Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

Diana

A non-primate loss and an addition

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This little announcement is a long-time coming. I have thought about it many times, and have started to write a sponsor-a-day blog post in my head on several occasions, but somehow just never got it out.

You can skip to the end for actual chimpanzee content!

For those who have been following the blog for a while, you might remember a very important non-primate sanctuary resident – office cat LouLou.

Not surprisingly, after a long and good 23 years of life, she passed away early this Spring.

The office is simply not the same without her. She is buried not far away in the little catio that J.B. built for the cats (we used to have three total) outside of the caregiver house at the sanctuary. I planted a small and haphazard garden over her grave this summer that produced a few tomatoes and lovely sunflowers in her memory.

 

Shortly before LouLou passed away, J.B. and I took in a foster dog named Nala from a local rescue called Josie’s Misfit Ranch.

To absolutely no one’s surprise, we adopted Nala shortly after she came to live with us. Now, the caregiver house where J.B. and I reside is full of dog energy (don’t let these calm photos delude you into thinking calm is the norm). If you are interested, the dogs have their own Instagram page here.

There is still some cat energy at the sanctuary, however. Barn Kitty (BK), though he comes and goes as he pleases, still frequents the barn and its surroundings.

As you well know, we have many talented artists in our midst who have donated art for various auctions and fundraisers. When LouLou passed away, I reached out to one of them, Sue Cartwright, about doing a portrait of LouLou and one of a previous office cat, Peanut. Sue did an amazing job! Now all three of our cats our represented to purrfection. In the below photo, that’s a painting of Cuba in the middle by a Seattle artist named Vicki Nelson.

So, this is what is called burying the lead. I’m glad you are still with me!

Sue Cartwright has also painted a stunning and large portrait of Cy for our upcoming Comfort & Joy online auction! Are you ready??!!

For an idea of size, the painting is leaning up against a tall dog crate:

There are more original art pieces and some other fun items that will be part of Comfort & Joy. It that doesn’t cause you to immediately register for the online auction, well, I just don’t know what will.

a special request and the human climbing structure

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First for the request:

We are working on the Comfort & Joy online auction and virtual gathering (more details to come), and we’d like to include short (30 sec or less) clips from YOU telling us which chimpanzee at Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest brings you joy and why! These are super informal videos you can just take on your phone in selfie mode and send them to me [email protected] using WeTransfer or some other file sharing service of your choice. Feel free to email me with any questions!

This can be your platform to express your love of a particular chimpanzee!

Speaking of platforms, we have a physical (wooden) platform, above the seated observation area, where staff only can access to get photos of the chimpanzees.

I climbed up there today and wondered if the chimpanzees below thought of me as being on a climbing structure, similar to the structures they have in their outdoor habitats. Maybe we should have a human forage up there some day.

 

This time of year serves up the potential for some contrasting photos, with the dark hair of the chimpanzees standing out against the muted yellow and beige tones of the grass.

 

Here’s Burrito, coming back down the hill after looking for leftover breakfast forage food:

And Foxie, who brought along a blue-haired friend as she traversed Young’s Hill:

Missy, as she was slack-lining across the fire hose:

I looked over to my right, and spotted someone on the Escher structure on The Bray. I did a bit of a double-take because I was not expecting the chimp to be Lucky! Look how relaxed she looks up there. She’s really embraced The Bray these last few weeks and continues to show off her adventurous side.

Is your favorite chimpanzee one of these four or someone else? Let us know by sending in your video clip!

Laws of Motion

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First, as an update, we are 20% to our goal on the Giving Day for Apes fundraiser and about halfway to receiving those matching funds pledged by Donna. Big, big thanks to everyone who has donated and helped us get this far! We are still eyeing that 10:00 -11:00 a.m. PT Power Hour on October 3rd to compete in the most donations raised during that hour. Are you with us?!

 

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There are so many opportunities for scientific discovery here at the sanctuary. As I was watching the chimpanzees forage today, I pondered two immutable laws of motion that Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest operates upon.

#1: Burrito Chimpanzee in motion tends to stay in motion:

 

#2: While Negra Chimpanzee at rest tends to stay at rest:

 

Bonus paparazzi photos I took of Terry very stealthily absconding with one of two coconuts that were part of The Bray forage today. He played it sooooo cool.

Conflict on the Bray: the Day Everyone Went Outside

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We’ve been talking about it for a few days now – the conflict that led Mave, Dora, and Honey B to go onto the Bray habitat.

So, here’s your birds-eye view of most of the excitement! This is a video best suited for a bigger screen like your computer monitor or television.

I saw the middle to the end of the conflict in person. It was quite loud. It’s quite nice to be able to watch it without sound.

Even while I was watching in person, I had this thought that both groups seemed more similar to free-living chimpanzees than I had ever witnessed before. It was scary, to be honest, because we didn’t know what was going to happen, but the maneuvering was also fascinating.

Maybe, just maybe, it will help some of the chimps explore more, like it seems to have with Lucky!

