I live in South Africa, a very beautiful part of the world. Driving through our towns you will witness grasslands, mountains and majestic cliffs, lush green groves, dessert sands, and more. Like our people, our landscapes are diverse, they are also home to a very large variety of wildlife. While most of the wildlife is not left to roam freely, instead they are kept in huge wildlife parks and nature reserves, there is one species that has free reign over the land, especially along our coastal region in Kwa Zulu Natal.

Introducing the Vervet Monkey.

Little critter sitting on my fence eating sugarcane

These little critters are native to the whole of Africa, but are abundantly found here in the Southern Tip of the continent. They roam the streets freely, usually like they own them! The move in troops of sometimes 20 or more – they’re the true gangs of Paradise!

Don’t be fooled by these cute furry creatures though – they often cause havoc and if they feel threatened, they can be quite vicious (although it is very rare that the attack)! They have a tendency to “break” into homes, steal food and always, always leave a mess behind. Recently a troop decided to invade my home (silly me, I left a window open)! They helped themselves to peanuts, most of which ended up scattered on the floor, threw what must have been the ultimate monkey party and on departure, one of them left a great big POOP on my counter – just lovely!

Yup, they left me a little "gift"

The Vervet Monkeys are extremely intelligent creatures and when they do land up in my yard, I can spend hours watching them playing, communicating with each other and generally just monkeying-around. They have grown very accustomed to humans and don’t mind if you hang around nearby. Some people feed the monkeys, in this case the monkey will come right up to you and take food from your hand. Feeding the monkeys is highly discouraged in our community though, so I don’t do it. By feeding monkeys human food, you mess with their natural diet, and this causes health problems for them. It also makes them lazy and they forget how to hunt, causing some troops to actually die of starvation if their relied upon source of food disappears! Last but not least, it also encourages them to leave the nature reserves and enter the cities for “easy meals”, this is when they cause havoc in the suburbs but also become vulnerable to being hit by cars, mauled by dogs and sadly, intentionally hurt by humans (how horrid is the human race)!

This is the type of MONKEY BUSINESS THEY GET UP TO

(Photos are all my own)

Monkey taking over the jungle gym at my kid's school

Enjoying the view from my roof

Because they monkeys are often subject to injury, many organizations have been set up to rescue those that have been injured or who are disease ridden. Monkey Helpline is one such initiative.

Just MONKEYING AROUND

The monkeys visit my home at least every second day, this is because I love right next to a sugarcane field, the sugarcane is one of their favorite treats! They will sit up on my fence or roof munching on the sugary sweetness for a good few hours. Which I am happy to let them do, as long as the keep their business outdoors, and not on my kitchen counter!

These critters have become part of our lives and while there are horrible humans who find it funny to shoot them with air guns or and paintball rifles, the majority of us leave them be, we appreciate their visits and welcome them into our suburbs – the land did belong to them first after all!