Monkey Farm
Jeff's latest book Monkey Farm: A Summer Among the Macaques. Available in print and audio wherever you get books! Paperback: Your Local Bookstore** and online bookshop.org Barnes and Noble Walmart.com Amazon **Ask your store to order from IngramSpark. Also carried by my favorite stores Sherman's Maine Coast Books; Book Passage; Narberth Bookshop; The Little Bookstore. ISBN 9798998815287 Audiobook: Libby Libro.fm Spotify Amazon Audible Apple Books Google Play Kobo Barnes and Noble eBook (DRM-free): Libby Bookshop.org Kobo Kindle Barnes and Noble Canadian friends: I set the retail price for ebook and audio at par - $10CAD and $10USD. Anything more is malarky. Keep looking if a site (like Amazon) is charging exchange rate. Elbows up. International: Rakuten Kobo Ireland Rakuten Kobo Belgium Audio French Rakuten Kobo Netherlands Rakuten Kobo Denmark Rakuten Kobo Turkey Rakuten Kobo Belgium Dutch Booktopia Product Storytel Indonesia Storytel France Storytel Iceland Bol.com Rakuten Japan Nextory Australia A full chapter follows, enjoy and let me know what you think... Chapter 11 - Monkey Island My summer among the macaques ended with a hangover, fresh stitches and a new tattoo. The story of how that happened began before dawn at a boat dock on Saint Helena Sound. The skills I'd acquired at the Yemassee clinic, specifically treating lacerations and fight wounds, had qualified me to work on Morgan Island when needed. The Monkey Farm maintained a colony of rhesus macaques on the island under a contract with the government. The macaques had been relocated to South Carolina from a government breeding facility in Puerto Rico fifteen years prior, after monkeys carrying the Herpes-B virus escaped into the community. After my boss recommended me to the Morgan Island team, the occupational health lab tested me for tuberculosis and hepatitis. The monkeys on the island were disease-free, and the humans who worked there were screened to make sure they didn't infect the animals. The lab also re-tested me for Herpes-B virus, carried by many of the macaques I worked with. Herpes-B was harmless to the monkeys, but could kill me. The re-test confirmed I hadn't been infected by an accidental needle stick the month before. After I stuck myself with that used needle, I rushed back to the clinic and scrubbed the wound with iodine and a stiff brush for ten minutes, then flushed the wound with water for another twenty minutes. Either the monkey hadn't carried B virus or the infection-control procedure worked. Good news! With blood tests out of the way, I was given the dates I would work on Morgan Island and instructions to take the morning boat from Eddings Point. My boss dictated directions. "Take the Carteret Street bridge from Beaufort on the mainland to Lady's Island. Continue on the Sea Island Parkway. Pass Datha, Distant, Warsaw and Polawana Islands. Keep going on to Saint Helena Island. Turn left on Eddings Point Road, go a couple miles across the causeway to Eddings Point Landing. Boat leaves at 6:30 am sharp. Be early because they'll leave you at the dock if you're one minute late." A winding pre-dawn drive across the archipelago of Saint Helena Sound got me to the dock just after 6:00 am. A car and two pickup trucks were already parked in an oyster shell lot between the narrow causeway and the salt marsh. The trucks lit the marsh with their headlights. The beams followed a walkway of planks laid between pilings out to open water where I could just make out a boat tied to a floating dock. Three people I'd never met were ferrying boxes of supplies and bags of Purina Monkey Chow from the trucks to the boat. I got out of my own truck with a duffel bag holding my coveralls and boots. Unsure what do do next, I went and stood next to the walkway, thinking maybe I could help. The three men ignored me as they sleepily went about their stevedoring. The veterinarian I was to assist that day climbed out of a nearby station wagon and trudged slowly over, a bag similar to mine slung over her shoulder. We exchanged sleepy good mornings. She wore a dark knit watch cap. It was September, and the air was thankfully cool after a shatteringly hot Lowcountry August. That heat pushed me down with a heavy weight from dawn to dusk. It was hardest in coveralls, boots and a mask, but even on my days off I stayed indoors in the air conditioning. That August was the first time in my life I didn't want to go outside, even to swim since the body temperature water did nothing to cool me down. Thankfully, September broke the spell. That morning the breeze off the salt marsh was brisk and fresh. We stayed out of the way while the crew finished loading the boat. The one in charge, a big man I hadn't met, turned off the headlights in one, then the other truck. Big Man motioned to us to follow as he crossed the walkway to join the two people already on the boat. His heavy steps made the planks bounce gently between the pilings. I stepped down a short ramp from the fixed walkway to the floating dock. I followed the veterinarian who had already climbed aboard the boat. Free from the glare of headlights, my eyes started to adjust to the pre-dawn light. The simple workboat was sturdily built of white fiberglass. It had