Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

advocacy

Protecting Mountain Gorillas through Community Involvement

by

This is our first guest blog post about gorilla conservation, written by Gretchen Clymer. Gretchen first became passionate about primate conservation after reading Gorillas in the Mist by Dian Fossey as a teenager. She went on to complete undergraduate and graduate studies in Biological Anthropology, conducting behavioral research on different primate species, including golden lion tamarins, rhesus macaques, and chacma baboons. She has worked for the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International (DFGFI) in both Atlanta and Musanze, Rwanda. As a primatologist, she has remained active in primate conservation and welfare, including currently working with Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest.

—

bwindi impentrable forest gorillas
Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, Uganda. Photo: Ian and Kate Bruce, 2013.

The threats to the survival of mountain gorillas, and all of the great apes, are severe and multi-faceted. Habitat loss due to logging and industry, armed conflict, the illegal bushmeat and pet trades, and infectious disease represent significant threats to the populations of chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans. Over the past 50 years, approaches to ape conservation have shifted as conservationists understand more and more that survival of ape populations is inextricably linked with the welfare and involvement of the communities that live near chimpanzee, gorilla, and orangutan habitats.

Early approaches in conservation

The pioneering research conducted by Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, and Birut? Galdikas in the 1960’s-1970’s brought the world’s attention to the fascinating behaviors of the great apes. Their work also brought to light the pressures that threatened the very survival of chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans. Conservation approaches at that time were largely focused on preservation of habitat, and the assumption that conservation of apes and their habitat was primarily realized through enforcement. Dian Fossey, in particular, championed methods she called “active conservation,” that were often antagonistic towards communities residing on the fringes of mountain gorilla habitat. This method of conservation focused only on protecting mountain gorilla populations while failing to take into account that poachers, loggers, and encroachers were not motivated by maliciousness, but rather the simple and stark need to provide for themselves and their families.

bisate health clinic
Bisate Health Clinic, Musanze, Rwanda. Photo: Gretchen Clymer, 2007.

The shift towards community-involved conservation

Habitat preservation is certainly paramount in working for the survival of the great apes, and this requires legislation to protect habitat as well as enforcement of existing legal protections for ape habitat and poaching bans. However, as approaches in ape conservation have been refined over the last 50 years, conservationists have learned the importance of embracing local communities in conservation, and of the intertwined relationship between human welfare and ape conservation.

Since Dian Fossey’s untimely and tragic death in 1985, the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International (DFGFI) and other mountain gorilla conservation groups have taken a different approach to conservation, focusing on including the local community into conservation efforts, through community programs, research, and eco-tourism.

It is estimated that “gorilla tourism may exceed $30 million USD shared between Rwanda, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)” (International Gorilla Conservation Program, 2014). Gorilla and other great ape eco-tourism not only brings money directly to conservation efforts by providing funds for anti-poaching patrols and research studies, but also helps to create a link to the local community by establishing a tourism industry, which in turn provides financial security to the area while actively discouraging unsustainable poaching and deforestation practices. Providing social services for population areas where community needs are great and currently unmet is an additional effective strategy to involve the community in conservation efforts. For example, the DFGFI, partnering with other organizations, provides funding for the Bisate Health Clinic, a rural health clinic in Musanze, Rwanda, by helping to promote health, education, and economic growth in an attempt to provide these communities with the opportunities to become more self-sufficient and less dependent on resources gathered from within the boundaries of the park.

Another program, in the Bwindi Impenetrable National Forest of Uganda, is Conservation through Public Health, which has focused on preventing “the spread of disease from wild animals to humans, and vice versa, by improving primary healthcare for people and animals in and around protected areas in Africa” (Whitley Fund for Nature, 2011). The program has sought to engage the local community by enlisting their help with gorilla population surveys and monitoring, as well as devoting efforts to community-led outreach and education. Conservation through Public Health also strengthens eco-tourism programs by improving facilities for this important conservation sector and ensuring that disease from visiting guests is not then spread to vulnerable mountain gorillas.

virungas
Virungas Volcanic Range, Rwanda. Photo: Gretchen Clymer, 2007.

Educational programs and support are another important realm in community-involved conservation. Practical education programs on health and sustainability can support local communities and ease resource or ecological pressures on ape habitat resources. Conservation education (from primary through graduate education levels), fosters local pride and involvement in conservation and can be hugely impactful in ongoing conservation efforts for apes. The Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International is active in nearly every level of educational opportunity in the communities near mountain gorilla habitat – from health education programs in local communities, to conservation education in local schools, up through graduate research training at the Karisoke research center. These efforts not only demonstrate that conservation is beneficial to the local communities, they show respect to communities as key stakeholders in conservation.

bwindi gorilla
Bwindi Impenetrable Forest. Photo: Ian and Kate Bruce, 2013.

