Scientists join forces to save Puerto Rico’s ‘Monkey Island’

The Cayo Santiago Field Station is the longest-running primate field site in the world. Since it was founded in 1938, generations of monkeys have lived out their life with humans watching. Only monkeys live on the island; people take a 15-minute boat trip every day from Punta Santiago on Puerto Rico’s east coast. The huge amount of data on each individual monkey’s life, death and contributions to the next generation allow scientists to ask questions in biology, anthropology and psychology that can’t be answered anywhere else. This microcosm of monkey society opens the door onto these highly intelligent and social primates’ lives – thereby allowing us to better understand our own. After Hurricane Maria made landfall 30 minutes south of Cayo Santiago, scientists in the United States scrambled to make contact with students, staff and friends in Puerto Rico. Several days later we finally managed to reach Angelina Ruiz Lambides, the director of the research station. Scientists arranged a helicopter so that she could survey Punta Santiago and Cayo Santiago. The photos and videos she sent back were devastating. Punta Santiago, where many of the staff live, was destroyed. A phototaken from the helicopter showed a large chalk message: “S.O.S. Necesitamos Agua/Comida” – We need water and food. Cayo Santiago, formerly two lush islands connected by an isthmus, was unrecognizable. The forests were brown, the mangroves were flooded and the isthmus was submerged. Research labs and other infrastructure were in pieces. Yet the monkeys were spotted! Somehow, defying our expectations, many of the Cayo monkeys had weathered the storm. Over the next few days other staff traveled to Cayo in small boats and started searching for each individual monkey, like 00O – a process that will take weeks. Some observers might question our focus on saving animals when people across Puerto Rico are suffering, but this is not an either/or choice. The Cayo Santiago Field Station is the livelihood of many dedicated staffers who live in Punta Santiago. We cannot aid the monkeys without helping to rebuild the town, and we aim to do both.The staff and researchers who work at Cayo Santiago are stewards of these animals, who cannot survive without our help. Many of the Puerto Rican staffers on site have spent years caring for monkeys like 00O. Now they are spending their mornings rebuilding Cayo Santiago, and then working on their own homes in the afternoon.