a windshield on top of a tiny cabin in the bow. The steering wheel and throttle were mounted next to a ship's compass bolted to the top of the cabin. The letters and numbers of the compass glowed from a soft yellow light inside the compass housing. I could see that we were pointed roughly north. The inboard motor repeated a quiet rumble under an engine box piled with supplies. Big Man quickly untied the lines, bow and stern, and climbed into the boat to take the wheel. He pushed the throttle forward and spun the wheel to the left. The boat rose smoothly on plane as we motored into Jenkins Creek. My eyes now fully adjusted, I could see the glow of sunrise build in the sky to our right, and there was enough ambient light to see our surroundings. We looked up at the top of tall marsh grass speeding by on either side of the Creek. Five months earlier in May, the grass was a green fringe barely above the tidal marshes at the confluence of the Ashepoo, Combahee, and Edisto rivers. The three rivers gave their water and their names to the ACE Basin, a pristine 350,000 acre nursery estuary in Saint Helena Sound. Smack dab in the middle of the ACE Basin sat Morgan Island, the only completely undeveloped island in the estuary. Undeveloped, but not uninhabited. The others on the boat didn't say much as we wound through the creeks and rivers on our way to Morgan Island. Between the early hour and the routine of what was regular duty for everyone else, I was left to watch and wonder. We shot out of Jenkins Creek into the wider Morgan River then turned east. Our bow was pointed toward the sunrise over the Atlantic Ocean beyond. The top edge of the sun broke above the watery horizon. A dorsal fin broke the surface of the water in front and to the right of the boat. A shark! No, sharks don't surf. It was a porpoise. The sleek marine mammal caught a ride on the wave of water pushed aside by our bow until we turned to head north up Parrot Creek next to Morgan Island. Morgan Island is technically six square miles, but only one square mile is high and dry. The rest is marsh. We motored in a long clockwise loop around the island's northern perimeter. At a buoy with a flashing green light, we turned south into the mouth of an unnamed tidal creek that led to the interior. After ten minutes winding through the creek, Big Man pulled back on the throttle. The boat slowed and we putted slowly toward the forested upland of Morgan Island. I pushed to the front of the cockpit to spot the throngs of free-range macaques that must've been gathered on shore to greet us. But weren't. Instead, a sleepy woman took our lines and tied our boat to a simple wooden pier that jutted out of bushes and trees that lined the shore beyond. A second boat was tied up on the other side of the dock, nearly identical to ours but older and more weathered. It was covered in morning dew and had been there all night. The veterinarian motioned me to climb out so the crew could unload. The tide crested during the trip out, so it was a short step up from the boat to the dock. We carried our duffel bags down the dock, walking alongside the woman who'd come to meet us. She wore the dark blue coveralls of an animal care technician. She seemed to wake up and nodded a greeting to me. "Welcome to Monkey Island son! I'm Dianne, you're in for a big day today!" I still didn't know what I was in for, only that my clinical skills had improved to the point where I could 'go out to Morgan for census.' The low morning sun lit the dock, but it was still dark under the trees on shore. I stepped off the pier onto the island proper. The ground was sand mixed with bits of dry organic matter fallen from a dense canopy above. When we stepped into the shadows of the trees we also stepped onto a dense mat of dead leaves, palmetto fronds, and pine needles. The branches of the pine and live oak trees above interlocked with each other to provide support against strong ocean winds. This mesh of branches was a distinguishing characteristic of the island's maritime forest. A perfect habitat for the rhesus macaques I had yet to see. We walked up a trail to a decrepit cabin with a low, sagging metal roof. A tall radio antenna shot straight up from the peak of the roof. It's thin outline was visible against the large white plastic tank of an improvised water tower behind the cabin. The cabin itself was painted a drab light brown that blended with the forest. More so because the paint peeled up in places as if to mimic leaves. A screened porch spanned the front of the building. Through its dusty screen I could see an old plaid couch and a worn yellow vinyl recliner. The veterinarian stepped on to the porch through a crooked screen door. I followed her past the junky furniture through a weathered wood doorframe into the cabin. Its old door was propped open by a rusty metal bucket full of sand bristling with cigarette butts. Most of the cabin was one big room. A slightly less decrepit couch and recliner stood against the back wall next to a kitchen area that held a round wooden table and a few matching chairs. A makeshift office area was to the right of the door. A dented gray metal desk under a cracked sliding glass window held a serious looking two-way shortwave