Dear Members, I have read the ongoing exchange of thoughts about primates in various private care situations. I have the privilege of living with 2 brown capuchin monkeys. I researched this endeavor for 2-3 years before truly believing I could be successful with caretaking a primate. This was back before I had access to this wonderful machine, the computer, and cyberspace. I read what few books I could find and called any person I was referred to for information. I received numerous conflicting stories and experiences, all of which sounded sincere by each person I spoke with. I did not just jump to a decision one day to buy a monkey and then act on it the next day. I honestly thought I was being very rational about my decision. I would like to say even with all the searching I did, it only partially educated me as to the intense amount of care and devotion (and bonding) that comes with living with a non-human primate. No words written or spoken ever prepared me for the things I have since learned by living with one. The incredible likeness to ourselves goes well beyond anything I could have ever learned in a book or just by speaking to people. Until a person lives and breathes "primate", complete understanding of what they are considering, to me, seems nearly impossible. I realize this is extremely unfortunate for any primate and have no realistic resolution for this, other than the requirement for anyone considering living with a primate to spend a large number of hours (days/weeks/months) working with a primate facility, in order to gain the needed experiences to finalize a decision about living with one themselves.
I wish I could say I regret my decision to acquire my first monkey but that would be a lie. I would never buy a baby monkey again, but would raise another if, and only if, I knew for certain it was truly an orphan. I do plan to someday have a facility for a few more displaced adult monkeys, when I have the proper means to do so. For now, I just continually give