Signs for Hope

In the past decade, it appears community-outreach focused conservational approaches show promising signs of success for the mountain gorillas. A 2010 census of mountain gorillas showed a ~26% increase in their numbers in the Virungas since the prior census in 2003 (Gray et al, 2010). While still critically endangered, an increase in population – particularly with ongoing conflict in the region – is a significant victory for the efforts of conservationists and the local communities.

The close proximity between human populations and endangered great apes is undoubtedly a factor in the threat to ape survival. However, fifty years of conservation efforts have demonstrated the importance of protecting apes with the cooperation and support of the populations that reside in proximity to ape habitat. Providing training and material support in sustainable agriculture helps to mitigate the need to log or hunt in critical ape habitat. Using ape conservation funds to provide basic health services such as clean water and medical clinics makes ape conservation beneficial to both the apes and humans in the area. Lastly, educational outreach can instill a sense of local pride in the majestic gorillas, and will hopefully bring about the next generation of conservationists sharing a common homeland with the apes, who will then strive to increase mountain gorilla populations to sustainable levels.

 

Works Cited:

International Gorilla Conservation Programme (IGCP). 2014. “Tourism.”

Whitely Fund for Nature, 2011. “Mountain Gorilla Conservation through Public Health, Uganda.”

Gray, M. Fawcett, K., Basabose, A., Cranfield, M., Vigilant, L., Roy, J., Uwingeli, P., Mburanumwe, I., Kagoda, E., Robbins, M. 2010. Virunga Massif Mountain Gorilla Census — 2010 Summary Report.

How Apps for Apes helps conservation

by

In his first post, Rich Zimmerman introduced us to the plight of free-living orangutans in Indonesia. Here he tells us how his program, Orangutan Outreach, has helped with some of the issues orangutans face and how Apps for Apes helps raise awareness for those efforts.

—

How has your work with Orangutan Outreach influenced conservation efforts in Indonesia?

Since its inception, Orangutan Outreach has been able to make a notable impact in the ongoing struggle to save the orangutans. Over the past few years we’ve been able to make substantial financial contributions to our strategic partners in the field, including Borneo Orangutan Survival (BOS), IAR, Center for Orangutan Protection (COP) and SOCP. These funds go to rescuing, caring for, relocating, rehabilitating, and releasing individual orangutans back to the forest in Borneo and Sumatra. Working with our partners in the field, we’ve helped fund the rescue of individuals who, without our help, would otherwise have perished or been smuggled out of Indonesia by illegal animal traders. Our support has contributed immensely to the success of the BOS Nyaru Menteng orangutan releases. This release program is the first of its kind in history. BOS is literally re-creating a genetically stable population of orangutans in the wild and we are honored to be able to help them.

In addition to the work on the ground, Orangutan Outreach does a lot of online advocacy on behalf of the orangutans via our website, and our social media networks: Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and YouTube. We’ve been able to bring people together from all over and create hubs of support among our fans and followers.

OO-rich-speaking

Rich helping to educate the public about the plight of orangutans. Photo © Orangutan Outreach.

Tell us a little bit about the Apps for Apes program and how this helps both captive and wild orangutans.

Apps for Apes was started a few years ago as a way to provide enrichment to orangutans in zoos and sanctuaries—and has now expanded to include chimpanzees! Apes are highly intelligent creatures who require mental stimulation to keep from growing bored and depressed. Every ape is a unique individual with his or her own particular likes and dislikes, and the quality of life of apes living in zoos and sanctuaries is highly dependent on the amount and type of enrichment they receive on a daily basis. With the Apps for Apes project, we are providing iPads to ape caregivers in order to provide them with unlimited enrichment opportunities. They have access to music, musical instruments, cognitive games, art, painting, drawing, photos and videos. I should also point out that we do not spend a penny on Apps for Apes. All iPads are donated. NatGeo gave us several dozen last year when they upgraded their field staff!

