Feeding Frenzy

March 8, 2014 at 11:55 am | Posted in itchy mouth | Leave a comment
Tags: Animals, Nature, Uniquely Singapore

Itchyfingers just finished our little walk up the Bukit Timah Nature Reserves and were about to head back to the car park when we smelt a strong aroma in the air.  It was the distinctly sweet smell of mango, a tropical fruit. We also noticed a lot of people stopping by the trees next to the Visitors Centre. What were they looking at?

Then we heard them.

So, up on a tree was a monkey. A Long-tailed Macaque to be exact.

Then on another tree, another macaque jumped onto a lower branch. Oh, then there was another! And another! So many macaques! Besides making so much noise jumping from one branch or one tree to another, these guys were also throwing something down, creating a loud “pong” sound!

Oooo? What’s this?

We could smell mangoes in the air, but this fruit that was thrown down looked different from the usual mangoes we find in the supermarkets.

Then we found another half-eaten one. Tisu Boy picked this up and confirmed it was a mango from its fibrous texture and smell. This must be a different sub-species of mango. It was now that I remembered seeing these fruits dropped from the roadside mango trees at my old place…

So why were the macaques throwing the mangoes down? Were they trying to drive away the nosey human below? But looking at the fruits that were thrown down, I think some of them might not be sweet enough and since there were abundance of these, the macaques can afford to be choosy….in fact, very choosy! But maybe some more mischievous guys were also dumping the good fruits for fun…Hahah…Some folks couldn’t resist the sweet smell and started picking up those uneaten and seemingly good ones to be brought home for consumption…some aunties even went right below the trees where the monkeys were throwing the fruity bombs! Hahah…quite dangerous leh, I think it should be quite painful to be hit from such a height! :p

A macaque descended low enough for us to take a photo…

Yum! Delicious! Mango is also one of my favourite fruits! 

It was nice to see these native wild macaques feeding freely on the fruits in our nature reserves, instead of waiting to be fed by visitors. Feeding of wild animals, especially the macaques, has long been a problem. These intelligent mammals will quickly associate human with food, and if they were not fed, they will turn aggressive and snatch any bags of food in sight. Those people who stay near nature reserves often complain of macaques raiding their rubbish bins, and some bolder ones even sneaked inside houses to steal food, making themselves a nuisance. As a result, some aggressive ones were culled by the authorities. People should understand that there is absolutely no need to feed these animals, as they can find abundance of food in the forests. Feeding them will just change their natural behaviour and create problems for them and ourselves.

Itchyfingers were also glad to see no feeding activities in the resort of Taman Negara National Park, Malaysia. We were birdwatching around the resort one late afternoon when we saw this group of Long-tailed Macaques. Being so near to the resort with so many visitors, I was happy to see them foraging the surrounding fruit trees for snack. People were happily looking and taking photos of them, and none attempted to lure them closer with human food. A fine example of how human and monkeys are co-exist together peacefully!

A young female enjoying her afternoon snack…

Mummy and her baby….how sweet!

One of the starfruit trees around the resort…Quite small huh…Too bad I dun really like the fruit…hahah….

Also see related post:
> Monkey See, Monkey Do