Via Drudge: Long-tailed macaques living near an Indonesian temple have figured out how to run a ransom racket on visiting tourists.
The monkeys grab valuables, such as glasses, hats, cameras or, in one case, a wad of cash from the ticket booth, then wait for temple staff to offer them food before dropping their ill-gotten gains and dashing off with the tasty prize.
Although this behaviour has been reported anecdotally at Uluwatu Temple on the island of Bali for years, it had never been studied scientifically in the wild. So Fany Brotcorne, a primatologist at the University of Liège in Belgium, and her colleagues set out to discover how and why it has spread through the monkey population.
“It’s a unique behaviour. The Uluwatu Temple is the only place in Bali where it’s found,” she says, which suggests it is a learned behaviour rather than an innate ability.
Brotcorne wanted to determine whether it was indeed cultural, which could help us better understand the monkey’s cognitive abilities, and even human evolution.
The monkeys grab valuables, such as glasses, hats, cameras or, in one case, a wad of cash from the ticket booth, then wait for temple staff to offer them food before dropping their ill-gotten gains and dashing off with the tasty prize.
Although this behaviour has been reported anecdotally at Uluwatu Temple on the island of Bali for years, it had never been studied scientifically in the wild. So Fany Brotcorne, a primatologist at the University of Liège in Belgium, and her colleagues set out to discover how and why it has spread through the monkey population.
“It’s a unique behaviour. The Uluwatu Temple is the only place in Bali where it’s found,” she says, which suggests it is a learned behaviour rather than an innate ability.
Brotcorne wanted to determine whether it was indeed cultural, which could help us better understand the monkey’s cognitive abilities, and even human evolution.
4 comments:
We are members of the San Diego Zoo. We have many visitors and most want to see visit that great zoo. I'll walk around for awhile but when we get to the monkeys I let them continue and just sit and watch. The primates are most fascinating.
Two women were walking down the street and passed an Italian organ grinder with his monkey.
One women dropped a coin in the monkey's cup.
Other woman said "Why did you do that, I thought you hated Italians.'
"I do, but they are just so cute when they are little."
LOL!
Progressive
Post a Comment