There’s still lots of snow on the ground here in Cle Elum, but the sun is shining today and it is beautiful. The greenhouse is the nicest it’s been in quite awhile, and the chimpanzees are doing some serious lounging out there. Here are a few photos of Burrito enjoying the sun after lunch today.
What a wonderful smile!
What happened to Burrito’s right ear? He is still sooooo handsome!!
Burrito came to us with that piece of his ear missing. Several of the chimps arrived with (minor) missing parts, probably from old fights with other chimps in the lab.
Elizabeth, these are wonderful photos, thank you. He has such sweet expressions.
This is kind of off the subject, but did anyone in the Seattle area hear Ken Schram on the radio this afternoon? For some reason I turned on KOMO 1000 on my way home from work and he was talking about the commercials that are going to be on TV for the Super Bowl this week end. He made a comment about the Chimp commercial and how he thought it was OK. Is there a webb sight that I or we can forward to him that tells how they are trained for these? Or is there some other information that I could get and send to him?
Thanks for any info you can provide.
Hey Kathy,
Thanks for asking! We’ll do a blog post about this issue tomorrow, but in the meantime, check out the information on this page: http://www.primatepatrol.org/learn_more/ – among other things, it includes a link to Sarah’s testimony from her time undercover at a chimpanzee training compound.
Jamie, Burrito and possibly Jody were all used in entertainment before being sold into research. While chimps don’t generally go from entertainment to research these days, the major issue is that they have such a short “career” and then have to be warehoused or discarded in some way. Then of course there is the physical abuse that they endure in order to be dominated by trainers.
Another helpful article is one that Patti Ragan wrote last year. The sanctuary she runs, Center for Great Apes, actually has some of the chimpanzees that were used in CareerBuilder commercials a few years ago. Here’s the link: http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2011/0207/Super-Bowl-commercials-What-happens-to-those-CareerBuilder-chimps
Thank you Diana,
I sent your reply to Ken Schram and asked him to check out the web sites.
Kathy – I heard that also and sent him an email through the KOMO website voicing my desire for him to educate himself on the issue before he addresses it again on air. I included a link to the CSNW website to help him get started 🙂 You are being kind in saying he only said the commercials were ok – he also commented that he thought they were ok because the chimps were not taken from the wild but rather born in captivity. As if that makes it ok. argh. I found it hard to be polite in my email!!!
There’s that freckled face I so adore!!!
These pics are beautiful Elizabeth! (Of course I’m biased when it comes to Mr. B!!).
Be still my heart. 🙂
He looks so happy!!!
What a handsome chimp! I love Burrito!