A New Baby arrives

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We had a very exciting weekend; Karen got a call to say someone had found a baby baboon and would she take him, so we jumped in the car and drove th 2 hours to George to collect him. apparently you never know what to expect as some babies are very traumatized, but when we met him he was very calm. Leanne was going to act as a suragate mother for the next week and it was hoped that he would bond with Gombo in that time. On the drive home he just sat on Liannes knee sucking on jelly beans (you would not normally feed primates lolly's, but it was the only thing he would eat and we needed to keep him calm and happy for the journey), so we ended up naming him Bean.
Bean is a scrawny little thing, he is malnourished and was dehydrated, but adorable. Karen believes he is about 4 months old and has been handled by humans alot as Bean will easily go to all of us and that is not normal. The story about him is a bit scetchy; someone took him as a pet after killing his mother, then as he got bigger could no longer be bothered with him so dumped him. Bean was found wondering alone into peoples gardens.
When we got back to the farm, we tried giving Bean a bottle of baby milk, but he would not take it so we had to force some electrolyte replacement fluid into him one syringe full at a time, we did the same with some multivitamin syrupe, there was alot of kicking and screaming. We later took Bean outside to let him explore his surroundings and meet the monkeys and Gombo. The monkeys were very interested but Gombo would have nothing to do with him, Bean was a bit lethargic, he pushed the monkeys away and prefered to sit on his own, that night he slept clinging to Leanne.
The next day was not much better, but at least we discovered that if we crushed bran flakes into the baby milk Bean would eat it, but it would take ages to get a small bowl full into him, again we had to force more electrolyte fluid into him. Bean is a slow delicate eater, nothing like Gombo who shoves as much as he can into his mouth until his cheek pouches look like they will burst and he has a right paddy if he thinks the monkeys are getting more than him. We also found out that Bean loves cuecumber so sent the day feeding him pieces. That night we put Bean, Gombo, and a couple of the monkeys in a cage to sleep together, they all slept huddled together in the sleeping box.
The next day however, Gombo was more insecure than ever, he clung to Karen and she could not put him down. We spent another day trying to coax Bean to eat, changing nappies etc., at least he was showing more interest in his surroundings, but we were getting very worried about him. That night Gombo slept clinging to Karen and Bean slept clinging to Leanne, we didn't feel that we were getting very far.
Day 4 was a completely different story, Bean suddenly started eating his bran & milk better, and Gombo & Bean started playing together. by the end of the day they were inseparable, playing, ganging up on the monkeys, clinging to each other when scared etc., Bean was also copying Gombo; drinking water and eating a little from the food bowls. That night they slep together, they are so funny and very cute together.
Karen thinks Bean will now be fine, she hopes to be able to release them both into the wild sometime in the future.

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