AR-News: South Carolina Monkey Island

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From:  primfocus at waste.org 
Sent: Wednesday, February 18, 2004 3:49 PM
Subject: primfocus: South Carolina Monkey Island


S.C. weighs monkey business 

DNR to decide if research monkeys will stay on island or go 
BY BO PETERSEN 
Of The Post and Courier Staff 

MORGAN ISLAND--The monkeys emerge from a primeval Eden of live oaks -- families grappling down the branches, "troops" strutting in the underbrush like little lions, mothers carrying yearlings on their backs. 

In the mist and rain, eerie as ghosts, they surround a human visitor. They whistle like birds and screech and hiss with a sharp intake of breath. Their eyes stare with intelligence and curiosity. They seem as native as the dwarf palmettos on this hummock in St. Helena Sound off Lady's Island. 

This is "Monkey Island," since 1979 the only free-range breeding colony for rhesus monkeys in the United States, and the country's biggest consistent producer of the valued research primates. It's home to about 3,000 monkeys, whose breeding results in some 750 baby monkeys each year. An average of 150 yearlings, four of every 10 males, are trapped annually for shipment to research labs as test animals. 

The state paid $20 million for Morgan Island in 2002 -- money that came from federal grants earmarked for conservation efforts. The island is on the southern fringe of the ACE Basin, which is a coastal conservation focus of the state. 

Later that year, the S.C. Department of Natural Resources board essentially gave the monkeys their walking papers when it voted against renewing a lease that expires at the end of this year, saying it didn't want to get into the monkey business. 

So far, though, the monkeys aren't going anywhere. Since the DNR vote, the state's finances have gotten tighter, and Gov. Mark Sanford is looking for ways to save money and generate revenue.Most of the monkeys on the island are owned by the U.S. Food and Drug and Administration, which leases the property for $787,000 per year, or the National Institutes of Health. 

A new DNR board formed six months ago and got its first report on the island Friday. 

"Certainly it's our prerogative to review" the earlier decision, said DNR board Chairman Mike McShane of Johns Island. With a strained budget, he said, the department has to make good use of every dollar. 

"From a cursory standpoint, (the island) seems to have worked well under private ownership for more than 20 years," he said. 

The state's leverage to evict the monkeys also might have weakened because the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks sparked a new federal push for bioterrorism vaccine research and more demand for monkeys to test vaccines. 

Greg Westergaard, who bought out his former employer late last year and formed Alpha Genesis Inc. to manage the breeding operation, said he hasn't had more than preliminary contingency discussions about moving the monkeys from their productive breeding ground. 

"I know the animals are critical to (FDA and NIH) research," he said. "No other facility could do that in terms of sheer numbers." 

Westergaard has a contract to provide monkeys to the FDA through 2006, and "as far as we're concerned, it is still fully enforced." He said the FDA is negotiating to extend the lease. 

DNR Director John Frampton said the state has not had formal discussion with the FDA but plans to talk with the agency. The department is going over a number of issues such as habitat and anti-terrorism needs, he said. "There is a need for monkeys in medical research." 

A NATURAL CURIOSITY 

The monkeys have the run of this place; the island is theirs except for a few deer and raccoons and the daily visits from feeders and researchers. 

They spend most of their day up in the shaded recesses of the trees. They dine daily on high-nutrition "monkey biscuits" that look like corn dogs. They drink water from "pig licks," which are toggle-release taps they work with their mouths. 

Their human caretakers are fond of referring to the setup as "monkey heaven." 

Under the low-hanging live oak branches among 17 feeding stations are 10 primitive, round corrals with high, slippery tin walls. 

Four times a year, food is cut off at the other feeding stations and the doors to the corrals shut. The monkeys jump in for the biscuits, but the tin is too slick for them to climb back out. Then the counting, identification tattooing and culling begins for yearling males headed for the labs. 

The monkeys have formed 30 "troops" or social groups ranging from 25 to 200 animals. They move through the woods in packs and occasionally bully for territory or a chance to stuff their cheeks with corn thrown by workers to attract them. 

"It's almost like candy to them," project manager Scott Cheslak said as he scattered a handful of corn. 

They posture aggressively but don't often fight. As two groups moved in on the corn, one monkey shrieked and jumped straight up and back, getting out of the way of another. But both groups got a share of the corn, a few monkeys stuffing their cheeks so full they sagged, then backing off to eat. 

"They are very smart animals. Their social structure is very complex. There's a lot of things that go on even we can't comprehend," Cheslak said. "Even if you get a hard-case alpha male, if some old granny comes along, he steps out of the way. He tends to respect that (long life)." 

Cheslak was hired to work on the island in 1979 when the breeding operation began. It still thrills him. His eyes light up as he points out an unusual blond "golden monkey" on an oak limb. 

"It's a recessive gene. They're very rare," he said. "When the sun's out and it hits that gold on that monkey, it just ..." His voice trailed off. "Yeah," he said later, "that's a beautiful animal." 

Westergaard trained as a child development psychologist. As a student, he conducted groundbreaking experiments to show that Capuchin monkeys made use of tools and developed a fondness for the animals. In Yemassee he keeps Capuchins that are offspring of those monkeys. 

"They're a lot like human children. They're fun to be around. There's something about monkeys. They're just a natural curiosity to people," Westergaard said. 

Still, the culled monkeys go to labs, where they are exposed to deadly chemicals or diseases and eventually euthanized. 

Animal rights groups call the practice cruel and unnecessary, but medical researchers consider it indispensable. The island's monkeys were used first for polio vaccine research and later for AIDS. The FDA now uses them for vaccine and counterterrorism research, said Phil Snoy, rhesus monkey breeding project officer. 

Westergaard contrasted the "small number" of monkeys used in experiments with millions of people who benefit from the medicines the research creates. "I just think it's a necessary tradeoff you make. I don't see any way around it." 

Cheslak said, "I know there are a lot of people out there who disagree with that notion." 

TUG OF WAR 

The island isn't the heart of Westergaard's operation. The move in research is toward selective breeding to produce specific traits such as blood characteristics for increasingly specialized experiments. It takes captive breeding to do that. 

But the cost of raising a monkey on the island is only one-third that of a captive monkey. That fact, along with the numbers that can be bred there, make the island a valuable resource. 

Westergaard is making an effort to run the operation more openly after years of secretive, question-deflecting management by the former company. He said not doing business openly creates more problems than it solves. 

And in the tug of war over "monkey heaven," it could be a little more valuable leverage. 

Westergaard said that moving the monkeys would stress them and kill "a significant percentage" with disease. The stress would upset breeding for years. 

Moving the animals means catching them -- a process Cheslak estimated would take a year or more. He said they had not even begun such a task, which Westergaard said would be a nightmare. 

Removing the monkeys completely would mean starving some out and hunting them down. Cheslak said he believes the workers could round up 99 percent without that. He said few if any animals are unaccounted for on the island after years of recorded breeding. 

Snoy said meeting a December deadline still is doable. 

Westergaard said the company could move the island's monkeys at least temporarily to enclosures in Yemassee or Hampton County. But he hasn't made any plans yet. 

The state could leave the operation intact while making use of the fishery and little hummocks surrounding it, Westergaard said. He hasn't been contacted by the state. 

"As December 2004 creeps up, you do wonder what the plan is going to be," he said. 


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