Having secured an Indian visa for another year, we returned to Goa and even more rain than had followed us round the U.K. during our stay.
The two baby Langurs have grown but didn’t seem that thrilled I was back, being been quite happy with their substitute mum. In fact Puck the younger of the two, on the first few nights had a spell of looking and calling for his new mum, before he would settle down to sleep. We have yet to build them an outside pen where they can learn to manage without human support for short spells. Although this wouldn’t happen in the wild until about 2 yrs of age, with each other for comfort, it should be achievable much sooner, without causing any harm. Pixie, our first Langur baby quickly accepted brief separations, and he didn’t have a ‘brother’ for comfort. Of necessity I need to do other things and with no volunteers since our return, I have barely been able to get out yet, hopefully as the monsoon ends, some volunteer monkey sitters will soon return. It has also been the Ganesh 15 day festival so all the Hindu staff have also been off celebrating.
A new bonnet macaque monkey arrived unexpectedly today, as yet not even named. This is a female of approx. 9 months which was found wandering around Calangute, one of the tourist towns, with a long rope still attached around her neck. She was caught by the Forestry services and brought into us.
All these baby monkeys have come into captivity only after the killing of their mother, and she had obviously been brought to Goa in order to use to beg from the tourists. Although understandably a little wary of everything at the moment, she only took minutes to make friends with one of our 17 rescued cats, and being a young female she should quite easily join one of the other groups we have established. We have often found a very strong affection between these orphaned babies, and cats. When tied up in isolation they get any comfort they can by befriending any available cat, and the cats usually appreciate the grooming and attention in return.
Mowgli the mongoose, now spends all day and often nights too, just roaming around the gardens, returning when called just for food and treats. He is still only half grown and several adults have been seen in the area lately, taking advantage of the frogs and other small animals out in the monsoon rains.
Apart from learning how to relate safely to them he also has to watch out for ‘Trinity’, our last rescued dog. She came to us after loosing one leg in a traffic accident but is still a confident street dog, and has yet to learn not to chase small fluffy animals she’s never seen before; three legs are no problem to her getting about. Having been living with all sorts of small animals from baby monkeys to palm squirrels, the other resident dogs just take Mowgli’s visits in their stride, but Trinity is going to need to have some training to accept that these small fluffy things are in fact top of the pack here!
