Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

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Paper Balls

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Brief description: A variety of treats can be placed in each ball of paper, making the surprise of what is inside each paper ball even more fun. Some paper balls can be left empty, encouraging the chimpanzees to keep looking, and making it more difficult to find all the treats. The paper balls can be spread around the enclosure.

Materials: Kraft paper, dried fruit, seeds, nuts in shell, peanut butter

Assembly instructions: No assembly required.

How to use: Cut or tear ~ 12″x12″ sections of kraft paper. Place treats in the middle, then crumple the paper around them. If making empty paper balls, cut or tear a larger section of paper so that it is not obvious the ball is empty.

Price: ~$20 for a roll of Kraft paper, which lasts a long time.

Paper Knots

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Brief description: Kraft paper is filled with a mixture of seeds and dried fruit, then tied into knots to increase the time it takes for the chimpanzee to access the food inside the paper. These are a less time consuming (for the humans preparing them) alternative to paper braids.

Materials: Kraft paper, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, raisins

Assembly instructions: Cut about 2 foot by 6 inch strips of kraft paper. Fold each strip in half, and sprinkle a mixture of pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, and raisins down the middle of each paper strip, leaving some empty space at either end. Roll, fold, or twist the large paper strips to secure the seeds and raisins inside the paper, then tie the paper roll into 1-2 knots.

How to use: Add treats such as seeds and dried fruit into each paper strip, then tie into knots. Multiple layers of Kraft paper can be added to increase difficulty level.

Price: Approximately $20 for a large roll of Kraft Paper (that will last for a long time).

Treat Buckets

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Brief description: A variety of treats are put into buckets, which are placed outside the caging. The chimpanzees are provided with tools to allow them to knock over the buckets and access the treats inside, or to use as straws to drink from the buckets (if filled with liquid).

Materials: small (~ 1 gallon) buckets, bamboo sticks, long plastic straws, kraft paper, fabric pieces

Assembly instructions: There are a variety of way to prepare these buckets.

    • Option 1: place a small handful of a mix of sunflower seeds and pumpkin seeds, add some fabric pieces over them.
    • Option 2: Add some fabric pieces to the buckets, then a few raisins, small pieces of dried fruit, and one large nut.
    • Option 3: Add a few slices of lemons, limes, or other cup up pieces of fruit to the buckets and fill them halfway full with water.
    • Option 4: Fill each bucket halfway with water and add a small amount of gatorade mix to make dilute juice.

How to use: Prepare buckets as desired, then place outside of caging within reach of chimpanzees with the use of their tools. Hand out tools to be used by chimpanzees to access the buckets. The chimpanzees may use their tools to knock over the buckets and then retrieve the treats off of the ground outside of the caging.

Price: We use the tubs our peanut butter comes in for these buckets, so there is a possibility to reuse materials. We also use durable buckets that can also go inside the caging for other uses, which cost about $20 and include other plastic toys. A link to these buckets can be found here.

Firehose Cubes

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We used the plans from Hose2Habit. Check them out here for detailed instructions.

How to use: We hide a variety of food, object enrichment and browse in the cube pockets

Price: We used free recycled firehose from our local fire department. These are only a few dollars each to purchase the hardware.

Forage pools

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Brief Description: The chimpanzees have to search through a filled pool for a favorite food

Materials: child size swimming pool or similar container such as a water trough or sandbox

Assembly instructions: No assembly required

How to use: Fill pool with desired substrate. You can use water, shredded paper, hay, etc. Add a handful of treats such as raisins, sunflower seeds, pomegranate seeds (the smaller the food, the more challenging the puzzle).

Price: $10-$20 for the pool

You can watch Jamie gather pomegranate seeds at 1:10 in this video:

Novel food and creative presentations

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Brief description: The sky is the limit for preparing new and interesting food enrichment! The chimps are usually pretty excited to try new foods, and caregivers love mixing up the way we prepare and serve their meals. We try and keep meals as healthy as possible, but their is still a lot of room for creativity.

Materials: Novel food items

Assembly instructions: No assembly required.

How to use: Prepare novel foods and/or novel presentations of foods

Price: Varies by season and food items.

Coconut still in the shell is very exciting!

We grow some things at the sanctuary so the chimps can enjoy fresh picked treats!

The chimps really like when we mix it up and put out whole produce items.

Paper Braids

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Brief Description We borrowed this idea from Primate Rescue Center!

Materials: A roll of Kraft paper (approximately 30″ wide)

Assembly Instructions: Cut paper into long strips over 1 foot (all strips should be about the same length and about 2-3 inches wide). Put a line of whatever dry treats you want to use (sunflower seeds work great) down the length of each piece of paper. Roll and twist the strips length wise so you “seal” in the food, but still have a long strip of twisted paper. Braid at least three twists of paper together so you have a long plait of paper full of treats! To make the puzzle more complicated, you can add more twists of empty paper or add layers of paper to the existing twists. Primate Rescue Center brushes the outside of their paper braids with a flour and water mix to make them stronger!

How to use: Give to the chimps and watch them tear them apart!

Price: Aproximately $20 for a large roll of Kraft Paper (that will last for a long time).