Smokey

It won\u27t be long now; the zero hour is approaching. Where can that crew chief of mine be? He is probably down at that pub with that O\u27Brien girl he met the other day. He should be here to supervise my feeding. Ah! here comes my dinner

The Impact of Web-Based Visitor Education on Human-Tibetan Macaque (\u3ci\u3eMacaca thibetana\u3c/i\u3e) Interactions at Mt. Huangshan, China

Daily visitor-macaque interactions lead to higher rates of macaque aggression (macaque-human, intragroup), macaque self-directed behaviors (SDBs), and zoonotic disease transfer. At the Valley of the Wild Monkeys in Mt. Huangshan, China, I made an educational website with site-specific information (e.g., guidelines for conduct, park rules, conservation) available and unavailable through QR codes for an equal number of randomized days. I recorded visitor-Tibetan macaque (Macaca thibetana) behaviors on all days using human and macaque ethograms. Past researchers at this site found positive correlations between decibel levels and macaque SDBs, as such decibel levels were recorded daily. I compared the frequencies of macaque and human behaviors and average decibel levels on website “on” or “off” days. On website “on” days, visitors exhibited more macaque-directed behaviors, but I found no difference in decibel levels and macaques’ rates of aggressive and SDBs. My results indicate that at this site, web-based technology was not correlated with reduced rates of stress-inducing visitor behaviors, perhaps because only one percent of visitors viewed the website