radio set. A thick wire snaked out of the window to the antenna on the roof. The transmitter was surrounded by stacks of paperwork and binders. Above it was a map of the island marked with circles and squares. To the left, open doors led to two small bedrooms on either side of a bathroom. An ancient toilet, the kind with a long chain dangling from a tank on the wall was visible through the bathroom door. The place looked and felt like a remote ranger station on a wildlife preserve, which it sort of was. A weathered man who could've been forty or sixty sat at the kitchen table with a mug of coffee. He looked up from a piece of paper on the clipboard in front of him as the veterinarian walked over. "Mornin' doc. I see you brought the new kid. Hey kid, I'm Jack. Well, I went out this morning and another ten monkeys jumped in the corral last night. That makes 182. Looked like about a third don't have tattoos, but I couldn't get an exact count." Jack's voice held the soft lilt acquired by someone who'd lived here for a while, but wasn't from the Deep South. The veterinarian acknowledged his update and told me to go into the bathroom and change into boots and coveralls. I came out to find Jack gone from the cabin and the vet in her coveralls waiting for me by the door. We walked out to where two of the crew from the boat stood with Diane and Jack between a couple of ancient vehicles I hadn't noticed earlier. The sun shone through the trees on an ancient flat-fender jeep. I loved it at first sight. Either Army surplus or an early civilian model. It was protected from the salt air by multiple coats of whatever leftover paint had been on hand at the time. Where the last coat of beige flaked off, I could see light orange and hints of robins egg blue beneath that. Its windshield frame was long gone. A hole gaped where one headlight had fallen out. There was no roll bar or rear seat. Stuffing poked through the cracked vinyl upholstery of a driver's seat behind a wide metal steering wheel. The passenger had to make do with an old couch cushion set on the floor of the vehicle. A surplus Army trailer painted the same leftover kaleidoscope was hitched to the jeep. It's pickup truck-sized bed held boxes of veterinary supplies. The other vehicle was an old pickup truck so dented and rusted I couldn't tell you more about it. I admired it anyway. As I stood wondering at the make of the truck, a movement back by the jeep caught my eye. I had to stare for a moment before I could spot the young adult rhesus macaque. He crept across the forest floor, halfway to the jeep trailer from the nearest tree trunk. Big Man was in a nearby storage shed even more decrepit than the cabin, where he stowed the last of the supplies from the boat. Everyone else had their backs to the monkey. The macaque crept steadily closer to the trailer, eyes wide, mouth open. I didn't know any better so I just watched. When he got to the trailer, he stood on his hind legs and peered over the side. A hand darted out and snatched a packet of sterile gauze just as Big Man came out of the shed, saw him and yelled. "Yo! Monkey! Git!" The macaque streaked away from the trailer in a three-legged dash, the white paper packet of gauze held to his chest with one hand. I continued to stare dumbly as the other four turned around and watched the thief disappear up into the tree canopy. Big Man chuckled as he walked toward our group. "That one's still at it, huh? Guess he didn't jump into the corral last night." I finally found my words and asked if that was something to look out for the rest of the day. Big Man replied. "Not really. Every so often one of 'em gets more curious than scared and hangs around the cabin. They love to get their hands on anything new and different, so the census trailer is better 'n bananas. No big deal so long as they don't steal anything sharp. You put the syringes and scissors on the bottom, right Jack?" Jack nodded, a smile on his face. Big Man stopped next to Jack who handed him a clipboard. Big Man started the morning briefing. He introduced me as Jeff, there to help the veterinarian. No other introductions as everyone knew everyone except me and it was clear I was the vet's problem. "Ok, me and Karl are on island the next three nights. Jack and Dianne are good to stay overtime this morning, but'll take the day boat back this afternoon as soon as we're finished with census. Dianne, how's everything doing?" "Batteries are at eighty percent this morning, generator ran fine last evening. Propane is good, water tank's three quarters full, next water delivery in a week. The water transfer pump is still on the fritz, but I know what part it needs and'll pick that up before I'm out here next. Did a radio check this morning with Yemassee. Y'all brought plenty of food so you're good for three days." He nodded his thanks, then looked down at the clipboard. "Ok, Monkeys are in Corral C on the southwest side of the island. As of Jack's final check this morning, a total of 182 animals jumped in over two days." He flipped the top sheet over and went through a checklist on the second page. "Ok, cages, sawhorses and plywood are already staged out at the corral. Lights, scales and measuring tapes are in the pickup. So are