As baboons become bolder, Cape Town region struggles to find solutions

AFP English

Hundreds of chacma baboons roam the Cape Town area, enchanting tourists and some locals, but also creating a nuisance for others. As human settlements increasingly encroach on their habitat, the region struggles to find solutions.

Transcript

00:00Sound of wind blowing.

00:08Sound of dogs barking.

00:14Sound of birds chirping.

00:21Sound of wind blowing.

00:27Sound of people talking.

00:40So what we have in Cape Town which is really unique is that Table Mountain National Park is an unfenced open access reserve.

00:48And the way that it is laid out is that it is intersected by urban areas, by roads, by farms, by homesteads, by whole developments in places.

01:00And so we get to live in this reserve, not just on the border of it all.

01:06Sound of wind blowing.

01:13Sound of birds chirping.

01:21Sound of people talking.

01:33Fences forming a barrier on the urban edge, these cost a lot of money.

01:36And they have to be there 365 days of the year.

01:40And that's a huge investment.

01:42And it's unusual for urban areas to invest in what is called a least concerned species.

01:47So globally if we think of Europe, boar are a least concerned species.

01:50And in Germany, Berlin, you have hunters who just go out and shoot the boars.

01:56That's a primarily lethal control method.

01:59So here on the tip of Africa we have a primarily non-lethal approach which is the gold standard for wildlife management.

02:07Sound of wind blowing.

02:14Sound of wind blowing.

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