This video shows Foxie displaying the many ways she gets enrichment out of dolls. She still melts our hearts with her unique and playful personality. What a joy to be able to provide a sanctuary home for her!
Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest
Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary
by Diana
This video shows Foxie displaying the many ways she gets enrichment out of dolls. She still melts our hearts with her unique and playful personality. What a joy to be able to provide a sanctuary home for her!
by J.B.
At Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest, we encourage all of our staff and volunteers to communicate with the chimps in their language as much as possible. This means that we adopt a submissive posture when the chimps are displaying, we cover our top teeth when we smile during play, and we pant hoot with the group when they are excited.
This last one can be difficult, though. Pant hoots, like many other chimp vocalizations such as breathy-pant greetings and laughter, require rapid breathing – as much as 10 to 15 times the normal rate. One minute you’re singing along with the chimps, the next minute you’re passed out on the floor. How do the chimps get away with it?
One interesting theory involves laryngeal air sacs, which are inflatable extensions of the vocal tract in the neck and upper chest of chimps and many other primates. I worked with chimps for a while without even realizing that they had air sacs, and they only came to my attention because they are prone to infection (airsacculitis) and occasionally need to be treated. They’re not noticeable in chimpanzees under normal circumstances like they are in some other species. Interestingly, humans and a few other primates lack them altogether.
So what function do they serve? No one really knows for sure. The most obvious answer would be that they make vocalizations more efficient, possibly by increasing amplitude, matching impedance with the surrounding air, or lowering their frequency so that they travel farther through forest environments. But this doesn’t seem to be true in all species. Alternatively, they may allow smaller primates to sound larger than they are for the purposes of mating or territoriality – much like the way that male dogs attempt to urinate as high on a tree as possible. Whereas dogs tag trees to say WATCH OUT – VERY BIG DOG WAS HERE, perhaps monkeys are saying BEWARE – YOU ARE ENTERING GIANT MONKEY TERRITORY. But again, the evidence is mixed.
Air sacs are thought to be associated with a few species-specific calls such as the siamang’s “ascending boom” and what is perhaps the best named primate vocalization of all time, the gorilla’s “sex whinny”.
My favorite theory – which does not make it true, by any means – is that these air sacs allow certain primates to produce rapid inhale-exhale calls without hyperventilating. The sacs expand during exhalation, which means that they fill with CO2-rich air, and then they collapse during inhalation. What do humans often do when we are hyperventilating? We breath into paper bags to rebreathe our own air and restore CO2 levels (don’t try this at home on my advice, as it appears some more serious conditions can be mistaken for hyperventilation and made worse by rebreathing). Chimps, it turns out, have the equivalent of paper bags built right in.
Air sacs may very well serve different functions in different species, or even multiple functions within the same species. The above theories aren’t mutually exclusive. But it’s clear that humans get along just fine without them – well, humans that don’t work with chimps, that is. Our ancestors most likely possessed them, so why would they disappear? It’s possible that when humans evolved ways to modulate our breathing and produce multiple phrases with each exhale we lost the need for them, and because they are prone to infection, they eventually disappeared.
Which means that we humans have to temper our excitement around the chimp house or else we’ll end up passing out before the party has even started.
by Anna
Jamie’s boot interests are not restricted to just holding them or having her caregivers wear them for her. She also likes objects that look like boots and the idea of boots. Every night before we close up the chimp house, Jamie requires that caregivers find her current favorite pair of boots and then drop them in a food chute so she can incorporate them into her night nest. Last night was a little bit different though. Instead of gesturing in the direction of her boot collection, she wandered over to the newly decorated Christmas tree (we will give the tree to the chimps on Christmas day) and gestured emphatically. She insisted I remove several of the resin cowboy boot ornaments and give them to her. This morning as we were cleaning, I found them woven into her blankets up in the playroom loft.