census records, tattoo equipment and portable generators. Trailer's loaded with vet supplies, gauntlets, and gloves." He looked at his watch, then at us. "It's 7:45, we need to set up by 8:30 so we can census all 180 macaques before noon. 1:00 at the latest if there are hiccups. It's cool now, but the temp is gonna get into the eighties later this afternoon. We don't wanna add heat to the stress they're already under. No breaks, lunch after, ok? Everyone good?" Heads nodded, mine included even though I didn't know what would come next. "Ok, boat crew with me in the truck, last night's island crew in the jeep. We'll go on ahead and set up." Big Man looked at me and the veterinarian. "Y'all walk and meet us there. Take the loop trail and you can't miss it. We'll have your station set up by the time you get there. " I was bummed to not get a ride in the old Army jeep. As I watched it pull away down the rough trail, it bounced over a deep rut. The jeep's rear corner hopped violently because the leaf spring was broken and the body sat hard on the rear axle. Maybe a walk in the woods was better. The veterinarian used the walk to fill me in. Our black rubber boots were nearly silent on sand mixed with pine needles as we walked next to a rutted vehicle trail that looped around the perimeter of the island. The veterinarian started with background. "Pretty crazy place, huh? The government put a breeding colony of 1,400 rhesus macaques on this island in the 80's. It's more than self-sustaining because now there're about 3,000 of them. I say 'about' because they live free-range in dozens of social groups. There's no way to do a complete count when they roam freely over hundreds of acres. There are four corrals around the island, A, B, C and D. We do census in March, June, September and December. The island staff bait one of the corrals with fruit and biscuits for two days. Monkeys living in the area jump down into the corral for fruit and can't climb back out. Take today's census. 182 macaques jumped into Corral C. We treat that group as a sample from all the monkeys living on the island. Then we use statistics to estimate the total population." She looked up from the ground ahead to see if I followed. I nodded in understanding. "Ok, great. During the census today, the staff will inspect, weigh and measure each monkey that jumped into the corral. Every monkey with a chest tattoo has its own census chart in a binder where its weight and such are recorded each time it's captured. If a monkey doesn't have a tattoo, it means it's never been seen in the census. The animal gets a tattoo and a new census chart with its first weight, length, sex, age and health exam. When it's caught again in a future census, its information is recorded on the same chart. Get why it's called a census?" I got it. The official census in the United States worked sort of the same way. Every ten years, census takers go door to door in a neighborhood and record a bunch of information. Not every door, but enough to create a reliable sample. Experts then do the math to estimate the population of the neighborhood, the state and the whole country. I said as much to the veterinarian. "Yes! Exactly! Now, I'm not involved because this is primatology stuff, but as I understand it, data we gather today is sent to Yemassee to be entered into the computer database. From that the population on the island gets estimated pretty accurately. Growth and especially replacement rate too, because animals are shipped out to supply federal research labs." I followed what she was saying, but had questions. I asked if the monkeys ever escaped from the island, and most important to me, why I was there. "Escapes happen but they're rare. Macaques swim, but don't like to cross open water. They're often on the beach or in the marsh hunting for crabs. If they see something floating out in the water their curiosity means they might swim out to it. They've been spotted riding tangled up mats of marsh grass. One was spotted floating on a tree trunk that fell from the island in a storm." The image of an adventurous monkey riding a floating log made me smile. That was one theory for how the remote Galapagos Islands were populated by tortoises and iguanas. We walked past a big corral situated on the inland side of the vehicle trail. A big letter "D" was stenciled in black spray paint on the galvanized metal wall. A huge set of double doors stood open on one end. The corral was empty except for a few broken branches and a feeder stand. We were closer to our destination at Corral C. The veterinarian walked a bit faster while she explained my duties for the census. "When the monkeys jump into the baited corral, they come from different family groups. The monkeys today could be from five, six different troops. That means they're gonna fight. You're here to treat fight wounds. I'll check the animals for disease, teeth issues, joint problems, skin conditions and reproductive health. The rest of the crew will tattoo, weigh, measure and update census charts in the binders. If there aren't many fight wounds, you're gonna work the tattoo table. How's that sound?" That sounded intense but doable. Except for the tattoo part. I told her I knew nothing about tattoos. She smiled and reassured me that if I could stitch up three layers of tissue I could use a tattoo gun. Now I understood why the head vet complimented my suture technique by telling me I was ready to go out to the island. I was going to be a field medic that morning. But one macaque at a time was one thing. 