Activist and founder of Baboon Matters, Jenni Trethowan, has dedicated her life to the protection of baboons. Not only has she ventured into the field to provide care for the sick and injured, she has also brought back stories and lessons that have helped to turn the tide of public opinion in favour of these indigenous primates.
During the course of a 30-year career in baboon management, activist Jenni Trethowan has seen a great many things, but one experience that has stayed with her is the first time she witnessed a baboon being euthanised.
“[The baboon], unfortunately, had been very badly injured, and the vet made the decision in the field to euthanise. I hadn’t been expecting it…I thought that we would just be able to save him,” remembers Trethowan, founder of Baboon Matters. Baboon Matters is a non-governmental organisation (NGO) working towards the long-term environmental protection of baboons in South Africa, according to their website.
Jenni Trethowan, founder of Baboon Matters, first started advocating for the rights of baboons in 1990, when she started the Kommetjie Environmental Awareness Group (KEAG) alongside Wally Petersen. She currently lives in Greyton, South Africa, where she continues to play an active role in baboon conservation. PHOTO: Tamsin Metelerkamp
After the procedure, the vet began to carry the body of the old male baboon from the area, says Trethowan. She describes her astonishment at the manner in which the rest of the baboon troop responded.
“They were literally screaming and shaking the trees, and so I saw first-hand the levels of grief, frustration,” says Trethowan. “You know, scientists may say it’s not grief – maybe it’s just anger – but for me, it felt like it was a very high level of grief.”
Over the years, Trethowan has had many opportunities to see the ways in which individuals in a troop of baboons look out for one another.
“You’ve got Jane Goodall for chimps, and there’s Dian Fossey for gorillas…and then there’s Jenni for baboons.”
“I think, when you start to recognise the range of emotions that they experience daily, and then the different personalities, you realise, you know…they are primates,” she says.
Trethowan has done amazing work with baboons, to the extent that she knows the creatures as individuals, according to Dr Elisa Galgut, senior lecturer in the philosophy department at the University of Cape Town, and trustee of Baboon Matters.
“You know, you’ve got Jane Goodall for chimps, and there’s Dian Fossey for gorillas, […] and then there’s Jenni for baboons,” says Galgut. “She’s really devoted her life to baboons. I think she understands them better than anybody else.”
Baboons are very much the underdogs of conservation, according to Jenni Trethowan, founder of Baboon Matters. “To many people, [baboons] are not beautiful creatures. And they certainly don’t have the appeal of the Big Five – the lions, the ellies, the rhinos and so forth,” says Trethowan. Trethowan started Baboon Matters in order to find better ways of managing baboons, she adds. PHOTOS: Facebook/Baboon Matters
Making a change
Trethowan first started advocating for the rights of baboons in 1990, when she started the Kommetjie Environmental Awareness Group (KEAG) alongside Wally Petersen. They chose to start the organisation after a troop of baboons that Petersen was studying for his conservation diploma were euthanised for causing disturbances along the urban edge of Kommetjie, near Cape Town, says Trethowan.
“It was acceptable in the 1990s – that the way of dealing with baboons was to eliminate entire troops,” says Trethowan.
In her role as fundraiser for the group, Trethowan – who did not have any qualifications in science or conservation at the time – embraced every opportunity to learn more about the environment.
“My experience with scientists was that they were just so happy to impart knowledge, to work with us, to work with me,” says Trethowan. “And I’m never scared to ask questions. That’s the only way you learn.”
While the level of public awareness around the struggles facing baboons has increased since Jenni Trethowan founded Baboon Matters in 2001, the policies guiding baboon management in the Cape Peninsula and surrounds still require revision and improvement, she says. Baboon Matters is a non-governmental organisation working towards the long-term environmental protection of baboons in South Africa, according to their website. PHOTO: Tamsin Metelerkamp
While Trethowan and Petersen started KEAG with the intention of protecting baboons, the organisation also took on a number of other projects, including the clearing of alien plant species and permaculture training. In 2001, Trethowan decided that she wanted to focus on issues related to baboons, and left KEAG to start Baboon Matters.
“[Funding] was the biggest single challenge, because baboons are very heavily polarised – people either love them or hate them,” says Trethowan, on the biggest challenge she faced when starting the NGO. “The project had stop-start funding for the first nine years.”
Being an advocate for the rights of baboons is a role that can invite a lot of abuse from fellow residents and authorities, according to Luana Pasanisi, a baboon activist living on the urban edge in Simon’s Town. Since becoming involved in the protection of baboons in her area, Pasanisi has received support from Trethowan.