Apps for Apes has three goals: 1) to provide stimulating enrichment & immediate gratification for the apes using iPads, 2) to raise awareness among zoo visitors of the critical need to protect orangutans in the wild, and 3) to promote the conservation efforts of Orangutan Outreach. For Apps for Apes to be truly successful we need to achieve ALL the goals. It’s wonderful to provide something fun for a captive ape, but we want to take it further. We want the iPad enrichment sessions to become ‘teachable moments’. Whether via live caregiver talks or stories on the news, we have a golden opportunity to get people to think about orangutans—to see them as amazing, intelligent beings who are being brutally killed in the wild—and to help them! That’s our larger goal of Apps for Apes—for the apes in captivity to truly become ambassadors for their cousins in the wild.

oo-a4a-toronto-pandi-4

oo-a4a-toronto-pandi-3

Puppe and her son Budi at the Toronto Zoo with their keeper Matthew Berridge.  Photos © Tom Pandi for Orangutan Outreach.

What can we do at home to help with conservation efforts?

People should try their best to avoid products that contain palm oil—and spread the word to all their friends. While boycotting all products that contain palm oil is not feasible, one can always make choices in what they buy. Consumers have power. By letting companies know you won’t buy products that contribute to the destruction of orangutan habitat you are making a powerful statement! Hopefully soon—but only with outside pressure from environmental groups—there will be products that only contain palm oil that is certifiably sustainable and that has not led to the deteriorating population of orangutans. Until then, use extreme caution when shopping, and read those labels!

A really fun way for people to get involved with orangutan conservation is by adopting an orangutan on our website. The adoptions are virtual—the orangutans stay at the care center (Believe me… people ask!). Adopting an orangutan is a great way for someone to follow along as their adoptee grows up. Donations are critical to keep the projects going, but spreading awareness is also key. People can’t act if they don’t know what’s happening far away in Borneo and Sumatra. We need people to share our website with their friends, join us on Facebook and spread the word. We have lots of online materials for young people to use in school. We cannot save the orangutans alone—only together can we make a difference!

CSNW was fortunate enough to be included in the Apps for Apes program and very much appreciate the iPad we received. Since then, we also got one from Shari H. so now the chimpanzees have two iPads! Now one person can keep Jamie occupied and someone else can play with the other chimps—perfect! Here’s a video of the chimps with their iPads:

Eyes on Apes website

by

One of our missions at Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest is to advocate for apes everywhere, which is why we developed the program Eyes on Apes. The idea is to have one centralized area for people to learn about issues that apes face both in captivity and in the wild, while providing tools for you to take action.

There’s a lot of great information on the pages for each of the issues (entertainment, pets, roadside zoos, biomedical research, and free-living issues in Africa and Asia).

One thing we just added were some pages on individual trainers in the entertainment industry. This is a really nice resource for people to have when you hear about a chimp in a commercial or movie and are curious what it is like for them with their trainers. Each page lists facts about the trainers, any relevant USDA citations, and links to our action alerts about productions these trainers were involved in.

Please share this site with your friends, and help raise awareness for apes everywhere! You can ask them to sign up for our Take Action list in order to get action alerts and help make a difference for apes everywhere.

Take a look through all the pages—there’s been some makeovers throughout the site, like this informational map showing the current vs. historical population of African apes:

africadistribution

And, since this was a little bit of a wordy post, I thought I’d throw in a picture of Negra from this morning’s breakfast forage on Young’s Hill:

web_negra_walk_grass_YH_dm_IMG_0576

Is successful reintroduction possible?

by

In her previous post, Dr. Gwendy Reyes-Illg introduced us to her work with the story of Margot. Here she talks about reintroductions from Afican sanctuaries back into the wild, and some information on how we can help. The sad reality is that many of these chimpanzees simply cannot be reintroduced to the wild because they have suffered too much trauma. No captive chimpanzee in the US has been successfully integrated into African forests—it is nothing like what they are used to. The same can be said for any chimpanzee who begins life in captivity, even if they live in Africa.

—

Have you witnessed apes experience successful reintroduction and rehabilitation?

Each chimpanzee is a unique individual, and their responses to trauma vary widely. Chimpanzees who were only in captivity for a short while before they were rescued are very different from those who were subjected to years of life as a “pet.” The former seem to have an easier time integrating with the other chimpanzees once in a sanctuary, while the latter are sometimes abnormally bonded to humans and may have a harder time finding their place in the group. Despite their gradual psychological recovery, they may still exhibit stereotypical behaviors, such as rocking or over-grooming.

Sanctuary life is much better than being in the hands of poachers or “owners.” Solitary confinement, the norm for most illegally-held primates, is one of the most miserable situations in which a social animal can find herself. In sanctuaries, primates have others of their own kind with whom to bond and interact. They are given a variety of healthy foods and fresh water. Oftentimes, they also form close relationships with caring staff members.

