9:24 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 22, 2010 – La Casa,
With another three days completed, I have survived until my next rest day. I have also added six new individuals—the Balam group—to my repertoire of monkeys here in the park. The highlights of my week were on Monday and Tuesday when the Balams had some run-ins with the neighboring Pakals on their border. Both resulted in long, drawn out howling duels consisting of “dog barking,” “rooster crowing” and “dinosaur roaring.” I was on the edge of my seat, and felt like this had been what I was waiting for. This is why I’m here. Next behaviors I’d like to check off are mate guarding, copulation and birth. But two groups having a shouting match at their border was definitely exciting.
Infanticide would be fascinating to witness as well, but of course absolutely horrifying. Infanticide occurs when a new, dominant male takes over a group and either chases off, injures or kills the formal central male, along with all the infants. The theorized benefits are that the new male can ensure his genes are the only ones being passed down, and the females can begin cycling again with the removal of their infants. This behavior is not necessarily common, but definitely well-documented within Alouatta pigra (as it is with several other highly patriarchal and polygynous genuses of monkeys).
Last February infanticide was observed in the Pakal group, and three infants were killed. It’s hard to believe that I’m experiencing what I’ve been reading about in all my behavior and primate textbooks. And hopefully in the near future I’ll be leading some studies of my own!
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