The Mango Patch

Its been quite a week. On Monday a whole bunch of things went wrong. First of all, when I got up at 4:30am to get ready to go out to the forest, there was no running water. This happens fairly often during the dry season, but still, its annoying. Then, the kitchen door was locked, so I had to break in through the window to get the provisions I’d packed for the day. Once inside the kitchen, I discovered that someone had eaten about half of the fruit I’d packed in my little Tupperware container. What was the deal?! Could nothing go right on this day?

Oh but that was not the end of it. Once in the forest, my watch stopped working about 10 minutes after I’d started collecting data on the South Group. This is a pretty essential piece of equipment for the project. The way I collect data is to set the timer on my watch to beep every 2 minutes, and each time it beeps, I record a data point of the monkeys’ behavior—sort of like taking a “snapshot” at 2 minute intervals. Now, I have a spare watch, it just wasn’t with me because I wasn’t aware that this one was in imminent danger of demise. I briefly considered coming back for my other watch, but it would have been at least an hour and 15 minute trek to get there and back, so I decided that it just wasn’t feasible. Don’t tell the real primatologists out there—but I just decided to make do. I thought I would still be able to get useful data in terms of recording what they ate and how they ate it, just not the 2-minute snapshots of their activities.

So I proceeded to watch the monkeys. As I followed them through a particularly viney area, I felt a sharp stinging pain on my arm and looked down to see that I had brushed up against some kind of Nicaraguan poison ivy. This has happened before. On the plus side, at least I got a good look at the plant this time so I know what to avoid in the future. From previous experience, I also know that if I clean off the area with alcohol right away, it neutralizes the damage. So, I took care of it and was none the worse for wear.

I thought surely, this will be the end of it. Unfortunately, it wasn’t. Towards mid-afternoon, I started to feel sick. Really really sick. Like sick to my stomach, sick. The monkeys became secondary to my primal goal of survival, and I left the forest. I spent the rest of the afternoon alternately vortexing and sleeping, thinking that there was no way I’d be in any shape to go out the next day or possibly even the day after.

But somehow I recovered. I got myself together and went out again on Tuesday—and it’s a really good thing I did. I found the North Group on the Camino just as they were about to make an incredibly big move. All morning they traveled and traveled. They took a twisting, winding route, but I began to have this suspicion that we would end up on Spondias Lane, where they packed up and left last November when the trees ran out of fruit. The Spondias trees are not fruiting now, but they are all sprouting young and tender leaves that howler monkeys are supposed to love to eat. (I don’t blame them-- I’ve tasted young Spondias leaves and they are quite good!). Well, we did end up on Spondias Lane, but only briefly. They stopped to snack on some young Spondias leaves, and then they were on the move again. They traveled and traveled until I saw in the distance—mango trees. I thought, “You have got to be kidding.” Several local people have alluded to this mythical patch of mango trees in the forest and have told me that my monkeys would journey there at some point—May or June most likely. But I only half believed them. From their description, these mango trees were far, far away, and while I didn’t doubt that some groups of monkeys would feast on the unripe fruits, I did doubt that it would be my troop that went all the way up there. Little did I know! It was virtually monkey heaven. The mango trees formed part of a “live fence”—that is, they had been planted in a line that must have demarcated a property boundary, and just beyond the trees were empty fields. There were 13 mango trees all in a row; the monkeys fanned out and feasted for hours.

I thought surely that by the end of the day, they would return back to more familiar parts, but they did not. They took off again, in the opposite direction that I expected, and they followed another corridor of trees between a pasture and a plantain field. If Wrinkle Belly himself wouldn’t have been there, I never would have believed that these were my monkeys, so far away from home.

On Wednesday morning, I found them exactly where I’d left them on Tuesday night. They quickly proceeded along the corridor, but I’m not really sure why. There didn’t seem to be any foods up there that wouldn’t have been otherwise available in their regular range, but there sure was another group of monkeys who wanted to keep them away. Every once and a while, some monkey from the North Group would venture a little farther in to the corridor, and then a monkey from the other group would howl and chase them back. I even saw Wrinkle Belly get in a little skirmish, but no worries—he emerged unscathed.

At any rate, the North Group slunk back down the corridor on Wednesday evening, and they slept by those 13 mango trees that had begun this whole journey. They spent the entire day on Thursday in the vicinity of the mango patch. There was a great commotion around mid-day as another group (possibly the same one they’d skirmished with the day before) tried to move into the territory. But the ferocious howls of Wrinkle Belly et al held them at bay. Late in the afternoon, the sky clouded over and it began to rain—then to really pour. I guess this is foreshadowing the rainy season to come. Its been dry so long that I forgot how rain felt. The air became deliciously cool, and I stretched my arms out to soak up as much water as I could. For the first time in months, I felt hydrated. Everything in the forest started to look a little greener and less sharp. As the rain subsided, the North Group monkeys had one last meal of unripe mangos and then they began their descent. They traveled and traveled, finally reaching Spondias Lane and refueling with some young Spondias leaves before they continued on their way. As the sun was setting, they were poised right on the edge of the forest patch where Simeon and I found them on the very first day. So it was a long strange journey, but the monkeys ended up back where they’ve always been. I have a feeling they will revisit this mango patch, and at least now after having followed them up there, I will know where to look.

Its been a long week and a long month; I'll be taking a rest from the forest for a couple of days. Thanks for reading! Until later then.