The island of Cayo Santiago is completely inhabited and controlled by over 2,000 rhesus macaque monkeys.
Tourists are not allowed to set foot on the island. Humans are not allowed to stay on the island and researchers are limited to their time on the island.
On this secluded Monkey Island, the Rhesus macaques colony first began when hundreds of them were delivered in 1938 for research projects, and it became the ultimate destination for primatologists. With the support of Columbia University and the School of Tropical Medicine of the University of Puerto Rico, psychologist Dr. Clearance Carpenter created a 38-acre island as the site for the project.
The monkeys were captured from 12 different districts of India, crated and transported by boat passing through NY up to San Juan. The goal was to establish a disease-free breeding colony of monkeys in order to provide animals for research on tropical diseases.
Cayo Santiago became well known for its research on population management practices and its extensive genetic and demographic databases. Still, everything changed in an instant in 2017 when Hurricane Maria destroyed the island with most of its vegetation lost. >>Continue Reading>>