180 was quite another, especially with the time pressure I could sense building in the operation. The dull gray metal of another corral appeared through the trees ahead. So did a flurry of human activity. I inhaled sharply and felt my eyes grow wide in a surge of nervous anticipation. **** Corral C stood on the southwest side of the island in an area dense with pine trees instead of the mix of oaks elsewhere. The trees were mature, two or more feet thick at the base. Their ramrod-straight trunks were spaced wide apart like columns in a giant warehouse. The trunks supported an interlocked roof of pine needles above. The ground was covered in a thick, uniform mat of fallen pine needles. The forest was shadowy and mysterious. A complete lack of underbrush indicated we would stay in the shade even when the sun was high overhead. The low light combined with the sound-deadening effect of the pine forest made the scene next to the corral surreal. The island crew moved through the quiet, dim woods with a quick economy of motion, feet silent on the carpet of pine needles. They had just finished setting up the census equipment and were returning boxes and crates to the truck and trailer parked off to one side. A single long table stretched between the tree trunks. The table was made of four foot by eight foot sheets of plywood laid across a row of tall sawhorses. The table stood above my waist, chest high on the shorter members of the crew. The veterinarian led me toward one end of the table. Mobile exam lights were clamped to the end closest to us, off for now. 25 yards away at the opposite end of the table, a row of three ring binders stood upright like books on a shelf. Hanging scales were suspended from a metal bar mounted above the table next to a collection of measuring tapes and a stack of metal clipboards. Electric hair clippers and a half dozen ink-stained electric tattoo guns were plugged into a long industrial power strip in the middle of the table. A thick yellow extension cord ran from the power strip to portable generators off among the trees. The veterinarian stepped up to the section of table under the lights. It was covered in a sheet of translucent plastic. A crate held dozens of clipboards, each with a blank form. A wire mesh basket held two dozen 100 milliliter bottles of ketamine. Boxes of 50 milliliter syringes stood next to the basket. 50 milliliters was bigger than I was used to for injectables. The veterinarian checked over her section of the table and directed me to do the same the next section over. "Ok Jeff, I'll do triage here under the lights, you'll be right next door treating fight wounds. If there's something you can't handle, or that needs both of us, I'll step over. I want you to make sure your table has all the supplies we use in the operating room back in Yemassee. You think anything's missing, you tell me." My section held a neat arrangement of clinical supplies, already laid out by the island crew. Boxes of sterile surgical gloves in white paper wrappers. Squeeze bottles of iodine, alcohol and sterile water. A pile of blue and white absorbent pads. A deep stainless steel tray held scalpels, surgical scissors, clamps and forceps submerged in alcohol. Boxes of different kinds of individually-wrapped sutures, needle threaded and ready to go in each handy packet. Bottles of injectable antibiotics and one milliliter syringes. A dozen tubes of topical antibiotic ointment. Electric hair clippers plugged into the power strip the next section over. The island team didn't miss a thing as far as I could tell. In fact, I noticed there were many multiples of each item, more than could possibly be required. The redundancy held for the rest of the equipment. Six tattoo guns, two lights, two scales, two generators. We were a fifteen minute drive away from the base camp. An hour by boat and car from Yemassee. Census of 180 monkeys had to happen in four hours or less. Once we started, we couldn't afford to have something break. I shared my realization with the veterinarian who walked me through what was going to happen. "Yeah, you got it. Once this train leaves the station it doesn't stop for any reason. Monkeys'll get run into the cages. You chemically restrain 'em two cages at a time. Once they're unconscious, the crew'll bring em over to me for triage and a health exam. You'll stitch up any fight wounds I find. We pass them to tattoo, then they get weighed, measured, and charted. I'll tell you when to anesthetize the next two cages. We don't stop until we're through all 182." I looked at the long table again. It made more sense. The table was an assembly line for the census process. Clinical evaluation under the lights at one end, then on to stitches, tattoos, weight, height, and record keeping at the other end. "You focus first on anesthetizing monkeys when I tell you, second on treating any fight wounds. Fresh sterile gloves for every monkey, do your