While baboon management in the South Peninsula has been a hot topic and public comment on the draft Baboon Strategic Management plan has come to a close, activists say baboons have inspired a lot of positive change in the community.
According to Luana Pasanisi from Green Group Simon’s Town, baboons in the Deep South have inspired a sense of ubuntu where the community came together.
“There is a positive slant and it is not even a baboon issue, it is a waste issue, an environmental issue.
“When I moved from Johannesburg to Sea Point and then Simon’s Town many years ago, there were no waste issues . . . there was so much discipline and there was respect.”
What started as a “baboon problem” for some ended up in a community working together, piloting a baboon-proof bin project as well as business owners and pig farmers working together to not only remove tons of wet waste but in doing so save costs on feeding pigs.
Pasanisi explains: “Last year, we piloted bins and removed two tons of waste in the summer, and a ton and a half in winter. All the restaurants, in Simon’s Town Main Road, put their organic waste in a bucket with a lid. And it gets taken out of Simon’s Town, from Glencairn all the way to Miller’s Point.
“So there’s none of that crazy attractant to town (for the baboons) on the Main Road anymore.”
As there were no baboon-proof bins at the time they come up with a solution of their own.
“Out of desperation because we had no baboon-proof bins I drilled and made rope bins, over 700 bins, and Aileen came up with this idea.”
Aileen Turner, a resident and retired intensive care nurse, says they were looking at finding solutions.
“My best friend Angelique, who has since tragically passed away, we both retired as intensive care nurses and were looking at solutions on Google for fixing bins.
“We came across a video of these straps they use in Canada for the bears and we thought well, if they are good enough for the bears then they are good enough for the baboons.
“The rope at the time was good enough but after time it slackened or it got stolen, so we came up with this. The first round of straps were orange and unfortunately, it was not weather proof, so they were failing and the baboons were giving it only one tug, after about six months, and they would be in (the bin). So I went back to the drawing board and I started researching the webbing and I found this type that they use in the yachting industry, it is exposed to all weather and water and to date it has been brilliant.”
She adds that she does the bin-proof clips “wherever” it is needed.
For the cost of R150, Turner transforms a city bin baboon-proof with the added strap that keeps the bin closed.
“I go and buy the stuff in bulk and because the demand is so high, I pay someone to cut all the straps up. Everything gets burned and sealed so that it does not break, the holes get burned with a smoldering iron and then I attach all the bolts and everything.
“We keep hearing about the new amazing bins that are coming out, but they don’t seem to materialise. They (the City) do seem to have the old-style bins that have a plastic yellow on the side with a steel cable that goes over the top of the bin. They work in the short term.”
Pasinisi adds after the baboon proof bins the next step was waste management.
“Baboons used to come down to the Main Road in Simon’s Town about two years ago.
“There was a male baboon that arrived and they went over the dockyard one night and the navy throws away food, not necessarily because it is waste, the baboons got there.
“Seeing that frenetic behaviour that comes from baboons finding food in a dustbin, it is completely different behaviour to when a baboon is foraging in the wild and baboons just don’t leave the area.
Out of desperation to get the service providers to do something we tried to remedy the solution. And it kind of brought this Ubuntu feeling, you benefit from it and you see the benefit. It is about community. So the first thing was the bins, trying to keep it closed and then the wet waste was an observation.”
Pasinisi says out of sheer exhaustion from trying to stop the baboons from being run over in the road at night and picking up the mess when they leave, she went to restaurants to ask whether she could have their wet waste collected.
“Due to exhaustion, I went into restaurants on the Main Road and asked if I gave them buckets with lids would they be prepared to take all organic waste and not allow it in the dustbin, to keep it in the bucket and I will arrange the collection of it.
“It started with the Sweetest Thing and she bought her own bins. Lighthouse and Harbour View and a few of them followed. And the first thing they said was for the first time in years there was no stench.
“That eradicated the baboons carrying on until late at night, they were like drug addicts if they found a drop of Coca-Cola. The minute wet waste has been removed a baboon just can’t stand a boring place.”
The initiative that began in May last year also benefited the pig farmers in the area.
“Now almost everyone is doing it and the pig farmers are happy because they are not having to buy extra food for their pigs.
“The restaurants love the pig farmers, the pig farmers love the restaurants and it has inspired a whole Ubuntu in the town, helping each other and it is so lovely.”
