Monkey business

Vervet monkeys are smarter than you think…

Kate Clarence says her two spaniels, Pitcher and Sandy, are very protective of her and Thandi Thutshini, her right hand, so the monkeys keep their distance. But as soon as Kate goes for a walk on the beach with the dogs the monkeys enter the house in search of food.

Kate says the monkeys don’t pose similar problems in the villages inland, because “they get butchered and eaten there.”

On the farm The Outpost outside Port Edward, where they grow bananas, macadamia nuts, sugar cane, lychees and dragon fruit, Ishmael Mkhize tells us about their problems with monkeys on a tour of the farm.

“We noticed bananas were disappearing from the packing shed. When we investigated, we discovered the monkeys would gather in a big old wild fig next to the shed at around 12:50, just before lunch time. When the workers leave for lunch, they would jump onto the roof, climb through a row of small windows and help themselves. And then, an hour later, around 13:45, just before the workers return, the monkeys would be off… each with a bunch of bananas for the road.”