DELIGHTED staff at Wool’s Monkey World ape rescue centre have welcomed a surprise arrival to the park.

Young Bueno Junior, one of just a handful of endangered woolly monkeys born in captivity, was delivered hours after experts first realised his mum was pregnant.

Park director Dr Alison Cronin, who will hand-rear Junior after mum Sara refused to care for him, explained: “We came in one morning and the primate care staff noticed her abdomen was straining and she was having contractions.”

Sara, aged 12, had a tough labour, finally delivering Junior, who weighed in at just 450 grams, by caesarean section later that day.

“We tried to give her baby back as she was coming round from the anaesthetic but she (Sara) wouldn’t take him,” said Dr Cronin. “This wasn’t too surprising after everything she had been through.”

Junior’s dad, Bueno Senior, died before he was born. Meanwhile, Junior and mum Sara are doing fine.

Dr Cronin, who has already hand-reared three other baby woolly monkeys at the park, will rear Junior until he joins one of Monkey World’s three groups of woolly monkeys when he’s five months old.

“Of course, we would have preferred Sara to have been able to rear her first infant. As soon as Junior was born there were a few worrying moments. We had to shake and rub him to get him going, but then he started gasping and wriggling which was great.

“We tried to leave him with her but she just ripped him off her. However, we are hopeful that next time Sara’s labour will progress properly and she’ll be able to deliver normally.

“When that happens, all of the right instincts will be there.”

There are only 37 Woolly Monkeys in captivity in the world, 19 of them at the Purbeck rescue centre.

Dr Cronin said: “They are facing imminent extinction and Monkey World is the only place on the planet where you can see groups of woolly monkeys in captivity.”