What to Know
- A vervet monkey has taken up residence hidden behind branches and leaves around 50 feet above the ground near NE 172nd Street and 16th Ave.
- As unusual as this seems to humans, vervet monkeys have actually been a part of South Florida’s landscape since the late 1940s.
- Just last week, police tried to track down a monkey spotted near I-95 and Northwest 180th street, but called off the search.
Some local monkey business has neighbors stopping and looking in the trees in a North Miami Beach neighborhood.
A vervet monkey has taken up residence hidden behind branches and leaves around 50 feet above the ground near Northeast 172nd Street and 16th Avenue.
“I walked outside and I saw a dog running down the ally, what I thought was a dog and then it started doing some ninja stuff and jumping on houses and stuff,” said Zac Groffman, who first spotted the animal. “I was like, that’s not a dog.”
As unusual as this seems to humans, vervet monkeys have actually been a part of South Florida’s landscape since the late 1940s, when at least a dozen monkeys escaped from a chimpanzee farm in what is now Dania Beach.
“When they reach sexual mutuality at the age of five, they leave their social group and they go to look for other monkey groups to join,” said Missy Williams, the director of the Dania Beach Vervet Project.
Williams added there is a colony of around 40 wild monkeys living around West Lake Park.
Local
Just last week, police tried to track down a monkey spotted near I-95 and Northwest 180th street, but called off the search.
The monkeys are native to Africa, but experts say they’re highly adapted to urban life and can navigate obstacles like South Florida’s traffic.
