There’s a new twist in the age-old food fight between humans and baboons in Cape Town — electrified mountainside fences to stop our primate cousins stealing our lunch.
The “common good mountain fence plan” could form the basis of a long-awaited new management strategy for Cape Town’s embattled baboon frontline — the suburbs adjoining Table Mountain National Park, which experience regular baboon raids.
The fence plan, first tabled 20 years ago, has been revived amid fears of a “baboon free-for-all” when the city council scraps its baboon management programme and monitors in June, as it has said it plans to do.
We need strategic fencing put up incrementally in the newish corridors which provide direct thoroughfare into town
— Luana Pasanisi, founder of environmental organisation The Green Group
Residents are now pinning their hopes on a new programme being planned by the Cape Peninsula baboon management joint task team made up of city authorities, CapeNature and the South African National Parks Board.
The team confirmed the fence is one of many plans under consideration.
“Fences are a no-brainer — they keep baboons safe, they eliminate conflict and allow baboons to use the whole wilderness habitat,” said Dave Gaynor, primatologist and architect of the fence proposal, which has already been presented to residents of Scarborough.
“It is blatantly obvious what will happen if the city stops their programme: baboons will come into every area, and baboons will be killed. Eventually the programme will have to be started again.”
Gaynor said the city’s previous policy of herding baboons away from the suburbs using such tactics as paintball guns was no longer effective, partly because baboons had adapted.
Mountain fencing would help monitors by at least partly blocking baboon access to the suburbs and food sources such as bins and dumps.
Baboon management has become increasingly contentious in Cape Town.
There were more than 330 baboons in the south peninsula at last count, and another 250 in the northern peninsula.
R12-million -- annual City of Cape Town spend on baboon monitors
R2-million - estimated annual running cost of Mountain Fence scheme
The troops are increasingly brazen and the city’s policy of killing “problem” baboons has polarised residents.
The debate over baboons has prompted dialogue involving primate experts and affected residents, a brainstorming process that appears to be bearing fruit.
Gaynor’s fence plan envisages about 30km of new electrified fencing to plug gaps in existing private fences on the mountainside, in a scheme to be managed by a trust and jointly funded by private and public sources.
The trust would employ people to both build the fences and then monitor them. Gaynor believes the plan is affordable; the city has a R12m annual budget for baboon management.
“Although most mountain-edge properties in the northern peninsula are already fenced, many are inadequate to prevent baboon incursions,” the proposal says.
“There are also many gaps, which would be fenced off under the new scheme while still allowing public access via baboon-proof gates. By steadily extending the mountain fence boundary, experts hope to narrow the ‘baboon corridors’ requiring monitoring.”
The draft plan is of particular interest to residents of Scarborough where a “splinter group” of four baboons moved in July, forcing local restaurants to hire guards with water pistols.
Fences are a no-brainer – they keep baboons safe, they eliminate conflict and allow baboons to use the whole wilderness habitat
— Dave Gaynor
Scarborough resident Fran Meyer-Gebhardt said: “In my opinion the solution is quality electric fencing coupled with the continued deployment of monitors.
"That would be the business model to follow, for the baboons’ safety, wellbeing and rehabilitation back to being wild and free again.”
The plan is not without its critics, however.
Some residents believe it is an attempt to “gentrify” suburbs by driving up the cost of living with additional special levies, and making human access more difficult too.
“You can’t fence baboons when there’s a national road they can walk down,” said one Scarborough resident of Gaynor’s plan. “Instead of straitjacketing the public we should encourage more rangers and better use of resources.”
Simon’s Town resident Luana Pasanisi, founder of environmental organisation The Green Group, said the fence proposal should not shoulder out other possible interventions, including human behaviour changes that had been effective in Simon’s Town, where baboons have taken up residence in an abandoned navy barracks.
SANParks, CapeNature and the city declined to comment before the release of a statement by the joint baboon task team, which is scheduled for early 2023.
“We are eager to circulate the draft plan so that all stakeholders, in particular our residents, can digest the content and submit their comments,” said deputy mayor Eddie Andrews, who is the mayoral committee member for spatial planning & environment.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.