4/18/2002: Monkey Mountain

[Undertoad]

Hong Kong is getting overrun by monkeys in an area called "Monkey Mountain". (If they named it "Ping Pong Ball Mountain" would it be overrun by... oh never mind.)

It turns out that the monkeys roam in gangs of between 30 and 100. Gangs! It's believed that there are 1250 macaques in all, and gang leaders have been identified and given names. The one shown above is named "Longlegged 7".

At first the govt tried to ban feeding of them, thinking that the feeding was what was bringing them out to try to live amongst the humans. They now say that animal lovers scuttled that idea, despite a HK $10,000 fine. So now they are resorting to birth control for the monkeys.

They're outfitting the male monkeys with condoms in the hope that -- no, I'm lying.

They're actually catching the females, injecting them with a long-term birth control of some sort, and then microchipping them so they can be tracked.