Word: laikipia
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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John Hall has been a cattle rancher on the Laikipia Plateau for 23 years. The safari guide, Chrissie Aldrich, brought the visitor up from Nanyuki to Hall's Enasoit Ranch. Hall's neighbors regard him as an eccentric because he gives the wild animals the free run of his ranch. At one time, he and his wife Thelma had a large lovely garden in their front yard, but the elephants systematically demolished it. Hall says cheerfully that he decided to enjoy watching the elephants instead of watching his flowers...
...ranch that would accept them. The ranchers mostly thought she was insane. Baboons raid crops. Importing baboons to a ranch made as much sense as transplanting cockroaches to a New York City apartment. But at last Strum made an arrangement with the Chololo Ranch on the edge of the Laikipia Plateau north of Nairobi. She had the baboons trapped and sedated and brought to a new home where they would be safe, and she went on silently studying them...
...Watching the baboons is like watching a soap opera," Strum says, "except that the baboons are much nicer people than you see on Dallas or Dynasty." A visitor walks out with Strum among the baboons at 8 a.m. in Laikipia. They are feeding on the buds of an acacia tree not far from the granite kopje where they sleep. Strum knows all the baboons. "That is C.J. and Ron," she begins. "The female is Zilla. C.J. and Ron have a conflict of emotions." Ron is new to the troop, and so is Ndofu...
...magic evening light comes across the Laikipia Plateau, and the baboons straggle in from their day's browsings among the acacia flowers. They sit and socialize on the lower rocks of their high kopje, grooming one another with a sweet absorption, playing with their babies. Like almost everyone and everything in Africa, they seem profoundly tribal. Another troop of baboons arrives, 100 yards away, and each tribe stares at the other with a nervous intensity across the lovely evening light...