
Brutal baboon battle erupts for throne at Toronto Zoo after matriarch dies - curtis
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2015/11/29/brutal-baboon-battle-erupts-for-throne-at-toronto-zoo-after-matriarch-dies.html
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scwoodal
> So Dutton and his staff anesthetized her to figure out what was going on. An
> exploratory surgery revealed a tumour in her uterus that had spread to the
> abdominal wall. It was terminal, Dutton said, so they euthanized her on the
> operating room table on Dec. 5, 2014.

> “You have to let their natural behaviour happen,” Franke said. “They have to
> sort it out. In the wild, a lot of times it’s to the death.”

Which makes me wonder how things would have played out had they not euthanized
the current matriarch. Would she have lived long enough to allow her oldest
daughter to mature? Would have there been other behaviors/rituals the baboons
would have gone through because they would have seen the matriarch pass
naturally?

Edit: grammar

~~~
funkyy
It seems the caretaker confuses himself here. Allowing animals to sort things
out by themselves, but removing leader unnaturally? Sounds like there was a
lack of deeper thought in here and human emotions (saving animal from pain)
took over logic.

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icebraining
Killing the animal earlier is not really unnatural - animals die suddenly all
the time.

There's a difference between "natural" and "what would have happened
otherwise".

~~~
funkyy
That's right, unless animals felt safe since they are in Zoo and their
behavior is different than out in dangerous nature...

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EdSharkey
There's a lot of grumpy sarcasm in this thread! I wonder, might a violent
primate story stir some innate tendency towards violence in humans?

Or maybe it's just monday during holiday season and that has people rumpled.
Or maybe too much of the internet is leaking into HN these days ... :(

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vermontdevil
Ridiculous for them to close the exhibit. Lest we can't have people learn and
understand how different animals behave within their groupings.

~~~
Rifu
From what I understood from the article, they closed the exhibit because they
didn't want the visitors to see the (potentially unsettling/traumatizing)
injuries on the baboons. Which actually sounds reasonable to me.

~~~
jws
At something like 4 or 5 years old I lived in Pittsburgh. The zoo had an
elephant with a red eye that terrified me. These were the days of bars and
chains and up close displays so you could see right into its horrible red eye
and after it tore aside the bars and snapped its chains it could easily
destroy you. (Note: 4 or 5 years old). The elephants were one of my brothers
favorites so we spent a lot of time there. I can still see that eye after more
than half a lifetime, I expect I'll still see it at the end. (LOTR could have
had a much more ominous eye.) I spent a lot of time looking at the animal
opposite the aisle pretending there was no elephant, it was in a low cage, I
have no recollection of what it was, maybe a marsupial? Now I can hear the
elephant shifting its weight back and forth behind me.

Point being, eventually… A zoo probably does not want 4 year old children
looking at a baboon with the side of its face torn away to expose the bone. In
this case, "think of the children".

~~~
highstep
Children all over the world participate in animal slaughter ever day. That's
just a normal part of being a human (historically). Only recently has our
society hidden that from view. Now as a result, we're becoming increasingly
crueless about the realities of survial.

~~~
jessaustin
I agree, but personally it has been somewhat emotionally taxing that this deer
season I've had to cut _two_ throats. Too much bow hunting seems to have left
me a poorer shot with a gun.

At some level, however, if I'm not comfortable cutting the throat of an animal
that is staring at me in fear, how comfortable should I be eating meat?

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tomohawk
At a wolf preserve, we were told that one of the packs was currently
leaderless, with several betas vying to be the alpha. This was apparently an
unusual situation as it had gone unresolved for quite some time.

This was precipitated by the previous alpha being tranquilized and brought to
the vet, where the alpha died. The thinking was that since the other wolves
did not see the alpha actually dead, it created a lot of confusion for the
pack. They've since changed policy.

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tim333
Bit like Iraq/Syria after they took out Hussein. At least the baboons didn't
kill thousands.

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NickHaflinger
What's with the anthropomorphizing cutsy naming, they're baboons not kids.

~~~
DanBC
Not sure if it happens at Toronto, but some places sell "adoptions" which help
pay for keeping the animals.

And some people respond more strongly to the cutesy names, which may increase
the amount of education they get from the zoo.

[http://www.monkeyworld.org/primate-
adoptions](http://www.monkeyworld.org/primate-adoptions)

~~~
NickHaflinger
Take a look at 'David Attenborough .. Life on Earth'
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czgc56Vfz4w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czgc56Vfz4w)

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gitpusher
[http://i.imgur.com/glHzNoe.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/glHzNoe.jpg)

