FAQ
General questions
What is this?
This is a wiki that tries to keep track of all monkeys who are documented by Arroz Marisco, JW, and Monkeys Inc.
But, why?
When I (the site administrator) started watching AM's videos, he thought, "Wow, this is a lot of monkeys. Maybe there's a web site somewhere that keeps track of them that I can use as a cheat sheet." But there were none.
AM himself had set up a web site with this information, but sadly, he didn't have time to keep it updated, and took it down.
So I started keeping notes in a spreadsheet. I figured it would be a few dozen monkeys I'd have to keep straight, but it shouldn't be too hard.
That turned out to be several hundred monkeys I was keeping track of. No wonder I was feeling overwhelmed!
Can you make this look nicer, or implement X feature?
This is a passion project, so I cannot devote a lot of time to it; I have a day job, after all! In theory, I could probably mess with the code enough to customize these features; I just don't have the time.
Also, I am prone to severe periods of burnout (this site is, in fact, a burnout project), so I have to be careful in taking on too many personal projects! I do not want to burn out from this.
Where is Monkey Hill? Can I visit it myself?
If you're in or near Hong Kong, sure! You want to go to Kam Shan Country Park. Here are a few things to keep in mind.
- If you're walking inside the park, you will be covering a lot of distance. Wear comfortable shoes. Treat it like a hike. If it's the summer, dress appropriately and stay hydrated.
- If you are driving through in the evening (no cars are allowed before 5 pm), be very careful about monkeys laying in the road. If you stop the car at all, be sure there is no one beneath your car before moving it again. Traffic accidents are one of the leading killers in Monkey Hill, and has claimed the lives of some popular residents, like Koby and Gerty.
- While the videos from Monkey Hill's videographers feature a lot of people feeding the monkeys, anyone caught doing this must pay a hefty fine (about $1,700 USD, according to AM).
- Feeding monkeys carelessly can spark dangerous and needless fights within a troop, or between troops. The registered and regular feeders at Monkey Hill know the troops, make sure to feed the highest-ranking monkeys first, and stop feeding if another troop comes nearby.
- Registered feeders also offer healthy food for the monkeys: fruit, nuts, and beans. They unwrap the food before giving it to the monkeys, eliminating the risk that the monkeys will choke on plastic bags or containers and reducing litter. Monkeys enjoy eating sugary candy, but it is bad for them in the long run (just like humans). Monkeys dislike eating meat, and generally avoid eating anything meat-based.
- Do not make eye contact with monkeys. They interpret that as a sign of aggression.
- If you have food on you, keep it secured in a closed bag. Holding food loose in a plastic bag will turn you into an accidental feeder with a broken plastic bag.
- Be careful about getting close to the monkeys, especially mothers with nursing infants. They can get very defensive.
- If you plan on taking photos, use a dedicated camera with a zoom lens. If you try using your phone to take photos, you risk getting too close for the monkeys' comfort.
These monkeys are adorable! Should I get one as a pet?
Absolutely not, for many reasons.
- Unlike dogs, cats, and other popular housepets, there is no species of monkey that has been domesticated.
- Monkeys and humans are so closely related, we are capable of passing many zoonotic diseases to one another. This can kill either the human or the monkey.
- Most "pet" monkeys are babies seized from the wild, often by poachers who kill the baby's mother. Even worse, the bond between mother and baby is immensely strong, so by the time the monkey is delivered to their new "home," they have already been heavily traumatized.
- Starting at around six months old, monkeys will start exhibiting behaviors that are inappropriate for a pet. These behaviors include dominance humping and attacking anything that they perceive to be a threat to their "troop," like nearby animals and humans. These behaviors are deeply ingrained, and are difficult, if not impossible, to train away without inflicting even more mental trauma.
- Because of the previous point, "pet" monkeys are usually abandoned by their owners (or disposed of in more cruel ways) at about 6-12 months old. By then, they have missed out on so many critical survival lessons their mother would have taught them that they have a hard time surviving in the wild. Some monkeys do not survive this transition. There's a reason that most "pet" monkey accounts on social media feature baby monkeys, and only stick around for several months.
In short: monkeys belong in the wild, not in someone's home.
Using the wiki
Why a wiki?
This will hopefully address some of the problems AM had, as it allows for several fans to collaborate in submitting new information. Plus, using a wiki let me use some handy extensions that made things easier, like Sam Wilson's excellent Genealogy extension.
Why don't you feature the monkey birthday estimates that the videographers provide?
That was out of scope for this version of the wiki. I will probably support it in the future! In the meantime, please feel free to edit an individual monkey's page text to include their birthday, so it's on there somewhere.
Why are monkey fathers not included in the family tree?
This is a limitation of the Genealogy extension, which was coded with human families in mind. The assumptions it makes work great for Homo sapiens, but not so well for Macaca mulatta.
The extension doesn't distinguish between mothers and fathers; it only distinguishes parents. It also doesn't distinguish "half-siblings" - if two people share at least one parent, the extension considers them full siblings. For humans, these are smart design calls, as it opens up flexibility for many different kinds of families.
However, a male monkey can conceive babies with many different females in the same mating season. And yet, a monkey "family" almost always consists of a mother and her children; most monkey fathers are uninterested in raising their offspring. So including the male monkey as a "parent" would include all children that came from the same father. In the case of a powerful, long-serving alpha, this would be an enormous list that would mix together children from many mothers. That wouldn't clear anything up!
Our workaround was simple: only pass the mother's name into the Genealogy extension as the lone "parent." This creates a family tree graph that makes far more sense, from a monkey perspective.
However, this left one gap: it would still be useful to have a list of all monkeys a father has sired. The workaround here was to implement this as a category, with each father getting his own category page. It's a bit awkward, honestly, but it's perfectly serviceable and does the job it needs to do.
Why does the family tree go horizontally, instead of vertically? And why does it have those empty split nodes when a parent has multiple children?
The Genealogy extension uses another extension, Mermaid, to draw graphs. These things seem to be a limitation of that extension.
In theory, Genealogy can use a different graphing extension, GraphViz, but in practice, I could only get Mermaid to work. And for all I know, GraphViz has the same limitations. So that's what we get!
Can you color in the box in the family tree for the monkey featured on that page?
In theory, yes! But that would take some time, and I simply can't afford it right now. Maybe in the future!
Contributing to the wiki
Can I edit the wiki?
Yes! You must create an account on the wiki first, but that is free and doesn't take long.
When editing pages on the wiki, please follow the Page editing guidelines.
What kind of help do you need?
- Data validation and correction - making sure children are linked to the correct mothers, making sure dates are correct.
- Birthdays - adding the monkey birthdays supplied by the videographers to the body text of the monkey page (not the infoboxes yet!).
- Images - uploading monkey images to the wiki.
For guidelines on how to do this, please follow the Page editing guidelines.
Why can't I create a new page?
Page creation involves some technical details that need to be handled in a very specific way, so only certain users are allowed to do so. You can email me to ask for this access.
If you'd like to see what's involved here, you can check out the Page creation guidelines.
There's a new baby monkey! Can I create a page for them?
Please don't create new pages for monkeys until they have a name, unless they are unfortunate enough to not get one.
Can I help support this project financially?