CROCODILE AND ALLIGATOR PACK UP FOR A SUMMER HOLIDAY

Evening Star, Issue 21624, 20 January 1934, Page 5

CROCODILE AND ALLIGATOR PACK UP FOR A SUMMER HOLIDAY

The absence of monkeys at Whipsnade has always been a disappointment to visitors, but at last this trouble is to be remedied, for a colony of rhesus monkeys will soon be established in the former wallaby wood. The trees are being surrounded by a wire fence 15ft high, and when their home-is ready for them fifty monkeys will be turned loose in the wood. Rhesus macaques are the common, medium-sized Asiatic monkeys, and as they are hardy, intelligent, and highly entertaining they have all the qualities necessary to make them a success at Whipsnade. The sight of these agile creatures climbing trees and running about in spacious quarters will be well worth seeing. Whether the fence will be enough to keep them within bounds is perhaps doubtful, but even if one should manage to climb out into the park he will not be a danger to anybody. These monkeys are vegetarians, and if they were wandering, about in complete "freedom they would be much more .likely to avoid visitors rather than to approach them unless goaded into attacking through malicious teasing. The wallabies were liberated from this wood some months ago, the herbage having become too scanty for them. Another interesting event at Whipsnade is the birth of ! three rheas, or South American ostriches. About the middle of June one of the hen fheas laid eight eggs, and as the work of incubation is carried out entirely by the cock rhea her mate promptly took possession of five of the eggs and began to sit. And for six weeks he spent the greater part of his time sitting on the eggs, and then in the first week of August his patience was rewarded. Three chicks were hatched, and they now give every sign of growing up to be strong young birds. The babies look like halls of white fluff, and when hatched were about the size of waterfowl. A crocodile from the Nile and a Mississippi alligator sent from Regent’s Park are two more additions to Whipsnade’s population. They travelled down by lorry packed away in - travelling boxes, and when they reached their destination plunged into the pond with loud splashes, evidently intended as an indication of their annoyance in being kept in drydock during the Journey. After having eaten a large meal they settled down hi their outdoor quarters. They are only spending a short summer holiday at Whipsnade.