Mañiña and Rosita arrive

Rosita arrived on Friday evening. She is very small and younger than I expected. My guess is four months. She bottle feeds but will eat fruit from my hand. The family was a delight. They stayed over night and we had a wonderful Bar-b-q. The mother and father and the three young sons came. It made an unforgettable evening.. This family bought Rosita on the roadside on impulse. Soon afterwards, they realized that it was a bad thing to do and moved as best and as quickly as they could to rectify the situation by bringing her here. They were very generous to Canaote. I know that they truly regret what they did and will now work to stop this dreadful trade.

Just before Mañiña arrived on Saturday, we had a visit from Gabriela, the human mother of Sussy. She brought Chippy and her human family with her. Chippy is so beautiful. She has gorgeous long legs and sucks her finger in a very human way. We were so delighted to see her again.. We think of Chippy as being part of our outreach program. She is well cared for by her owners and obviously much loved. I will post more about Chippy on another occasion

Gabriela brought a big lunch for all the children as well as milk and Merengada for our supplies. When Gabriela is here, Sussy is so animated, she really loves her human mother and the feeling is obviously mutual.

On Saturday afternoon, Mañiña arrived with his family. In spite of his name, he is a very fine male except for the neutering. The family, have been very caring and there were many tears before they left. He is using the enclosure next to my bedroom for the time being. I will need more funds to build something especially for him. He has been crying today so I have had to spend time with him. He already comes to me a sits on my shoulder, but he is missing his owner. I am just so glad that he was brought to me. His family has promised a contribution, this is so important now. He is the last that I can afford to take with my own money.
A word of explanation. Normally in Spanish you would expect the 'a' ending on a name to indictate that the subject is female. When the owners first aquired Mañiña, they suposed that he was a girl. Subsequently his true sex was discovered but the name remained.

I now have
Sussy, Sophie, Marco, Schatov, Emma, Totto, MonaLisa, Imanol, Rosita, Mañiña

It would break my heart to turn a child away.

Over the Friday and Saturday, the children had many visitors. The Rosita family, The Mañiña family and the Chippy family with Gabriela as well.. This was a big photo call for the children and I saw some very fine pictures.

Sunday night caused me concern because in spite of heavy rain, Mañiña refused to come into the house. He sheltered in the fork of a tree in his garden, covered by a branch with very thick leaves. At first light, I went to find him and could see that he was no worse for wear. I need not have worried, he is a monkey, and monkeys live in trees. He used his basic instincts, possibly for the first time. He started playing on his rope ladder and ropes. Later in the morning, he discovered that MonaLisa had joined him and we are watching to see if a relationship is going to develop. They both ate a large breakfast, and warily shared a large bunch of fresh leaves from the forest. Previously I have found that leaves make friends with monkeys. I worry too much. Just before this posting I saw MonaLisa and Mañiña taking turns to dive at the hammock, a great game.

We routinely look at the general health of all the monkeys and in particular, when they first come here. This morning we found that Rosita has a vigourous infestation of stomach worms. We treated this with Eprofil and will be watching her carefully over the next few days. It usually clears up within a few days.
Pictures. Rosita is on the left and Mañiña on the right.