best to maintain a sterile field but we're out here in the woods so… be practical. There'll be a ton of activity around you, so don't get distracted. Ok, looks like it's go time." I followed her gaze to where Jack stood next to Corral C. I'd barely noticed the corral while I took in the census assembly line. Next to Jack, one end of a long line of metal cages was bolted to the corral wall. The cages were attached end to end in a single row that extended about fifty yards from the hatch in the corral into the trees. Each rectangular cage was about two feet tall, eighteen inches wide, and three feet long. A pair of vertically-sliding metal doors at the junction between the cages stood open. With the doors between the cages lifted up into the open position, the row of cages formed a fifty yard long continuous tunnel, one end secured to the hatch into the corral, the other end closed off. With a nod from Jack, Dianne pulled the starter cord on a generator. It roared to life with one pull and she walked back toward the census table. As the electricity began to flow, both exam lights came on. An electric hair trimmer buzzed and vibrated on the tattoo table, its switch stuck in the on position. I quickly stepped over and turned it off. The veterinarian and I readied ourselves by putting on blue rubber exam gloves. She told me to set up the ketamine. "Fill a syringe so you're ready. Check the concentration on the bottle, should be 10 milligrams of ketamine in every milliliter. I know you know this, but we always cross check right? Dose at 10 milligrams of ketamine per kilogram of body weight. That means one milliliter of ketamine in the syringe for every kilogram the monkey weighs. No time to change needles between animals, administer multiple doses from the same syringe. Every macaque on the island has an identical serotype, they all carry the same viruses. Watch your technique, you don't want a needle stick all the way out here." As I drew 40 milliliters of ketamine into each of two big syringes, Big Man walked to the closed-off end of the cage tunnel. He walked back toward the corral, double-checking the cage-to-cage connections. When he got to Jack, he looked at his watch, then over at the rest of us where we stood by our stations. He yelled over the noise of the generator. "Ok! Everybody ready?" I nodded and assumed the rest of the team did too because Big Man nodded at Jack. Jack reached down and grabbed a loop of rope on the hatch in the corral wall. He jerked it and the hatch slid straight up. Now there was an opening from the corral into the tunnel of cages. For a moment nothing happened. Then a single monkey shot through the hatch and ran down the cage tunnel at full speed. Three heartbeats later, the remaining 181 monkeys streamed through the hatch in a continuous head-to-tail line. The hole in the side of the corral was their way out, they had no idea it led to confinement instead of the forest. The metal cages rattled from the force of this freight train of monkeys running as fast as they could down the tunnel. When the macaque leading the train reached the end of the line, he came to a stop next to the solitary monkey that ran out first. The rest piled up behind them, shoving them together into an awkward embrace. The momentum of the monkey train pressed the 182 macaques into a solid column of red fur, limbs, and angry faces. The rattle of metal on metal stopped as suddenly as it started. Jack pushed the hatch closed to cut off the possibility of retreat back into the corral. He and Big Man gently pushed the sliding doors closed at each junction between cages, sometimes giving quiet encouragement to the monkeys to "get out of the way." When they got to the end, the 182 monkeys were divided three or four at a time in each of the 50 cages. I looked over at the veterinarian at her station. She'd taken off her watch cap and tied her hair up. Her face was all business in the harsh white of the exam lights. She nodded back at me. "Two cages. One milliliter per kilogram intramuscular. Go." My hyper focus kicked in. I started to estimate weight and calculate doses as I walked over to the two cages at the end of the row. I was sure a small young female was three kilograms. That meant three milliliters. I uncapped the needle, pointed the syringe up and flicked it with an index finger. A bubble rose to the top. I pushed the plunger until the air bled out and a droplet of ketamine sparkled at the tip of the needle. The female rhesus was squeezed into a cage with three others. She helpfully squirmed away to hide her vulnerable face and belly from me, so it was straightforward to inject three milliliters into the muscle of her thigh. Next was a medium sized male, nine kilograms. After injecting nine milliliters, the plunger was at 27. A smaller male looked to weigh seven kilograms so his dose of seven left 20. The fourth macaque in the cage was another young female. Four kilograms, four milliliters. I finished the first cage with 16 milliliters of ketamine left in my syringe. The three kilogram female, the first monkey I'd anesthetized, was already getting drowsy so I kept going through the second cage. Slow is smooth and smooth is fast. Somewhere behind me somebody yelled out the