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In this National Geographic article a scientist discusses her observations on the behavior of baboons. Work with olive baboons in Kenya led her to conclude that the stable core of baboon troops consists of females, and not males, as was previously believed.
By Shirley C. Strum
I was watching Naomi, one of my favorite baboons, sitting with her friend Queenie. Entering notes about Naomi's behavior on my clipboard data sheet, I suddenly felt small hands touch my back, so softly that at first I could not identify the sensation. Surprised and puzzled, I slowly turned my head and saw that it was Robin, Naomi's two-year-old daughter, grooming the thin cotton of my shirt.
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It was a gesture that thrilled me.
Early that still African evening I had come out on the brink of an imposing escarpment, one of the parallel cliffs that slash the plains of Kekopey Ranch in Kenya. A troop of baboons ambled ahead of me. They were still playing and grooming before choosing resting-places for the night on the ledges and in the niches of the cliff. Large trees—the natural dormitories for any monkey—are scarce in this part of the East African Rift country.
This was a peaceful time, relished by all. Both with each other and with me, the animals were more relaxed than in the active hours of the day. The baboons rarely moved away from me. After all, they had known me now for 16 months.
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The day's last observation period was devoted to Naomi. Hers were the deepest of all those amber eyes that are characteristic of baboons. She was the largest of the females, blending a look of ungainliness with a certain self-assurance of gait.
Then came the feather touch of Robin's grooming, and I forgot everything else. With this first timid statement—baboons establish and cement bonds among themselves by grooming—she was issuing a cautious greeting. It was as if she were saying, “You are special to me. Am I special to you?”
Little could Robin know what she meant to me, for I was not about to reveal my feelings for her. And if this declaration sounds hard-hearted, it states a position central to my study of the baboons. My object was to avoid intimacy, to be at the same time tolerated but unobtrusive. My aim was to let the baboons tell me about their primateness, not to force my humanness on them. It was an objective unattainable in the absolute sense, for there I was, quite openly, another living primate in their midst.
Robin's gesture of trust was a precious personal reward culminating a long association with a tightly knit group of monkeys known as the “Pumphouse Gang.” Of course, it was not a gang at all, but one of nine troops of olive baboons (Papio anubis) totaling about 800 animals that ranged the grass and scrublands around Lake Elmenteita, famous for its flamingos and pelicans. An earlier observer had given this name to the baboon troop often seen around a pumping station that forced water up a cliff to an outlying residence and watering tanks of Kekopey, a 48,000-acre cattle ranch near Gilgil.
Kekopey's owners, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Cole, had permitted me to use that unoccupied foreman's house, some distance from the main ranch buildings, as headquarters for my baboon study. In my fieldwork, I had an ally in Dr. Timothy Ransom, who had come to photograph the baboons. Tim had studied baboons himself at the Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania.
I had come to Kenya on a National Science Foundation grant to do research for my doctoral thesis at the University of California at Berkeley. As I descended into the Rift on the road from Nairobi to Gilgil, the view took away my breath. The grasslands seemed to stretch endlessly north and south, flanked by shadow-dappled hills.
Kekopey shared this grandeur, with parallel cliffs running through vast brown pastures. The plains, which the cattle shared with impala, Thomson's gazelle, eland, and many other animals, had been cleared of their tangled natural cover. Although lush and green after rains, Kekopey usually presented a hot and dusty face to animals and humans alike.
Baboons are among the largest and most adaptable monkeys on the African Continent. They inhabit nearly all areas, from forests to semideserts, from Ethiopia to the Cape of Good Hope.
Eating grass, especially tender young shoots, the baboons of Kekopey compete with the cattle and other wildlife. But with their nimble hands they also gather any berry, seed, root, pod, or flower they can find. This diversity of diet favors the baboons. During bad times, when all other wildlife would be thin, the baboons could maintain themselves.
My hardest task was winning the trust of the baboons. They had learned to fear humans, who usually either chased them with dogs, threw rocks at them, or shot them for sport. These animals had grown accustomed to a van used by an earlier researcher, Dr. Robert Harding, but I felt I needed to be closer to them, which meant observing them on foot. It was only after several months, though, that they tolerated my presence.
