: CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Conservation, Cute rare baby otter, Monkeys, Orphaned baby monkeys, Saving endangered monkeys, Uncategorized | Date: Aug 03 2009 | By: cercopan

Eve the otter, adorable monkey and other CERCOPAN merchandise now available at http://www.cafepress.com/cercopan .
Great as gifts, even better for yourself! All proceeds go towards helping the animals in our care.

melody-the-mona-baby-t-shirt

pink-eve-the-otter-tshirt

Tags: African Wildlife, Baby Otter, Cercopan, CLAWLESS OTTER, MONKEY GIFTS, Nigerian wildlife, ORPHAN ANIMALS, rehabilitation

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Category: CERCOPAN staff fighting to save rainforest and endanger, CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Monkeys, Nigeria, Orphaned baby monkeys, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Aug 01 2009 | By: cercopan

After losing lovable mona Scoopy only a day ago, baby Mona’s Ikom and Okon have now fallen sick with the same condition. My heart sank when Austin our veterinary assistant came into the office to relay the news. I ran out to their enclosures heart pounding, half expecting to find them in the same state I found Scoop. To my relief, they were still moving around and although clearly unwell, I knew they had a chance.  

We immediately removed the babies from the enclosure, administered drugs and put them together in a huge travel box in the vet lab with a hot water bottle and plenty of comfort food. The illness they have is a syndrome which appears to be particular to monas. As this species is rare in captivity, no-one really knows very much about them at all. Whilst we are not yet  sure what causes it, we have some theories and have experts around the world helping us to figure it out. We also now have a committment from Cambridge Veterinary School to help us find an answer.

We originally thought that the problem may be nutritional, some tiny trace element that may be missing from the diet.  Rainforests provide an enormous variety of leaves and insects which are impossible to replicate in captivity, but we really do try our very best. The monkeys in our care are given over 60 different types of food; including fruit, fish, seeds, nuts, boiled eggs, rice and beans, special leaves collected by staff and our own invention ’monkey cake’, which is packed full of nutritional ingredients such as eggs, oats and crayfish. 

Ikom and Okon will now be cared for by our volunteers night and day and will be showered with all of the care and attention we can possibly offer. Mona’s when they are sick crave lots of TLC and the more they have, the quicker they seem to recover! Whenever Im sick, I feel the same and like a bit of sympathy so I know where they are coming from!

I will keep you all posted on any news as it happens…

Baby mona’s Ikon and Ikom comforting one another  in their travel box

Tags: African Wildlife, Cercopan, Cercopithecus mona, Cute baby monkeys, mona guenon, Nigerian wildlife, Orphan monkeys, rehabilitation

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