Caring for tribes of elfins

A man in Guizhou province has spent half his life looking after groups of very rare and endangered monkeys

Every morning at 8, Xiao Zhijin walks miles to a river valley, taking breakfast to his old friends of nearly 26 years, the Francois langurs, some of the world's rarest monkeys.

The Francois langur is athletic but elfin in appearance. With black silky hair and very distinct white sideburns that grow down from its ears to the corners of its cheeks. The endangered monkey, found mostly in parts of China and Vietnam, has first class national protection in China.

Xiao Zhijin, 52, has kept the morning ritual between himself and the Francois langurs since he started taming them in 1997 in the Mayanghe nature reserve of Yanhe Tujia autonomous prefecture, in southwest China's Guizhou province.

Ten of the monkeys appeared when they heard Xiao's three whistles, then they sat on rocks scattered along the Mayanghe River bank, taking sweet potato chips from Xiao's hand and eating.

"We should have seen 11 of them. Maybe the missing one is dead," Xiao says, his eyes wet.

He knows that the depth and velocity of water used for hydropower in the area can swallow the baby langurs.

"No one could get close to them. Now the little robbers expect him," says a local villager, referring to Xiao and smiling.

Fed up with the monkeys stealing grain, locals nicknamed the langurs yanzhu monkey, which in Chinese literally means greedy pigs inhabiting rocks and caves.

The villagers didn't know how precious the langurs were until the Mayanghe nature reserve was upgraded to be a national reserve for better preservation of the langurs in 2003.

The total number of the primates is believed to be about 2,000 in the world, and there were 730 (in 76 groups) of Francois langurs in Mayanghe national nature reserve in 2004, according to Fauna and Flora International.

To protect the precious species, the local government appointed four workers to feed them, but only Xiao is still at it.

Xiao, the only such caretaker of Francois langurs in China, started the feedings with a group of five dwelling in a cave.

"I named the leader of the group Zhaolai, implying my hope that one day the langurs would come as soon as I whistle."

For two months, Xiao camped at the mouth of a cave that was 30 meters from the langurs' dwelling.

He used a telescope to observe them every five minutes and recorded the physical characteristics and food habits of each one in the group.

In the following month, Xiao put corn, peanuts and sweet potato chips at the same time each day in a fixed place within the langurs' territory, enticing them to come and eat.

Xiao finally decided to meet the langurs on Chinese New Year's Day in 1998 when they had been accustomed to getting food at the fixed place and on time.

"I was surprised and comforted that they didn't run away when they saw me, as if they knew I was the man to feed them," Xiao says.

He then spent another month to train them to respond to whistles.

"They rushed around and fled when they first heard my whistle," Xiao says. He tried changing the location of the food, then whistling three times to signal his location.

The langurs gradually recognized Xiao's three whistles. They came to eat the food, keeping a safe distance of five to six meters from him.

Over the past two decades, Xiao has become an expert on langurs thanks to his daily observations of the animals.

He says that based on his years-long observations, the number of Francois langurs in the reserve is limited to within 800 because only the leader of each group has the right to mate and breed, and relations with other groups with a leader are totally forbidden in the monkeys' social order.

The langurs, whose average life span is about 26 years, can give birth to only one offspring at a time, and the intervals between births last two and a half to three years.

"Xiao's observations and detailed records help a lot for my study," says Hu Gang, an animal behavior expert focusing on Francois langurs.

Hu classified the langurs in four age groups: Infants are less than half a year old, teenagers around 2 years old, young adults roughly between 4 and 5, and grown-ups beyond 6 years old.

"I love the black elfins, but I won't spoil the love," Xiao says. If the langurs don't show up upon hearing his three whistles within half an hour, he will whistle a fourth time, informing them that the food is gone.

"The Francois langurs attach great importance to family values," says Xiao, who has tamed three groups of langurs in succession.

He says he was most impressed by the second group, whose leader he named Mama.

Mama, who was young and strong, defeated Zhaolai and took over his group in 2004, enlarging his own group to 12 members.

"Mama enjoyed his heyday with his big family for nearly five years," Xiao says, Mama's family saw two invasions as he grew old and weak, but he successfully defended against the first one with his sons' help.

"It's cruel that the new leader must kill baby langurs of the former leader when he takes the throne," Xiao says. Mama was finally defeated in 2005, and a newborn of his was killed by the new leader. "That's why I didn't name the new leader."

Xiao has devoted his golden years to the reserve and has developed gray hair and wrinkles while watching the "regime changes".

"Our family depended on his wages, but we could just scrape by for the past two decades," Xiao's wife says, shaking her head when Xiao is asked whether it is rewarding to be an animal caretaker in the reserve.

Xiao says it's rewarding because he was not taking care of the langurs for himself but for the world.

"Taming the black elfins was my best decision in life."

jiatingting@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily Africa Weekly 10/10/2014 page29)