If you read yesterday’s blog, you will know that we gave the chimps a little preview of Christmas, including a few of their gifts. One gift we included was a Cowboy Boot book for Jamie. Today she spent a lot of time thoroughly examining its contents and carrying it from one nest to another for safe keeping.
by Anna
This week has been filled with sunshine and no-snow, which is somewhat unusual for December in Central Washington. These lovely weather conditions, combined with the fact that the chimps have received a surplus stock of Christmas gifts, made us decide to do a Christmas preview for the chimpanzees out on Young’s Hill. The last couple of years we have given the chimps potted Christmas trees in December and then planted them on Young’s Hill when the ground thaws in the spring. There are currently 3 Christmas trees planted in their 2 acre outdoor enclosure. This afternoon we decorated them all for a holiday forage.
Bell peppers and apple slices make pretty festive ornaments!
Jamie:
She quickly found all her new gifts!
Negra went out briefly onto the hill, but decided to eat her lunch in the toasty playroom.
by Anna
by Katelyn
Jessica Keogh sponsored this day of sanctuary in honor of her boyfriend, Jonathan Londono, and in celebration of his birthday! Jessica shared this message about today:
“I am sponsoring today in honor of my boyfriend, Jonathan, on his birthday. One of the first things Jonathan told me as we were getting to know each other was that when he retired he wanted to study primatology to work with chimpanzees. I thought he was joking, but quickly learned he was kind of serious. Fortunately for me his enthusiasm is contagious, and fortunately for us we discovered CSNW. We follow the blog and watch your videos together. Jonathan really enjoys watching the way the chimps eat. Actually he enjoys everything they do. Mostly though, we follow along because we greatly respect the work you do and appreciate the home you have provided for the chimps. So thank you and happy birthday, Jonathan!”
We love that you both get so much enjoyment from following the chimps! Thank you so much for caring about them and for sponsoring today for Jonathan, Jessica! Your compassionate gift makes a difference in their lives and we so appreciate it.
Well, Jonathan, Burrito knows a thing or two about eating:
The chimps like to watch each other eat as well (food peer), but only when they are curious to see what their friend is eating and hoping they might be in the mood to share. Here is Foxie is checking out Annie’s pine tree snack:
Annie is hoping Negra might share that cabbage:
Happy Birthday, Jonathan, from all of us at CSNW! We hope it’s the best one yet! Hopefully it involves your favorite foods without the pressure to share with others who are staring at you. If it helps, the chimps are rarely swayed. 🙂
by Katelyn
We have a stunning week of sun ahead of us in the forecast and even though the temperatures are progressively colder, the bright sun is filling everyone with adventurous spirits and joyful days. As Kelsi shared in her blog yesterday, even the Queen has been braving the chill to enjoy time outside.
Despite that, when I opened the door to Young’s Hill first thing this morning I couldn’t have been more surprised to see everyone literally racing outside seemingly on a group mission. Foxie and her doll headed straight for the nearest platforms where she proceeded to play stomp and shiver her way around with a mischievous look on her face.
Here she is mid-stomp:
Jody, Annie and Burrito wasted no time heading straight for the tire swings and it didn’t take long to realize they were remembering that the cold weather brings ice treats to be found in the tire swings! I love that they remember favorite things from each season now.
Jody:
Burrito found some ice pieces Annie and Jody missed:
Annie and Jody heading back toward the greenhouse with their ice chunks (Missy foreground):
Annie headed to the greenhouse:
Jamie on her way back from the business of the morning:
Annie returned to the outdoors seemingly to just enjoy the view and the feel the elements:
After Jody came inside with her ice she immediately realized that Foxie was still outside in the cold and charged back up the hill to collect her. Foxie is an adventurous soul and declined Jody’s encouragement to return to the greenhouse (much to Jody’s dismay) and continued on her way checking things out, but she eventually made her way back:
It makes my heart sing to see how the chimps embrace their days and everything they discover within each one, how adventurous and brave they’ve become, and how, well, themselves they’ve become. Winter, spring, summer and fall, they show us a new season of themselves.
PO Box 952
Cle Elum, WA 98922
[email protected]
509-699-0728
501c3 registered charity
EIN: 68-0552915
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