Get
To Know
The
Olive baboon is the most wide ranging of all baboons, being
found in savannahs, steppes, and forests of 25 countries throughout
Africa, extending from Mali eastward to Ethiopia and Tanzania. Omnivorous,
they are able to find nutrition in almost any environment, and are
able to adapt with different foraging tactics. They eat a large
variety of plants (such as leaves, grass, roots, bark, flowers,
fruit, lichens, tubers, seeds, mushrooms, corms, and rhizomes),
and invertebrates and small mammals, as well as birds. In dry, arid
regions, such as the northeastern deserts, they hunt small invertebrates
like insects, spiders, and scorpions and elsewhere larger animals
such as small rodents and hares to foxes and other primates. Its
limit is usually small antelope, such as Thomson's gazelle and also,
rarely, sheep, goats, and live chickens, which may amount to 33.5%
of its food from hunting. In Eritrea, the olive baboon has formed
a symbiotic relationship with that country's endangered elephant
population. The baboons use the water holes dug by the elephants,
while the elephants use the tree-top baboons as an early warning
system. They live in groups of 15 to 150, made up of a few males,
many females, and their young. Each baboon has a social ranking
somewhere in the group, and female dominance is hereditary, with
daughters having nearly the same rank as their mothers. Despite
being hierarchical, baboons appear to be democratic when it comes
to deciding the direction of collective movement. Individuals are
more likely to follow when multiple decision-makers agree on what
direction to go rather than simply following dominant individuals.
The male olive baboon is on average, 70 cm tall while standing and
24 kg while the female measures 60 cm in height and averages 14.7
kg and they both have a green-grey coat. Like other baboons, they
have an elongated, dog-like muzzle. Their tail almost looks as if
it is broken, and they have a bare patch on their rump and a cheek
pouch in which to store food. They communicate with various vocalizations
and facial expressions. Adults give a range of calls and the most
common facial expression of the olive baboon is "lipsmacking", which
is associated with a number of behaviors. They are listed as least
concern because they are "very widespread and abundant and although
persecuted as a crop raider there are no major threats believed
to be resulting in a range-wide population decline." Despite persecution,
the baboon is still widespread and numerous. However, competition
and disease have possibly led to fewer baboons in closed forests.
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The Diary
by
Jeffrey Zable
I was running with the bulls when one of them
lifted me up and threw me all the way to Palos de la Frontera
in Castile, 1492, right onto the ship with Columbus at the helm
as he was waving to the people on the shore. "What in God's
name!" he said out loud to no one in particular, obviously irritated
that I had interrupted his sendoff. "Don't do it!" I said as
directly and as forcefully as I was able. "You are going to
start something that will amount to the demise of millions of
Native people!" "Put this son of a bitch in chains," he ordered
and immediately two of his men took me below where I remained
until we got to one of the islands off what would later become
known as America. It was here that he told me I was now on my
own and that he hoped to never see me again. As I walked away
I had a diary with me that I had stolen and hidden in my underwear.
I decided that I would tell the story and that hopefully my
diary would somehow get back to civilization intact. Fortunately
I was able to live with the Natives, but by the time I learned
their language well enough to inform them of how bad it would
get, it was already too late. Eventually I was captured along
with other Natives and one of Columbus' men cut off my good
arm as I wasn't able to find enough gold to his satisfaction.
After that I bled to death before I was able to put this last
incident down in my diary which I'm not sure was ever found
by a civilized human being.
Jeffrey Zable is a teacher and conga drummer who plays
Afro Cuban Folkloric music for dance classes and Rumbas around the San
Francisco Bay Area. His poetry, fiction, and non-fiction have appeared
in hundreds of literary magazines and anthologies. Recent writing in Serving
House Journal, Sick Lit, Unscooped Bagel, Mocking Heart Review, Kairos,
Dead King, Ink In Thirds, Tigershark, Drunken Llama, DogPlotz, Vending
Machine Press, Third Wednesday, Bookends Review, The Vein, Revolution
John, Futures Trading and many others.
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