From richratzan@yahoo.com Thu Aug 16 14:44:43 2001
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Date: Thu, 16 Aug 2001 14:44:37 -0700 (PDT)
From: rich ratzan <richratzan@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: Talking About the Trogs/Bushmen and other critters
To: classics@u.washington.edu
Cc: rich ratzanyahoo <richratzan@yahoo.com>
In-Reply-To: <200108162045.f7GKjOj23612@darwin.helios.nd.edu>
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you may be right about it not being a baboon. my
memory is shaky there. but i did watch, not read, it
and i think it was a nonhuman primate. and i'm pretty
sure it was the bushmen.

ciao
r


--- Alfred M Kriman <akriman@darwin.helios.nd.edu>
wrote:
> Richard Ratzan wrote
> 
> > apropos Bushmen and tricks to catch animals, i too
> saw
> > a special on bushmen a while back and they have an
> > ingenious way to use baboons (i think it was) to
> find
> > water: they put salt into a tree with a small
> hole,
> > wait until the baboon puts its fist into the hole
> and
> > then walk up to catch it/rope it, since the baboon
> > will not release the fistful of salt, remaining
> stuck.
> > then they use the roped animal to lead them to the
> > water!
> 
> This general technique seems to be widespread.  I
> always heard
> that this was the way monkeys were captured (for
> food) in Amazonia.
> Looking on the web now, however, I find limited
> mention of it; the
> main source of stories is India, where a
> half-coconut is used.
> Also, Lev Tolstoy used it as a metaphor in _War and
> Peace_ to
> describe the French army leaving Moscow.  I suspect
> the technique
> is not used with baboons or other apes because (1)
> they're not as
> stupid, and (2) an angry ape on a rope is trouble
> like the similar
> metaphor involving a tiger by the tail: you daren't
> let go.  (Don't
> let the scrawny-looking limbs fool you; a chimp can
> exert greater
> force with its bare hands than a man can, and won't
> neglect to bite.)
> 
> AMK


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