Ellen Brady-McGaughey

If you are new to the blog, or missed some of our recent posts, we are currently going through the process of reintroducing the group of 9. Here are a few posts to get you caught up (here and here!). As a part of this process, we have been providing the reintroduced group with a social enrichment puzzle each day. We learned about the concept of social enrichment from our colleague Dr. Andrew Halloran, who visited the sanctuary in October, and provided us with some initial ideas for social enrichment puzzles we could create.

What is social enrichment? Social enrichment can be many things. The answer to this question is easier defined by focusing on the goal of social enrichment, which is to create an opportunity for the chimpanzees to positively and regularly re-establish their dominance hierarchy. In the wild, chimpanzees would come upon limited, high-value foods (like a fig tree) as a group, and have to navigate the ins and outs of their social hierarchy in order to access the food. The most dominant individual would be expected to get the best spot with the most figs, while others must navigate the social scene and where they fall in it to know where and when they will be permitted to access the food. The limited nature of the food source may encourage submissive and affiliative behaviors from lower ranking individuals wanting access to the high value foods. In our case, we have created large puzzles where multiple chimps can work on them at once, but the puzzle can be manipulated in such a way that one chimp can prevent another from accessing the desired foods.

As Enrichment Coordinator, I have been working to dream up new designs to add to our social enrichment program in addition to the designs Dr. Halloran provided, and it has been a fun challenge! You really get to be creative, and I’ve had fun re-purposing some supplies we had laying around the sanctuary to make new puzzles. Here are some of the new puzzles I made:

Above is a giant raisin board enrichment puzzle, which was made from a large cutting board and some smaller boards that rotate to allow access to the holes underneath them. The chimps have repeatedly outsmarted my design on this and simply lift the whole board up and suck the raisins out from the opposite side! I am troubleshooting that loophole still, as they do need to be able to lift the board some in order to get the raisins they push out through the back of the board with a chopstick.

Above is a treat board, which has holes drilled into it diagonally (that do not go all the way through the board), which we have filled with pudding. There are two firehose segments that can slide over the board to allow access to holes (and treats) that are currently covered up. The board is then attached to the caging by the eye screws on either end of it, so the chimps cannot take the firehose off of the board entirely.

The best part has been watching the social enrichment in use, and seeing the chimps first learn how to use a new puzzle (they needed a few demonstrations), and then successfully navigate the social dynamics at play to access the puzzle. In general, we have seen what we hoped and expected to see – Cy in control of the puzzles. Willy has at times gotten to the puzzle first because he came into the space first, but Cy has been dominating the puzzles once he arrives and Willy has either been accepting only getting a small amount of the puzzle (and treats from it), or has been moving away to wait for his turn once Cy is done. There have been a couple instances where Willy B seemed to get frustrated about his lack of access to the puzzle and started to display, which Cy has answered with displays of his own. In these instances where Willy B has displayed, the cycle has occurred several times until Cy and Willy eventually display and leave the area, and once Cy is gone, Willy quickly returns to work on the puzzle. Is he a genius, or just taking advantage of how the situation played out? We hope the use of social enrichment will continue to help Willy B find and understand his place within the social hierarchy of his group, both in the current grouping (which is Cy, Willy B, Rayne, and Lucky) and as we add more individuals. I know Honey B is more than ready to get her hands on some new puzzles!

Don’t forget to check out the Comfort and Joy auction! You could help me make more social enrichment for the chimps by bidding on the Giant Holey Lids (trash can lids that will one day become a new and exciting puzzle for the chimpanzees)!