“[Trethowan’s] got wide shoulders. She’s definitely supported me,” says Pasanisi. “She’s brought a lot of awareness and educated a lot of people. [S]he comes and does a lot of eco-talks on baboons in the area, and I think that every bit has helped tremendously.”
The ongoing fight
The level of public awareness and appreciation of baboons has grown since Baboon Matters started, with more people seeing the creatures as interesting rather than a “nuisance factor”, according to Trethowan. However, the policies guiding baboon management in the Cape Peninsula and surrounds still require revision and improvement, she adds.
“The problem is that you’ve got a variety of landowners, […] and everybody’s got different mandates and rules and responsibilities of what they can and can’t do [to manage baboons],” explains Trethowan.
“It comes down to the fact of how we choose to be, and what kind of neighbours we choose to be.”
Luthando Tyhalibongo, spokesperson for the City of Cape Town (CCT), acknowledges that the ownership of different parcels of land complicates the consistent application of baboon management strategies.
“Challenges should be expected, as there will always be differences of opinion and approaches in how the City’s Urban Baboon Programme should be implemented,” says Tyhalibongo in email correspondence with MatieMedia. “That said, the City remains committed to working together with all spheres of government, the NSPCA [National Council of Societies for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals], communities and interest groups in achieving the best possible outcome: to keep baboons wild and in their natural habitat, away from the urban environment where there are many dangers to their safety and wellbeing.”
The City of Cape Town’s Urban Baboon Programme has been in existence since 2009, and works towards the safety and welfare of baboon populations and residents alike, says Luthando Tyhalibongo, spokesperson for the City of Cape Town. According to the Urban Baboon Programme’s Annual Population Census 2020/2021, the baboon population that is currently being overseen by service providers in the Cape Peninsula has increased from 404 in 2016 to 474 in 2021. While there has been an overall increase in the number of baboons during this time period, Jenni Trethowan, founder of Baboon Matters, is concerned that there has been very little increase in the number of breeding adults. GRAPH: Tamsin Metelerkamp
Trethowan argues that rather than using methods such as paintball markers to disperse baboons, people should reduce the attractants – including poor waste management – that are drawing baboons into urban areas.
“It comes down to the fact of how we choose to be, and what kind of neighbours we choose to be,” says Trethowan. “Being a good neighbour means that you manage your home in an appropriate fashion, […] and if you’ve got wildlife neighbours, it means you’ve got to be very aware of things like waste management, access to property and what things you would plant in your garden.”
During the past year, Trethowan has been involved in two projects intended to improve the safety of baboons. One involved the creation and distribution of emergency rescue packs, which contain resources for the treatment of injured wildlife, and the other involved the insulation of some transformer boxes in baboon-populated areas, according to Trethowan. Poorly insulated transformer boxes place baboons at risk of being critically electrocuted, she explains.
Baboons continue to be drawn into urban spaces by attractants such as poor waste management, according to Jenni Trethowan, founder of Baboon Matters. “It comes down to the fact of how we choose to be, and what kind of neighbours we choose to be,” says Trethowan. “Being a good neighbour means that you manage your home in an appropriate fashion, […] and if you’ve got wildlife neighbours, it means you’ve got to be very aware of things like waste management.” PHOTO: Tamsin Metelerkamp
Telling baboons’ stories
In 2009, Trethowan published Beast or Blessing: Stories and Images about Living with Baboons in Africa. “Beast or Blessing was born from the fact that everywhere I went, everybody always told me their favourite baboon story…and they were just so rich,” she says. “I just thought we had to compile them in one place.”
Trethowan is currently working on another book, which she hopes to publish in 2022. This book will focus more on her own experiences in baboon conservation in South Africa. Through these experiences, Trethowan has formed a definite attachment to the baboons she has encountered, she says.
“It’s a very genuine love…it’s not sort of mawkish emotionalism or anything like that,” she explains. “In every single case, when you see human-induced injuries, […] you know they just don’t deserve to be treated the way they are treated.”
In the lead up to publishing her book, Beast or Blessing: Stories and Images about Living with Baboons in Africa, in 2009, baboon activist Jenni Trethowan collected people’s favourite stories about baboons. “It was absolutely wonderful reading everybody’s stories, and then putting [the book] together,” says Trethowan. PHOTO: Tamsin Metelerkamp