Morocco's Barbary Macaques: How to Visit Responsibly

1. Meet the Barbary macaque

Barbary macaques are sturdy, thick-furred monkeys with almost no tail. They live in groups of up to several dozen, led by females, and the males are unusually involved in carrying and caring for the young. Their fur helps them survive winters in the Middle Atlas, where snow is common.

The species is classified as endangered. Numbers have fallen sharply in recent decades through loss of forest, drought and the illegal capture of infants for the pet trade and for tourist photographs.

2. How a troop lives

A troop spends its day moving between the ground and the branches, feeding on cedar needles, acorns, seeds, roots, mushrooms and insects. In a hard winter the animals strip bark from the trees, and at night they huddle together on a branch for warmth.

Much of the day is given to grooming, which is how friendships and rank are kept in order. Watch for a male carrying a baby on his back or holding it out to another male: it is a kind of handshake, and one of the most unusual behaviours of any monkey.

Fewer than ten thousand are thought to remain in the wild, most of them in the Middle Atlas, with smaller groups in Algeria and a famous introduced colony on the Rock of Gibraltar.

3. Where to see them

Wild macaques live in the mountains, never in the desert or the cities. Four areas give you a realistic chance of a sighting, and the first of them lies on the main road south from Fes.

• The cedar forest near Azrou: The best-known spot, around the old Gouraud cedar in Ifrane National Park. Troops gather beside the road.
• Ifrane National Park: Quieter forest tracks away from the car parks offer more natural sightings.
• Ouzoud waterfalls: A group lives around the gorge, about 2.5 hours from Marrakech.
• The Rif mountains: Small populations near Chefchaouen, rarely seen by visitors.

Local tip: On our tours between Fes and Merzouga we stop in the cedar forest, and your guide knows where the troops tend to be at different times of day.

4. The cedar forest stop on the road to the desert

Leaving Fes, the road climbs to Ifrane, a tidy mountain town at about 1,650 metres whose pitched roofs earned it the nickname 'the Switzerland of Morocco'. A few kilometres on, around Azrou, the forest begins: tall Atlas cedars, some of them several centuries old, mixed with evergreen oak.

We usually stop here for twenty to thirty minutes. It is long enough to stretch your legs on a forest track, watch a troop feed and take photographs before the road continues over the high plateau towards Midelt and the Ziz Valley.

Local tip: Bring a zoom lens or use your phone's zoom rather than stepping closer. The best pictures show the animals behaving naturally in the trees.

5. The golden rule: do not feed them

It is tempting, and vendors sell peanuts for exactly that purpose, but feeding does real harm. Human food causes obesity, tooth decay and illness, and makes the monkeys dependent and aggressive. Animals that wait by the road for handouts are also at risk from traffic.

Researchers working in the park ask visitors for one thing above all: watch, but do not feed.

6. How to behave around the monkeys

The troops beside the road are used to people, which makes them look tamer than they are. They remain wild animals with strong jaws, and they read body language far more closely than we do. These habits keep the meeting calm.

• Keep a distance of several metres and let them come and go as they wish.
• Do not touch them or try to hold a baby: mothers and males will defend the young.
• Keep food and bags closed and out of sight.
• Avoid staring directly or showing your teeth, which they read as a threat.
• No flash photography.
• Supervise children closely.

7. How visitors can help

Conservation here depends on small choices repeated by thousands of travellers. You do not need to give money to make a difference.

• Do not buy peanuts or bananas from the roadside sellers.
• Walk a little way from the car park: animals away from the road behave more naturally.
• Take all rubbish with you, especially plastic and food wrappers.
• Ask your driver to slow down on forest roads, where monkeys cross without warning.
• Never pay for a photograph with a chained animal, in the forest or in town.

8. Say no to monkey photos in the cities

The monkeys on chains in Jemaa el-Fna and other squares were taken from the wild as infants. Paying for a photograph keeps that trade alive. The kindest thing a visitor can do is walk past.

A young macaque taken for this trade is separated from its mother, and spends its days on a chain in the heat. Capturing and selling the animals is against Moroccan law, yet the practice survives wherever tourists keep paying. If you want a photograph of a monkey, take it in the forest, from a distance, for free.

9. Best time to see them

Macaques are active all year. Spring is especially rewarding, when the infants are born and the forest is green. In winter you may see them in the snow, a sight few people expect in Africa.

Time of day matters as much as the season. Early morning and late afternoon are when the animals come down to feed, and when the forest is quietest. In the middle of a summer day they retreat into the shade and you may see very few.

Frequently Asked Questions