A baboon group lives and moves as a unit. As I began my study, Pumphouse consisted of 61 individuals, from new infants, black in color, to large males weighing more than 75 pounds. The troop was composed of 7 adult males, 21 adult females, and 33 immature individuals. Distinguishable from one another after a time, these animals soon became as familiar to me as my dearest friends. But knowing the individuals was merely the first step in making sense of what I was seeing and recording.
It took me many months to fit pieces to the puzzle of baboon social structure. According to one well-established theory, baboon society is a closed and rigidly organized system governed by adult males, few in number but all-dominant. Membership is stable except for births and deaths. Adult males are viewed as the core of the troop, affording protection, asserting discipline, and providing cohesion through their leadership. The role of females is merely reproductive.
This view was truly a breakthrough in its time, but from new information about primates, gathered worldwide, I had my doubts that even baboons could be so easily explained. I questioned that the adult males, a small percentage of the troop, could be responsible so totally for its social life.
When I went to work at Kekopey, I soon learned that troop membership was not static. During my stay, several males from other troops joined Pumphouse. Meanwhile a number of the resident males left to join neighboring troops.
The fortunes of Ray, one of the immigrant males, were closely intertwined with my own. Ray and I joined Pumphouse at the same time. We both sought acceptance and we both—at first—were viewed askance.
I wondered how Ray would gain entry to the troop. Would this splendid baboon, at least 12 years old and in his sleek prime of life, walk into the troop and sit next to a female, demanding that she groom him? Would he find the top male and offer a challenge with bared canines, stares, ground slapping, and aggressive pant-grunting?
Surprising to me, Ray did none of these things. Instead he sat, as I was sitting, trying to be as unobtrusive as possible. What Ray was watching from the fringes of the troop I could only guess. Now, much later, I have a better idea of what he learned, for I learned along with him.
Obviously, adult males crossed over from troop to troop. So it became apparent that smaller units, such as the family, assured overall stability to the troop. Among baboons, as among most monkeys and apes, paternity is neither known nor recognized. A family comprises an adult female and all her offspring, including large sons not fully mature.
I found baboon family ties to be very strong. Family members spend more time with each other than with other baboons. They walk and sit together, rest and groom together, and give each other assistance in times of conflict with animals outside the family. A young baboon's physical independence of its mother does not sever their relationship. As with chimpanzees—and humans—emotional bonds endure.
Peggy's family was the largest in Pumphouse. Her youngest offspring was an infant, Paul, followed in ascending age by the 2-year-old Blue, the nearly adult Thea, and handsome O'Henry. Though younger than O'Henry, Thea would be physically and sexually mature before her brother. While Thea at age 4 might have her first infant on the way, O'Henry would be 8 before being adult in appearance and behavior. In the wild they attain a maximum age of perhaps 20 years.
Peggy spent a great deal of time grooming Paul. Using her fingers to part his hair, she would remove insects and bits of grass, seed, dirt, and dead skin. The most comforting form of contact, grooming reinforces a mother's emotional bonds with her infant. It also serves to establish or maintain relationships with other baboons. Grooming stimulates rivalry already existing between siblings, and Blue would try to nuzzle his way between Peggy and Paul or give Peggy an invitation to groom him instead.
Peggy and Thea were now good companions as well as mother and daughter. Thea also doted on her youngest brother. O'Henry was the loner, spending less and less time—unlike Blue—with other juveniles. When he did socialize, it was with his own family.
In squabbles within the family, Peggy would invariably favor and support the youngest of her offspring involved. The others would choose the side that offered the best advantage, and in this juggling for power the squabble dragged on. But in the face of any challenge from without, the baboon family always presented a common front.
Friendship as applied to animals is an anthropomorphic concept, but I think it has meaning among baboons. Ties across family lines were often long lasting, and these “friends” liked simply to be together, sitting, resting, sleeping, grooming, and often moving near one another when the troop foraged.
I observed only two types of baboon friendships, those between females, and those between males and females—never between adult males. Just as family ties form the basic structure of the troop, so friendships, I discovered, provide the critical attachments between males and females, and between different family groups. Friendships between males and females seemed neither so intense nor so lasting as between females.