It’s not all sunflowers and rainbows

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Crafting public messaging for a sanctuary can be challenging. As you all know, we tend to err on the side of transparency with Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest. One reason that I think we are able to do this (aside from having the best supporters in the world who take the time to really get to know the sanctuary) is that we share so often and include the many different voices from the caregivers who post to this blog.

As a community, I think sanctuaries and animal welfare organizations (us included) can do themselves a disservice by presenting the story of the animals in our care in very black and white terms, sometimes implying that after they are rescued or released from their past lives of exploitation, they never have a bad day again. We know on an intellectual level that this is not possible. As intelligent, emotional, and social beings living in a complex environment, all animals, no matter their circumstances, will continue to experience pain, fear, boredom, depression, and all of the other emotions that they have evolved to experience. At the same time, we want, with all of our hearts, to believe that sanctuary = a paradise free from any negative experiences. Everyone is a sucker for a happy ending.

And sometimes the messaging in our field emphasizes that unreachable ideal. So, when an animal does have a bad day, or gets hurt, or is struggling with an emotional or social issue, followers (particularly the more casual followers who may not know as much about a sanctuary) can become disenchanted and accusatory, which could lead, ironically, to a sanctuary being less transparent.

Of course, there are facilities out there that are truly not good for a variety of reasons. Unfortunately, anyone can call their place a sanctuary. These facilities (I’m thinking of Myrtle Beach Safari, as an example), may have a very polished social media presence with multiple trainers that have millions of followers, all the while they deal in wildlife trafficking, dangerously misrepresent the true nature of the animals in their care, and grossly exaggerate (to put it mildly) their claims of giving funds towards the conservation of endangered species.

It’s frustrating.

All legitimate sanctuaries [important side note: Check this page on our website for tips and links on how you can tell a legitimate sanctuary from a pseudo-sanctuary], want the best for those in their care and they want people to support their efforts to make this happen. It can feel risky to open up and share the difficult times or just the reality of captivity, like the fact that the chimps are inside and “behind bars“). But, if all we ever shared were the chimpanzees in their outdoor habitats and never talked about the hard days, it would give everyone the wrong picture and create an ideal that no sanctuary could live up to.

To be quite honest, though, Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest is pretty great :). The animals here experience a good life. Not a perfect life, not a life devoid of all suffering, but a good one.

Here are some photos of flowers blooming all around them, to disprove my point about it not being all about sunflowers:

This is a sunflower that came up spontaneously, we think from a discarded or digested sunflower seed from the chimpanzees. They are becoming their own gardeners!

I’m not sure where these came from. I just noticed a small field of them on Young’s Hill. They look like chamomile to me.

Here’s an update on that tall sunflower that I wrote about a couple of weeks ago. With the chute and door behind for scale, you can see how tall it is!

This was a few days ago:

and this is how it looked this morning:

And here is 50+ year old Negra, more than 15 years into her sanctuary life, thoroughly enjoying part of today’s lunch forage:

Magic Moments

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Earlier in the summer, J.B. and I fixed up the irrigation and soil for the old garden beds that are now near the chute. I, a little late in the season, pretty much randomly threw some seeds in the ground. Not much has grown, with the major exception of some sunflowers. One sunflower in particular has shot up exponentially compared to the others, grown a thick stem, and is going to bloom soon.

It’s so interesting to me that among all the seeds, it was just that one who not just survived, but seemed to find the perfect conditions to thrive.

I’m not a very good gardener, or at least not a very ordered and meticulous one, as you can tell from this story, but I love to see plants thrive. Just like I love to see the chimpanzees and the bovines, and the humans too, thrive at the sanctuary. We don’t always know the exact ingredients and conditions that each individual will respond to, so there’s a lot of trying and observing, taking note, and doing more of the things that produce happiness, joy, contentment, relaxation, and interest. There’s no one formula that works for everyone.

Missy, for example, doesn’t need a lot of human attention. Her physical environment is important. She needs space to run, things to climb on, and puzzles that she has to solve.

When she does seek out human attention, like today, it is pretty rewarding for the human. Today that human was me. I’m pretty sure Missy is quite aware that I love her toes. Whenever she’s in the mood to hang out, at some point she will put her toes out for me to touch. It’s the best.

She also puts her back against the caging so I can give her a little knuckle rub massage. This is my view when she does that:

One bonus photo that shows her face. At dinner, Anthony cut up some romaine lettuce, much to the delight of every single chimpanzee in the house. Here’s Missy enjoying hers, with Annie lurking behind:

We are trying to put together all of the ingredients to make our HOOT! event thrive for all of you (too much of a stretch)? Don’t forget to get your tickets!

A Little Bit of Mischief

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Sometimes a little bit of mischief is a good thing. If you are wondering which human left the contraband in Honey B’s greenhouse, look no further than the author of this blog post.

If you’d like to talk to me in person about this mistake or the many other mistakes I’ve made over the years at the sanctuary, or if you are perhaps looking to get into a little bit of mischief yourself, I invite you to join me at HOOT! in one month! You will learn so much more about the chimpanzees and bovines, and you’ll meet some terrific people, all the while eating great food and celebrating the sanctuary. We want you there! Get your tickets (in person or virtual) today!