Written by: R. Reeder
One of the best parts of watching the woollies is getting to see them interact with each other. One age class in particular takes the cake for cutest interactions, and these are the infants/juveniles of the group. While the adults sleep after a long period of fruit foraging, you’ll often notice the babies quietly playing among the branches close to their mothers. I’ve grown particularly fond of one individual: Conrad. He’s very small, stays close to Coco, his mother, although he is independent enough that he is usually not actually on his mother. Conrad is also the Benjamin Button of the group. He is the youngest individual in Group C, yet his face is old and wrinkled, his body fragile-looking. But, despite his odd-looking features, he’s got a lot of gumption. He’s the infant I see instigating all the play sessions with the other kids. These play sessions are some of the highlights of my time watching the woollies. You can’t help but smile as you watch them. While playing, Conrad and whomever he convinced to join him are hanging from their tails from a branch, swinging towards and away from each other, wrestling. Conrad is always the smaller individual, and so usually isn’t much competition for the other, but what he lacks in size he makes up for in energy. He is relentless. He will harass them until they are forced to put some muscle behind their actions to stop the little pest. During one of these play bouts Conrad was climbing all over a subadult male, Cuzco, who finally got fed up and put Conrad in a headlock. He eventually released him and walked away, but Conrad didn’t seem to mind. His sheer persistence had made him the clear winner of the wrestling match. Continue reading →