My understanding of the place of males in the troop began through observation of Ray's behavior as he sought the company of Naomi. Every one of the seven adult males had at least one female friend, and the cementing of that first friendship was a new male's key to group acceptance. Even if such alliances began when the female was sexually receptive, the close association continued throughout nonmating periods.
Female baboons are sexually attractive to males for only a very short period. Usually a female such as Naomi was either pregnant or nursing an infant, but in both these states she still had male friendships.
Naomi's acceptance of Ray seemed to lessen his timidity, and he began to approach other females. But Ray's first serious encounters with adult males came when Naomi became sexually receptive again. At this time a female forms a temporary relationship with one male, or with several males in succession. The involved pair are said to be “in consort.” Each consortship may last only a few minutes or continue for several days.
Ray acted like a consort male and followed Naomi doggedly, grooming her very frequently. Other males also were attracted to Naomi—not only her longtime friend, Radcliff, an exceedingly elegant male, but also Carl and Sumner, probably the oldest of the males. The veteran Pumphouse males could no longer ignore Ray, for he stayed close on Naomi's heels. Wherever she went, there too went Ray, Rad, Carl, and Sumner.
The males, with eyelids lowered, began yawning to display their canines—certain signs of tension. Rad began to slap the ground, pant-grunting a threat. Ray was caught in the middle, trying to stay close to Naomi and at the same time keep track of what the males behind him were up to.
To complicate matters, Big Sam, a younger male, joined the following. Most powerful looking of the Pumphouse males, he had a crooked smile, caused by an injury, that gave him—to me—a menacing appearance.
After a bit of feinting, a fight erupted—not between Rad and Ray but between Big Sam and Ray.
Both males were thoroughly frightened, but during the grappling only one male screamed. An adult male scream is a very serious statement of fear. Then, as suddenly as it began, the scrap ended. Neither Big Sam nor Ray had suffered hurt. Ray broke away and ran off, while Big Sam continued to gesture threateningly at his retreating figure.
The fight had carried off in one direction; the noncombatants had gone in another. Far off was Naomi—with a new consort.
While the other males mated with Naomi, Ray stayed at a distance. I suspected that he might revert to his position of the early days, peripheral and friendless. But soon Ray made two moves to rejoin the troop. He sought out Kate, one of his other female friends. He also began a long spell of intimidating Big Sam, which ended a month later when Big Sam capitulated to Ray's harassment.
Big Sam and Ray exchanged positions. Big Sam now acted like a new and friendless male, while Ray added more females to his list of friends. Other adult males deferred to him, or at least avoided him. The change did not last; the situation was reversed not once but twice more during my stay.
The adult males kept shifting from troop to troop. Virgil moved in, briefly, from Eburu Cliffs troop. Then two other Eburu males, Strider and Brutus, joined Pumphouse. Changes continued when two of the troop's original males were killed and one subadult male, Taffy, left to join Crater troop.
Normally males would have little to do with each other, spending the time quietly feeding or sitting with their favorite female friends. But the joining, departure, or death of a male, a serious fight, the sexual receptivity of a female—all these could drastically change a male's relationship to other males. In contrast, a female's relationships seemed stable and unchanging.
Though baboons were known to be omnivorous, Dr. Harding, who studied Pumphouse before me, was the first researcher to observe meat eating as a rather commonplace event. My own study corroborated his findings—and also saw the baboons' little-known hunting skills develop dramatically.
Usually it was the scream of the captured animal that alerted me to a kill, but on a number of occasions I witnessed successful hunts. In most cases, but not always, the prey died during capture, most frequently of a broken neck. The animals that the baboons took were always smaller than themselves. Cape hares were a favorite. The young of small antelope such as steenbok, dik-dik, klipspringer, and Thomson's gazelle, together with an occasional bird, rounded out the list. In a few cases the baboons took infants of the larger reedbuck and impala.
Dr. Harding had found that the killers and consumers were almost exclusively adult males. But in the course of my study, certain female baboons, juveniles, and even infants showed an interest in meat.
