Bushbaby Tales...
The following are some tales of bushbaby antics you might enjoy...
You might be interested in the bushbaby incident that occured last
spring/summer. We had a baby bushbaby born. So we removed the mother and
baby (because we were not sure how the baby would be treated by the
male and other female in the exhibit). This in itself was a comedy of
errors as we got the wrong mother at first, then figured it out and
corrected the situation. We then took mom & jr. off exhibit to give them
some privacy. Each time we fed & checked them mom was there & jr. was in
the nest box. Finally we decided to check on the little one as we had
not seen it for awhile. Upon inspection we found no baby! We finally
found that mom had figured out a way to get out of the cage & and had
taken the baby into the upper ceiling spaces of the building. She was
sly enough to be there at feeding times and return to the youngster
after we were gone. We searched vigoruosly but with no results. So we
let her come and go freely and she became confident with the situation.
Eventually when the youngster became old enough she brought it down to
the feeding station and and we were able to shut them in the repaired
cage by the end of summer. Mom & the no-longer-little one are now doing
fine. So, for the summer we had free roaming bushbabys in our attic.
submitted 8 Jan 98 by:
Dan Alldredge, Zookeeper
Mesker Park Zoo, Evansville, Indiana
Living in Kenya, East Africa, for many years, we always had pets in our house.
By far the most delightful was Boingie, our bushbaby.
Coming home from a meeting one day, one of our sons surprised me with a present:
in an African basket covered with a moskito net, we found a tiny bushbaby, which
he had - I must admit - "stolen" from his mother by climbing up into an acacia
tree and removing him from the nest.
Tiny noises, not unlike those made by humans by clicking together two
fingernails, announced it was time for a meal. The first meal we supplied - not
being familiar with bushbaby diet - was a huge moth. We left him with it and
after a few minutes extracted the wings from the basket, the body having been
devoured. We also fed him milk from a small bottle and an eye dropper. He loved
it. But usually the evenings found us walking the length of our airstrip,
hunting for grasshoppers. Yes, he loved them. But you should have seen him go
for termites! (Not to speak of chocolate a little later. And the sugar he helped
himself to whenever the sideboard sliding door was left open!)
Though being a nocturnal creature, he was curious enough to leave his "nest" on
top of our bedroom closet whenever he heard unfamiliar voices. He felt it his
duty to inspect our guests, some of who loved it when he jumped on their
shoulders. Others didn't!
Anyway, our children (and most small guests, too) loved it when he woke them by
jumping on their chests early in the morning. The usual game involved throwing
Boingie into "space" and his repeated landing on the bedcovers.
When the kids were away at boarding school, he only had my husband and myself
for playmates. After (usually) sleeping all day, he would awake and head out
into the trees, come evening. Anytime during the night I would feel the "plop"
on my pillow and automatically supplied what he had come for: a tickling which
he relished. After a few minutes he would jump up onto the open door and head
for the trees again, till about 6 a.m. when he would hang from the headboard by
his toes, stand on my husband's forehead on his front feet, and lick him awake.
Soon he would tire and proceed to prepare his sleeping quarters by extracting a
tie from my husband's side of the closet and depositing it in his "nest".
Several ties later he'd find it comfortable enough, yawn and settle down for the
day. Things became critical when there were no ties left to wear and my husband
had to "borrow" one from Boingie. He'd stand up on his hindlegs and defend his
property.
He was about 11 months old when he first came home, his beautiful fur roughed up
and pieces missing between his eyes. Our friend, a vet, had a look at him and
declared: "This is not serious. He has found a mate. They always fight during
mating time." Well, instead of bringing her home she took him away. He would
start staying out for the day. We'd hear them bouncing around on the roof at
night, and eventually his visits stopped abruptly. Once more I saw him. I heard
him call (no longer the baby call of former days) and saw him in one of the
acacias near the house. Recognizing me he descended but stayed out of reach.
Boingie was now no longer a family pet but had returned to his natural
environment and habits. We missed him a lot! And still do.
Edelgard and Heinz Battermann
Ditzingen, Germany
Australian entertainer Rolf Harris has blamed himself for the London Zoo escape of a rare Senegal bushbaby, believed to be the only one in captivity. The tiny creature has now been missing for 11 days after making a successful bid for freedom. Despite attempts to lure him back with tasty titbits, zoo officials admit the African creature with a wide-eyed look of innocence has outwitted them. The getaway happened during filming for the BBC television series Zoo Watch, presented by Harris. Camera crews invaded the zoo's nocturnal house to watch the bushbaby being introduced to its new surroundings. As a keeper climbed into the new pen and tried to release him from his metal carrying cage, the bushbaby made the freedom dash. As he watched the animal disappear, Harris said, "It's all my fault. If we hadn't have been filming this would never have happened."
Reported by Peter Darben
Seen in Brisbane Courier Mail on 8/8/95
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