Yesterday Jackie and I set up a great enrichment project for the chimps. We filled buckets with some snow and added a little juice for flavor, and then we put the buckets outside the caging and gave the chimps straws to use as tools. Everyone had their own way of trying to get the most out of the buckets. Eventually all the snow completely melted and the buckets were dry, but we certainly found a way for this project to last longer than just juice in buckets.
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annie and foxie were my favorites with their staccato sucking. i am going to try that tonight and hyperventilate myself into a stupor …
Leslie, an interesting fact about chimps and their throat anatomy: they are actually able to breathe and swallow at the same time, unlike adult humans. As babies, this is something we share with chimps (and with mammals in general), and it’s why we’re able to nurse and breathe at the same time. When we get to be about a year old, our vocal tract changes and becomes more of a right degree angle, instead of curved. This is typically when children start using their first words. However, having that sharp angle in our throat makes it so that we can choke. We can’t breathe and swallow at the same time, something will get stuck! Chimps still have the curved vocal tract, so they are able to do cool things like pant hoot really loud and for a long time, but they can’t vocally speak.
So basically, I wouldn’t suggest trying what Foxie was doing 😉
How interesting. Thanks, Debbie!
yes debbie … that was super interesting … another case of a superior design
hee hee funny old Foxie 🙂
yay for Burrito using tools!
ROFL! how cute was Foxie sucking on that straw… and Annie too. Looks like Burrito still doesn’t have the hang of using a straw but his fingers work fine 🙂
These pictures are great – thanks so much for sharing.
Did Negra join in, as well? Love the concentration in their faces—thanks Debbie & Jackie.
Yes, Negra and Missy both joined in as well, unfortunately we didn’t get a chance to get any good clips of them! But this definitely was a successful enrichment project for all the chimps.
Love this video! They are all just wonderful, Foxie cracked me up! They all have it down!
I’d just gotten home from work then the grocery store, plopped down into my chair, picked up my iPad and watched this video. Foxie was the funniest thing, with her slurping, I had a deep belly laugh. The sound of her going so fast is what makes me laugh. Now this video is my go to video when I need a pick-me-up laugh.
Loved it! 🙂
Yea, slushies! They look like they loved it…I figured they would since they like snacking on the plain snow. Foxie was so funny, and I’m not surprised Buritto figured out how to get the bucket close enough to the fence to use his fingers. Wonderful video! (Going back up to watch it again.)