What began as a rare occurrence became a part of daily life by the finish of my study. Carl was the most persistent hunter, until he suffered a serious injury to his arm. Then Rad came into his own. When Rad took off after a herd of Thomson's gazelle, nearby males often attended him. At the victim's scream, the others would come running.
Out of this pattern evolved a truly exciting happening.
It began as usual. Rad closed in on a group of Tommies, as the gazelles are commonly called. Most were adult females with grown young, moving across an open grassy area. With my binoculars, I could see a mother with a small baby on the far side of the herd.
Rad scattered the rest of the animals, surprised the mother and infant, and almost succeeded in grabbing the baby. Having missed once, Rad was in earnest and ran after them full speed. Then, all at once, I noticed other males coming toward Rad!
Rad was at the end of his endurance, but just as he gave up Sumner took over, with Big Sam and Brutus also converging on the prey. The chase turned into a relay, one male running after the baby and another taking over when the first tired. Finally Big Sam chased the young antelope into Brutus's grasp.
The baboons obviously learned from this experience. More and more frequently, I witnessed hunting in which one or more baboons chased a Tommy toward another hunter. The success rate climbed steeply.
The Pumphouse baboons killed more prey than baboons observed anywhere else. There is logic, but no proof, behind the apparent explanation: As ranching operations extended cattle pasture and introduced irrigation, the leopards, lions, and hyenas—antelopes' and baboons' natural predators—were being shot and trapped out. So more meat on the hoof was available to the baboons, and their own risk of being attacked had diminished.
A memorable event during a tense meat-eating session almost coincided in time with Robin's gentle touch of friendship. The two occurrences confirmed my final acceptance into Pumphouse.
Sumner had just killed a young Tommy. Strider loitered about nearby. The commotion drew in other males, including Ray and Big Sam, who were again—as periodically—at loggerheads. When Big Sam got the carcass, Ray intensified his threats.
Then it happened. With other males still present, I was startled to see Ray turn to look at me. There was no mistaking what he meant. He narrowed his eyes, pulled his ears back flat, and raised his eyebrows, the while hunching his shoulders. It was a familiar gesture of greeting: He was asking me to approach him.
I made no move toward him—this I had forbidden myself—but the event should have prepared me for what followed. Big Sam looked to Rad for support against Ray, but Rad consciously ignored the gambit. Seeing Big Sam thus deserted, Ray rushed him and chased him a short distance away.
Ray turned suddenly and came toward me. I can't describe the fear that seized me, seeing Ray with hair standing on end and so full of aggressive intent, rushing straight at me. I turned quickly to avoid his glance, my heart beating hard. Ray pulled up short.
Ray, I thought, frustrated by Big Sam, was directing his aggression at me. Ray made a second and then a third rush at me, and I finally realized that he was not threatening me at all but instead was trying, in typical baboon fashion, to enlist my support against Big Sam! I had to decline, and signaled this to Ray by turning completely away.
Ray won that day without me, but I shall never forget the compliment he paid me.
In the end the Pumphouse baboons did accept me, but on their own terms. I had not sought intimacy with them. Not to respond to their overtures was often very hard, as when young Dylan, for example, mischievously untied my shoelaces and others, taking courage, rushed to imitate him.
Learning about baboons, I became convinced that many old notions about these monkeys needed revision. But my own study has only touched the surface. By continuing our observations of nonhuman primate behavior, we can hope to gain a better understanding of ourselves: what we share with other primates, and what is uniquely ours.
My last day with Pumphouse was, for the baboons, just like any other. But to me, as the animals made their way to the cliffs where they would sleep, everything seemed more beautiful than ever. The air was already cool, yet the rocks, heated by the sun, still gave off warmth. The sunset was like a testimonial to the lovely day just past.
Slowly, in twos and threes, the baboons climbed the cliff face to find comfortable places for the night. No stranger could have guessed that 65 of my animal subjects and friends rested there, had it not been for a baboon sound now and then. As I turned to go, a male—I don't know which one—cried “Wahoo!” Silence magnified the echo from the cliff.
Source: National Geographic, May 1975.
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Baboon; Monkey (animal)
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