time. "8:40! We have until 9:00!" It was Big Man over at the census table next to the scales. He called out the time I finished anesthetizing the first macaques. This let everyone know how much time we had to get them through the census process. Anthony, one of the crew from the boat appeared next to me. "Go on, head back and get ready. I'll watch 'em and bring them over when they're unconscious." Back at my fight wound station, I ran my eyes over the supplies one last time, plucked a packet of sterile surgical gloves out of the box and spread a blue and white pad on the table in front of me. Back at the cages Anthony unfastened two latches on the top edge of the cage and folded the whole side down. A random unconscious arm and a leg or two flopped out when the cage opened up. He gently picked up the little three kilogram female and carried her over to the veterinarian, then hustled back to shuttle the remaining macaques from cage to table. The vet did a thorough check for wounds and broken bones. Finding none, she proceeded with the health exam, jotting down quick notes about teeth, eyes and skin on a clipboard taken from the crate next to her. She raised her voice a bit to be heard over the generator. "Young adult female, no fight trauma, no tattoo." Someone, maybe Jack, took the clipboard and whisked the monkey away to the tattoo table. I heard a shaver start to buzz. The veterinarian was through the next monkey in a flash. This one already had a tattoo so was taken to the scales. The third monkey had been in a fight. "Young adult male, fresh laceration on right rear upper thigh, no health issues, no tattoo." She beckoned for me to come take the animal. I carried him to my table and gently laid him down on the pad. The wound on his rear thigh meant he'd been running away from a more aggressive male when he got it. It'd been about five minutes since I knocked him out, so I needed to move quickly. The laceration was new, through the top layer of skin, about an inch and a half long. A small amount of blood had just begun to clot at one end. I used my electric clippers to shave the hair away from the cut. I squirted iodine on the wound and the skin around it, then wiped it away with gauze. Next, I opened up the appropriate suture packet and set it next to the monkey. Time to get mostly sterile. I put fresh surgical gloves on over my blue rubber exam gloves. I chose a pair of forceps from the metal tray full of alcohol and set about stitching up the wound. I don't remember the details of suturing, only that at the time I was proud of my ability to close a wound leaving only neat knots under the skin. The absorbable suture material would hold until the wound healed, then dissolve into the surrounding tissue. The macaque couldn't tear his stitches out. This was a big deal, since Monkey Island was no place for the cone of shame you see on a dog or cat. The wound wasn't deep or old enough to warrant injectable antibiotics, so I finished with a smear of topical ointment. The vet saw me strip off the surgical gloves. "Good job Jeff. One down, but we gotta keep moving, I have another one here for you." Someone from the tattoo table appeared and took the young male to get his first ink. I put down a fresh absorbent pad and picked up my next patient from the veterinarian's table. This one was in worse shape but would be ok. The wound was a deep tear with three flaps of skin instead of a simple laceration. It was on his left shoulder, which meant he faced his foe when it happened. The wound was older too, probably from a full two days ago when the corral was first baited. I had to shave away clumps of hair matted together by thick clots of blood before I could tell if there were signs of infection. Some of the tissue was dead, necrotic, so I used scissors to trim it away. The tear was wide at the surface, but had made a small hole in the deepest third layer of skin. I could see muscle and tendons through the opening. I used different kinds of sutures to close each of the three layers, starting with the deepest subcutaneous and working my way back up. By the time I finished stitching up the monkey with the bad tear in his shoulder, two more were in line behind it. The veterinarian joined me at my station and we took care of those two together. Half of the initial eight monkeys had fight wounds. If that kept up it was going to be a long day. As it turned out, less than a quarter had some sort of wound, none of them worse than the tear I'd just treated and most required only a few stitches. Thankfully no broken bones. Still, that was forty macaques, so the rest of the morning was a blur of ketamine injections and wound closures. A couple of times the action slowed enough for me to step over to the tattoo table. I wasn't qualified to give a young monkey its first chest tattoo, but they let me freshen up the faded letters and numbers on older animals. I shaved away the soft hair and disinfected the monkey's skin with alcohol. The tattoo guns seemed ancient, but they all worked. A small electromagnet vibrated a needle up and down in a guide. I dipped the tip of the gun in black ink then gently ran the buzzing needle over the skin and wiped away the small amount of blood that rose to the