Baboon Facts

Identification

Chacma baboons have long legs and elongated face with eyes close to one another. Dark yellow-brown, sometimes grey coat. Pale chest, dark hair along crown and spine. Black face with white hair below eyes and on the muzzle. Sickle tail.

Differences between males and females

Males are larger and more aggressive than females. Average weight of male is around 22kg, female 16kg. Length (including tail) of male 1.2-1.6m, female 1.0 to 1.2m. Female has scarlet swollen buttocks when in season. Adult males have large canine teeth, shown off by large yawns when advertising dominance.

Habitat

Chacma baboons are distributed throughout southern Africa, including South Africa, Namibia, Mozambique, Botswana, Zimbabwe. They prefer cliffs or tall trees for sleeping sites and also require sufficient water for drinking. They inhabit a broad range of environments, including woodland, grassland, acacia scrub, and other savanna environments, semi-desert and seaside regions, and mountains (as high as 9000+ metres).

Social Structure and Habits

Diurnal, mostly terrestrial (partly arboreal). Gregarious animals. Troops vary from about 20 animals with one dominant male to 100 with 12 dominant males. These adult males are prominent in most of the activities, e.g. troop movements, chasing and fighting, mating, grooming, guarding and maintaining a strict hierarchy. They forage throughout the day, leaving their sleeping sites just after sunrise and returning in late afternoon.

Diet

Fruits, seeds, leaves & grasses, flowers, bulbs, roots, gum, and animal prey (includings scorpions, snails, insects, birds and small mammals). Chacma baboons near the ocean also eat limpets, mussels and crabs.

Vocalisation

Males have a bisyllabic bark; the others chatter and shriek. Have distinctive calls for different birds, buck and other animals. The presence of major predators, such as the leopard, causes much shrieking, barking, and anxious grunts (which can even scare the leopard away).

Breeding

Females reach sexual maturity at around 3 years; males at around 5 years. One (rarely two) infant is born to a female at a time, after a gestation period of about 6 months. The birth interval is about one-and-a-half to two years.

Life expectancy

Life span is about 40+ years in the wild, although in many situations this is severely reduced, in part because of clashes between baboons and human activities.