DEPRIVED of their preferred food source – bananas, peanuts and other goodies brought in by tourists now kept away by the coronavirus – hungry monkeys on the island of Bali have taken to raiding villagers’ homes.
Villagers in Sangeh say the grey long-tailed macaques have been venturing out from a sanctuary about 500m away to hang out on their roofs and await the right time to swoop down and snatch a snack.
Worried the sporadic sorties will escalate into an all-out assault on the village, residents have been taking food to the Sangeh Monkey Forest to placate the primates.
“We are afraid the hungry monkeys will turn wild and vicious,” villager Saskara Gustu Alit said.
About 600 of the macaques live in the forest sanctuary, swinging from the tall nutmeg trees and leaping about the famous Pura Bukit Sari temple, and are considered sacred.
In normal times the protected jungle in the southeast of the island is popular among local residents for wedding photos, as well as among international visitors.
The relatively tame monkeys can be easily coaxed to sit on a shoulder or lap for a peanut or two.
Ordinarily, tourism is the main source of income for Bali’s four million residents, who welcomed more than five million foreign visitors annually before the pandemic.
The Sangeh Monkey Forest typically had about 6,000 visitors a month, but as the pandemic spread last year and international travel dropped off dramatically, that number dropped to about 500.
Since July, when Indonesia banned all foreign travellers to the island and shut the sanctuary to local residents as well, there has been nobody.
Not only has that meant nobody bringing in food for the monkeys, the sanctuary has also lost out on admission fees and is running low on money to purchase food, said operations manager Made Mohon.
The donations from villagers have helped, but they are also feeling the economic pinch and are gradually giving less, he said.
“This prolonged pandemic is beyond our expectations,” Made said. “Food for monkeys has become a problem.”
Food costs run about 850,000 rupiah (RM247) a day, Made said, for 200kg of cassava, the monkeys’ staple food, and 10kg of bananas.
The macaque is an omnivore and can eat a variety of animals and plants found in the jungle, but those in the Sangeh Monkey Forest have had enough contact with humans over the years that they seem to prefer other things.
And they’re not afraid to take matters into their own hands, Saskara said.
Frequently, monkeys wander into the village and sit on roofs, occasionally removing tiles and dropping them to the ground.
When villagers put out daily religious offerings of food on their terraces, the monkeys make off with them.
“A few days ago I attended a traditional ceremony at a temple near the Sangeh forest,” Saskara said.
“When I took out two plastic bags containing food and flowers as offerings, two monkeys grabbed it all and ran into the forest.”
Normally, the monkeys spend all day interacting with visitors – stealing sunglasses and water bottles, jumping on shoulders – and Saskara theorises that more than just being hungry, they are bored.
“That’s why I have urged villagers here to come and play with the monkeys and offer them food,” he said. “I think they need to interact with humans.” — AP
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