Images of Punch being bullied by his roommates, retreating to safety and clinging to one another for comfort have captured hearts across the world.
But finally, Monkey Punch is integrating.
And his keeper told CNN that the apparently violent videos that have alarmed Punch’s global legion of fans are just part of the growing process for the seven-month-old monkey, who lives at the Ichikawa City Zoo.
The little primate has made new friends and depends less and less on the orangutan plush he was given as a replacement for his mother, says Shunpei Miyakoshi, during CNN’s recent visit to the zoo.
“Now he’s communicating with other monkeys and it’s great to see him reaching these milestones,” says the zookeeper.
Shunpei Miyakoshi adds that Punch now hugs and plays with other monkeys, a stark contrast to the heartbreaking videos previously released online that showed the little monkey being attacked and chased away by his fellow monkeys.
The zoo stated, in a post on social media, that some higher-ranking members of the group, who “showed aggression more frequently”, had been temporarily removed from the enclosure at the beginning of this month.
But the zookeeper stresses that even these behaviors were considered normal in the Japanese monkey’s world and that his peers are trying to teach Punch the hierarchy of their society.
“Japanese macaques tend to be physical because, unlike humans, they don’t teach them languages… If they were taking it seriously, they would bite much more aggressively,” he explains.
The officer also says the widely shared videos capturing violent encounters represent just a few minutes of Punch’s day.
But the road to full integration remains long. During CNN’s recent visit to the zoo, the baby monkey still spent most of its time alone.
