Abandoned by his mother in the first few days of his life and raised by the keepers at the zoo, he has had some trouble integrating into the group of around 60 Japanese macaques.<\/p>\n
The keepers gave him a stuffed orangutan<\/a>, which he carries with him \u2014 grooming its plushy fur the way monkeys usually care for one another. <\/p>\n Some monkeys in the group were pushing Punch away, dragging him and reacting negatively to him. <\/p>\n The internet is demanding to know why. And why would his mother abandon him?<\/p>\n As primate researchers who have spent thousands of hours scientifically observing Japanese monkeys like Punch, we wanted to provide a bit of Japanese monkey-world context.<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Punch with his stuffed orangutan (JIJI Press)<\/p>\n Wild monkey mothers don\u2019t abandon infants<\/p>\n Japanese macaques or snow monkeys \u2014 Macaca fuscata to scientists \u2014 are a highly social and intelligent species.<\/p>\n In the wild, these monkeys do not abandon their infants.<\/p>\n We won\u2019t say it has never happened, but it would be an extreme behaviour if it occurred. We have also not seen it in more than 25 years of studying Japanese monkeys at the Awajishima Monkey Center on Awaji Island, Japan, where the monkeys live in free-ranging groups.<\/p>\n Quite the contrary, we have observed mothers caring for their infants and providing extra care for infants with physical disabilities that prevent them from clinging to their mother, and for injured or ill infants.<\/p>\n We have witnessed macaque mothers at Awajishima hold their disabled infants up to nurse and walk on three limbs, using an arm to support the baby, sometimes carrying them for years longer than a mother usually would.<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Punch plays in the monkeys’ playground at the Ichikawa city zoo (AP)<\/p>\n If an infant dies in the wild, a mother will often carry the body for days, presumably a reflection of her deep attachment.<\/p>\n This also makes sense from an evolutionary perspective because, in rare cases, an unresponsive infant may regain consciousness.<\/p>\n To be a Japanese mother monkey is to be a dedicated mother.<\/p>\n Dedicated, sometimes bewildered, mothers<\/p>\n This is not to say that every wild Japanese monkey mother is immediately good at it. We have seen bewildered monkey mothers holding their infants upside down or becoming distracted while their infants wander into trouble.<\/p>\n About the authors<\/p>\n Sarah E. Turner is an Associate Professor in Geography, Planning and Environment, Concordia University.<\/p>\n Brogan M. Stewart is a PhD Candidate in Environmental Science, Concordia University. <\/p>\n Megan M. Joyce is a PhD Student in the Department of Geography, Planning and Environment, Concordia University.<\/p>\n Mikaela Gerwing is a Wildlife Conservation Biologist and PhD Student, Concordia University.<\/p>\n This article was originally published by The Conversation<\/a> and is republished under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n We have seen them looking at the new squirming creature they have birthed with expressions of mystified dismay that would be recognizable to any human mother at one time or another.<\/p>\n But in a wild group, those first-time mothers have relatives to help them and to learn from. They usually stay in the same group for their whole lives, and they have a dominance rank order that they pass down to their offspring.<\/p>\n Male Japanese monkeys are usually not directly involved with infants. As the infants get older, though, and gain more independence, the males help out too by socializing with them.<\/p>\n Abandonment in captivity<\/p>\n Punch\u2019s mother either lacked the skills to look after her infant, was stressed by captivity and its associated conditions, or both. We don\u2019t know her full story; she may have been raised by humans herself or experienced other difficulties.<\/p>\n Infant abandonment does happen sometimes in captivity \u2014 7.7 per cent of cases according to one study \u2014 primarily in first-time or low-ranking mothers. Human caretakers do their best to raise infants, but it causes challenges.<\/p>\n Adoption can happen in captivity too. But the environment is different in a zoo: groups are not necessarily composed of female relatives the way a wild group would be; the males can\u2019t leave as they would in the wild. Also some zoo monkeys are raised by humans or come from the entertainment industry.<\/p>\n These monkeys may \u201cspeak\u201d a different social language. Punch wasn\u2019t able to learn how to \u201cspeak Japanese macaque\u201d from his human caregivers.<\/p>\n A behaviourally flexible species<\/p>\n![\"Punch](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/SEI285942188.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Punch](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Japan_Baby_Monkey_32787.jpg\")
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