No more monkey mania as Thai city clamps down

Marauding monkeys will not face slingshots any more in the historic Thai city of Lopburi, where they have been rounded up and sterilised after turning rampant over the past four years.

Before COVID-19 shut Lopburi, some of its 58,000 residents casually fed the 3,000 long-tailed macaques that lived alongside them and even threw an annual fruit banquet for them, drawing tourists to the “Monkey City,” which sits three hours drive north of Bangkok.

The macaques, believed to bring good fortune, also inhabit nearby forests and have long been a part of the city’s history. But after Lopburi came out of the pandemic lockdown in mid-2022, its residents found that without people feeding them, the monkeys had become unruly.

Troops of macaques had taken over buildings, often confronting residents, stealing food and causing accidents. Gangs of monkeys engaged in mass brawls.

“Their method is robbery – by all means,” said Wisarut Somngam, a local researcher with Ecoexist Society, a nongovernmental organisation. “They were ready to snatch anything off your hands, any bags they suspect contain food or items like mobile phones.”