Mandrills are intelligent, large primates that require complex cognitive enrichment and naturalistic foraging opportunities to prevent boredom and maintain positive welfare.
Foraging enrichment for mandrills must engage their manual dexterity, problem-solving ability and social foraging behaviour. Static feeding that requires no effort or skill fails to meet their cognitive and behavioural needs. Varied enrichment including buried food, live invertebrates, puzzle feeders of varying complexity and seasonal browse provision transforms the quality of captive mandrill welfare.