surface. It was harder than it looked. The unconscious monkeys seemed to always be in an awkward position. Their elastic skin moved around easily. I don't know how many tattoos I made better, but I didn't make any worse. A few years later I got my own first tattoo. The artist used exactly the same equipment and procedure we used on Monkey Island. The five person island crew took turns doing all the jobs. They busily weighed each monkey, measured bodies, arms and legs. They noted evidence of recent pregnancy. The sexual maturity of young monkeys was observed and logged. Whoever was doing the measurements calmly called out a constant stream of information to record keepers who listened and wrote it down on the correct chart. Every macaque went through the census process in less than twenty minutes. That meant they still had some time to sleep off their chemical restraint before rejoining the family group they left when they jumped into the corral for a banana days before. When a macaque had been through the entire process, it was still unconscious from the ketamine. Or at least in the immobile and dissociated state ketamine causes. The animal was carried out into the forest and laid gently on its side in a warm spot of sunshine. Still close enough to keep an eye on, but far enough away from the census table so they wouldn't freak out when they woke up. Since the animals were in a vulnerable state, each monkey was placed a safe distance away from other macaques also recovering from anesthesia. At the peak, there must've been forty monkeys spread across the soft pine needles of the forest floor. I did my best not to anthropomorphize the macaques in my time with them. I followed the policy against seeing them as primate relatives. My colleagues had a harder time keeping their emotional distance. Animal care and more so behavioral care technicians interacted with the macaques when they were more endearing. Hungry. Curious. Nurturing. Annoyed. Caring. Playful. I was a veterinary technician. We interacted with the macaques when they were defensive or aggressive. When their behavior was closer to what you think of as 'wild animal.' It was easier for me to see them that way. But the one time I felt kinship with my fellow primate? When I watched them wake up from anesthesia in the forest. It was quite the scene. A young male monkey, let's call him Chad, slept peacefully on his right side on a bed of soft pine needles in a spot of warm sunlight. Chad was big for his age and his muscular arms and legs had been arranged gently to one side. His head rested at a comfortable angle, though his mouth was open and his tongue drooped out. He was perfectly still for many minutes, as if he would sleep forever. Then movement. A leg extended slowly, almost a stretch. An arm pulled in and curled against his chest. After a moment, Chad lifted his head an inch off the ground, eyes closed, tongue still out, then laid it back down. Head back up, this time mouth closed and eyes half open as he became aware of his situation. Chad lifted his head higher and opened his eyes all the way. He pulled his arm under him to push himself up. His head and torso wobbled unsteadily, propped on that arm. A groggy expression of surprise came over Chad's face as if he had no idea where he was or how he got there. His eyes rolled from side to side. After a long moment propped on one arm, Chad shifted his weight onto his butt. Monkeys usually sit on their haunches with their legs gathered underneath, so he looked silly with his legs splayed out to the sides. He planted his other arm and clumsily pulled one leg at a time underneath his butt, still supporting himself with his arms planted on the ground. Chad stayed in this 'dude where am I' position for a while as the fog wore off. His expression drifted between drugged, confused and a grimace of distaste from his dry mouth. When he picked his hands up off the ground and could balance upright, Chad started to come around cognitively. He could take in his surroundings, though still he still wobbled unsteadily at times. His face took on a very clear 'where the hell am I and how did I get here?' expression. The ketamine wore off faster now. Chad looked down at his chest where it stung from the tattoo gun. His face grew concerned as he lifted a hand to touch his fresh ink. Chad looked up with a pained almost regretful expression as he processed the fact he had a new tattoo. His hand went from his chest up to his left shoulder. He turned his head to peer down at fresh stitches in a two inch laceration. Chad seemed less puzzled about the fight wound than the tattoo. At this point the acute effects had faded. Chad wasn't wobbling any more, at least while he remained seated. He looked around again, this time he noticed the half dozen other unconscious monkeys nearby. His eyes grew wide. That was not good. At all. Time to get out of there. Chad lurched up on all fours. The sudden transition to vertical caused him to sway left, then right. He evened out, and after one last look back at his unconscious cousins, Chad walked off into the forest with a hangover, fresh stitches, and a new tattoo. ***** Find out what happened next in the full book Monkey Farm: A Summer Among the Macaques!
