Shoot to kill: Indonesian authorities enlist snipers to take down wild monkeys
The monkeys steal fruit and corn from villagers’ plantations and have bitten 11 people so far this year
A district in central Indonesia has invited the army, police and local hunters to help battle bands of wild monkeys which are raiding plantations and attacking villagers, the district head said on Friday.
Dozens of men armed with rifles – including local soldiers, police officials, and hunters – are now patrolling villages in Boyolali district in central Java searching for wild long-tailed macaques.
“With the invasion of hundreds of these monkeys, we allow shooting clubs to help overcome this problem by hunting them,” Boyolali district chief Seno Samodro said.
Monkey attacks on local residents remain a problem, and officials are trying to find long-term ways to resolve the problem.
They have tried spray-painting a captured monkey before release, which caused the other monkeys to reject the painted animal – who later died. But this method of culling the population was deemed too slow and ineffective, Samodro said.
