‘To them a power line is a line of trees’: Costa Rica moves to protect howler monkeys from electrocution

A baby howler monkey treated with burn cream at International Animal Rescue. Thousands of animals a year are electrocuted by power cables in Costa Rica. Photograph: Courtesy of International Animal Rescue

Peque, a small black howler monkey, scratches her head as she sits on a thick wooden branch in a wired enclosure with seven other orphaned baby howler monkeys at a rescue centre in Nosara, on Costa Rica’s Pacific coast.

Last year, Peque was one of more than 100 animals to arrive at International Animal Rescue Costa Rica (IARCR) as a result of electrocution on power lines, which primates such as monkeys frequently mistake for trees and vines.