Fugitive NJ park baboon caught at farm

The fugitive baboon of central New Jersey was captured Saturday after she was spotted sitting on a fence post on a farm in Howell Township.

A crew from Six Flags Great Adventure park, in adjacent Jackson Township, arrived at the farm on Fairfield Road and shot her with a tranquilizer dart. She will be returned to the 350-acre wild safari exhibit there.

The baboon is about 2 years old, weighs 30 to 35 pounds and is about 2 feet tall, said Kristin Siebeneicher, a park spokeswoman. "We are fairly confident that it is our baboon," she said.

She estimated that the animal had traveled about 10 miles through Jackson, Freehold and Howell before being captured. A resident of the farm saw the baboon and called police, she said. A six-person crew from the animal park dashed to the scene.

Police and park officials had been looking for the baboon since Thursday afternoon, The Associated Press reported.

Siebeneicher said it's not clear how the baboon escaped, and said that it was the first animal to get out of the park on its own since it was built in 1974. About a decade ago someone cut a hole in a fence and several antelope fled.

The park has added two extra strips of electric wire to the baboon enclosure, which is also surrounded by a chain-link fence. The park also installed surveillance cameras in the baboon area, and is working on a way to do a nightly count of its estimated 150 baboons, as it does with other animals.

The baboon was still sleeping Saturday evening, and will be kept in isolation for about two weeks to make sure she is healthy, Siebeneicher said.