Unfortunately, all of you who have diligently studied the recent baboon family trees I published will need to make some alterations.  Yei, a rather nice older baboon, and her little 5-month daughter, Yoani, have died.  It’s not entirely clear what happened to Yei, but I noticed one day that she was very sick, walking with her back arched, a possible symptom of having eaten something bad (i.e. trash, metal, etc.).  We worried about her, but unfortunately there’s not much we could do.  The next day, she was nowhere to be seen.  It was particularly depressing to think about her little baby, still very dependent, stuck with her dead/dying mother.  No matter what, we knew Yoani would not survive without her mother, but it’s a bummer to think about the specifics of it all.  But there is a hero of this story.  Yalimu, Yei’s teenage son, clearly found the distressed infant with his mother’s body and, rather than leaving her, picked her up and carried her for days.  We found him holding Yoani constantly–grooming her, grunting at her–making every effort to protect and care for her.  But, alas, he can’t lactate, and that’s really what Yoani needed most, so she too died.  A sad end for Yei and her clan, but it was nice  to see yet another example of how baboon families–like human families–take care of their own.

Yalimu grooming the weak Yoani