After spending a lot of time in the field, you tend to adopt certain traits from the monkeys. Reciprocal grooming, for instance.
After two good days with Balam, we were scheduled to observe Pakal—the group that has given us so much trouble lately. While we were following Balam they actually had an encounter with Pakal and got quite aggressive—we all thought a full fledged fight might break out. It didn’t luckily, and besides the excitement of the meeting we didn’t otherwise notice anything unusual with any of the Pakal members (specifically the females).
Day before yesterday however, Chiara and Evelyn returned from the field with some exciting news. Esma of the Pakal group has a newborn! He had to have been born early that morning or the night before, because we hadn’t seen a tiny fuzz ball hanging on Esma during the inter-group encounter.
So needless to say, we were all pretty excited to begin our cycle with the Pakals. While they hardly gave us any decent views at first, remaining high in the canopy for the majority of yesterday, we got our chance today. It was still tough to spot the little pink and gray newborn, but we could occasionally see him peeking out under Esma’s arm or hanging on her belly as she jumped from limb to limb.
You can just barely make out the infant clutching onto Esma's stomach on the left, and its face is visible in the photo on the right
(click to enlarge).
(click to enlarge).
Since the Pakal group underwent infanticide last February (the coup was led by now-central male Pakal), the other two females (Parcha and Pura) are also most likely pregnant. Pakal killed the infants sired by the previous central male so he could copulate and bear offspring with the three females. So despite the dismal circumstances, it will be amusing to have several infants playing with the already existing juveniles Kanika and Emma.
A hidden tunnel under a Mayan structure by the river where we were observing the Pakals
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