Fascinating new video footage captured on a remote island has captured a bizarre new phenomenon - baby monkeys being abducted by another species.
The unprecedented craze of so-called 'monkey kidnappings' by capuchin monkeys have left scientists baffled, having first discovered the distinctive behaviour while reviewing footage from the small island of Panama.
Zoe Goldsborough, alongside other researchers at Max Planck and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Germany, had initially set up more than 80 cameras to study capuchin tool use, but were shocked to witness the first howler babies begin to appear in early 2022.
In bewildering new footage shared on YouTube a capuchin monkey, the size of a house-cat, is videoed with a baby howler monkey clinging to its back. Neither monkey are related, nor even of the same species.
In fact, over the course of the 'tends and thousands of video footage and images', the all-male capuchin monkeys were seen carrying at least 11 howler babies between 2022 and 2023.
