Question: Where do the baboons have a home? Is their place to feed nearby?

Suzanne Harvey answered on 17 Jun 2013:

Hi Edward! Yes baboons do have a home, we call it a home range as they move around across a few miles of forest and grassland. They spend most of their day moving around feeding from different plants in this territory, and defend it from neighbouring groups.

They sleep high up in trees (without falling out, very good balance!) and might return to the same trees for a week or so before moving on. The sleeping trees are chosen to be close to food – when mangos are ripe they will sleep near the mango forest, other times they might stay near water where they can eat crabs.

An interesting fact that I didn’t know until I started field work – chimps sleep in trees and move around searching for food just like baboons, but they sleep in nests! They build a new nest every night, which looks like a giant bird’s nest and is lined with soft leaves, a very comfortable bed!