Baboon mothers living in the wild carry dead infants for up to 10 days, according to a new study led by UCL and Universite de Montpellier.

The research, published in Royal Society Open Science, is the most extensive study on baboons, reporting on 12 cases of group responses to infants’ deaths, including a miscarriage and two stillbirths, recorded over 13 years in wild Namibian chacma baboons.

Chacma baboons live in large multi-sex groups, with strong linear male and female hierarchies. One group of baboons can range anywhere from 20 to 100 primates.

Anthropologists observed baboon mothers in the Namibian desert carrying dead infants for varying lengths of time, ranging from one hour to ten days, with the average length being three to four days. During this time the mother grooms the dead infant frequently.

Lead author, Dr Alecia Carter (UCL Anthropology and Universite de Montpellier), said: «There are numerous hypotheses to explain primate responses to dead infants. Perhaps the strongest hypothesis is that carrying after death is an extension of nurturing behaviour.

«We are not suggesting that the mothers are unaware that their infants are dead, but there is such strong selection on mother-infant bond formation that, once formed, the bond is difficult to break. It’s less clear why only some mothers carry or protect their dead infant, but I suspect that a range of factors influence this behaviour.»

While there are a number of hypotheses, the researchers believe the most plausible are the ‘grief-management hypothesis’, which suggests that mothers carry the dead infant as a way of dealing emotionally with their loss, and the ‘social-bonds hypothesis’ which suggests that mothers carry their infants because of the intense social bond mothers and infants share during life.

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