Identifying Individuals and Instinct

One of the first things anyone studying primate behavior has to do is learn to identify individuals (at least adults) in their groups.  In addition to getting some preliminary data and figuring out my data collection protocol, I am spending time on this- it’s rather hard to get even preliminary data without doing so.  Now, if you’ve seen my pictures you know that my new species, the crested black macaque is…well, BLACK.  As in all black in color, even their faces.  The only exception is that they look a little grey in spots (depending on light, ha) and their genitals (pink butts, pink to bright red genitals for the males especially).  Ok, now remember…I am now working in a forest environment, in other words much less light.  This means it is hard to see little things like scars…one of our males is missing an eye and I can’t always see that!  On the other hand, olive baboons are brown and their color varies quite a bit- this was something I used to id.  Plus, you know- bright sunlight, no canopy.

Meet Raja

Meet Tarzan...I swear this is a different animal 

Oh, and these macaques basically don’t have tails- they have these little tail nubs, not distinctive except for a couple whose tails lean to one side.  And you guessed it, tails were a feature I keyed in on in the baboons.  Baboons are pretty nasty to each other, so tails would have all sorts of break, missing hair, etc.  Not to mention extensive regular variation.

My usual procedure for learning ids is to use little oddities, scars, etc.  You’ve got to learn what is typical of the species and where the variation is- if everyone has a crease in a certain spot, it’s not gonna help.  I slowly learn to discriminate between the animals, and eventually get fast.  And around that time I start recognizing individuals like you do other humans- you just know them.  One day you see someone run by, look over, and you KNOW who it is- it’s instinct.

Basically, these guys are tough to learn, certainly harder than olive baboons.  I‘m really glad I have some previous experience.  Seriously, check out the pictures here- basically, I’m trying to learn these guys from every angle, and that means front, back (ie, butt), side).  So, yeah, those butts look different to me, but it takes some time.  And well...the males genitals vary a lot- so much so that this is a research topic of the project.  So, yeah...I'm using that, feel free to laugh at that, I do. 

I had a point where some things just clicked the other day and I started figuring some things out.  First, I started seeing some subtle differences I’d not been seeing- those pink things on the rear (sitting pads), they look different.

I swear, these are different animals...

And I realized that the combination of species (color, etc) and habitat make my usual routine not so helpful.  That routine works for me because I can start by logically thinking through ids, basically eliminating individuals until I get the right one.  I’m not a person who does things instinctively naturally; I am methodical and logical.  So, I’m trying to make myself just go for it- to have those telltale features, but then to just try to learn the animal as an individual.  Which means I’m trying to just look at an animal, not focusing on little scratches, but the individual themselves, and go with my instinct.  Rinse and repeat, and be grateful for our field assistants (who are probably scratching their heads trying to figure out how I can id someone one minute and not the next at the moment).  Basically, I’m forcing myself to go with my instinct and practicing until I can get it right.  I'm not spending lots of time trying to decide, you know, making sure I am right by going after the animal and checking for a scar, etc.  So, we’ll see…