The sanctuaries I have volunteered for and visited in Africa differ greatly in the conditions in which the apes live. Some sanctuaries provide large tracts of forest where the apes can explore, play, build nests, etc. They are rarely seen during the day, coming near the cages only for feeding time. Other sanctuaries are much smaller, and caregivers must enrich the smaller area they have available to keep the primates stimulated and prevent boredom. Because most African sanctuaries rely on solar power for their electric fences, the apes must come inside at night so they will not escape when the power to the fence gets too low. Aggression can be a problem, especially in close inside quarters.

I have always been enamored with the idea of reintroducing chimpanzees to the wild. In theory, it seems to be one way to right all the wrongs our species has inflicted on these creatures. Reintroduction is liberation, emancipation. Unfortunately, the reality of chimpanzee reintroduction is much more muddled, both logistically and ethically.

The African sanctuaries I have worked closely with are still struggling to find a suitable release site—an area where reintroduced chimpanzees could find the resources they need to survive, without being killed by hunters, or by a well-established group of wild chimpanzees. This is a common challenge for sanctuaries hoping to reintroduce apes to the wild. In addition, apes who have been in captivity for any length of time may harbor infectious diseases that could endanger wild populations.

The actual “release” is just the beginning—not the end—of a life-long commitment to the animals: reintroduced apes must be fitted with tracking devices and constantly monitored for the rest of their lives. This is because they are inevitably habituated to people and areas uninhabited by people are almost impossible to find; to prevent human-ape conflict, crop-raiding, etc., releasers must ensure the reintroduced animals are not moving toward villages or farmland.

A fairly high percentage of chimpanzees die shortly after they are released, even with all the measures in place to prevent this. And after many years in a sanctuary environment, reintroduction may be a stress- and distress-causing event, at least initially, for the individuals involved. Finally, the financial costs of reintroduction project can be very high, and some might argue that limited resources would be better spent on individuals remaining in sanctuaries and on efforts to protect animals still in the wild, for example, by protecting forests or educating people.

Still, reintroduction may be the right option in certain situations. Successfully released apes have many options and freedoms not available to those in sanctuaries. They can roam where they choose, and are free to spend time with individuals they prefer and avoid those they don’t get along with. They do not have to depend on people for food, water, and other necessities. Chimpanzees reintroduced to the wild avoid the sometimes unpleasant husbandry and medical procedures that are an almost universal part of sanctuary chimpanzee life.

Another freedom that comes with reintroduction is the freedom to reproduce and raise offspring. Contraception is used in most sanctuaries because they do not wish to subject more animals to a life of captivity; in addition, every “vacancy” occupied by captive-born animal is not available for one who needs to be rescued. Once in the wild, reproduction not only enriches the lives of the mother and other group members, it also pulls the species a little further away from extinction in the wild—predicted by some to occur for chimpanzees in as little 15 years.

Finally, because reintroduction projects capture the hearts and imagination of many people, they can help draw attention of the plight of apes in general. Local people living in a proposed reintroduction site are “sensitized” to the idea of protecting the apes being released and this may have a ripple effect that gradually helps foster positive attitudes in the larger population.

What can we do to help?

Limited resources are one of the biggest challenges for sanctuaries, especially those in developing countries. People who want to help can donate equipment, supplies, time or money to help meet sanctuaries’ daily needs and help expand education and outreach programs. Many sanctuaries accept volunteers for extended periods, even individuals who have never worked with primates before. Since my work has a veterinary focus, I approach distributors, manufacturers, and practitioners in the hopes that they will donate medications, equipment (such as anesthesia monitors, ultrasound machines, and fracture repair instruments), and medical supplies to bring to the sanctuaries where I work.

In addition, it is important to examine how we might unintentionally be contributing to the tragedy of orphaned chimpanzees. When considering buying wood products, it may be worth looking into the source; logging companies seeking wood for Western markets contribute to the problem both by cutting roads into remote, formerly inaccessible areas of forest and by transporting illegal bushmeat out of the forest. In addition, they sometimes do not provide enough food to their workers, leading some individuals to resort to hunting primates and other wild species.

Finally, taking action on issues that harm primates in the U.S., such as medical research and use in the entertainment and pet industries, has a ripple effect for chimpanzees, gorillas and other primates still in their native regions. These campaigns always need supporters and even people with limited time to contribute can help raise the profile and the moral status of primates in our society.

These pictures were taken at three of the sanctuaries Gwendy has worked for: Limbe Wildlife Centre (in Cameroon), In Defense of Animals—Africa’s Sanaga-Yong Chimpanzee Rescue Center (in Cameroon), and the Jane Goodall Institute South Africa (Chimp Eden).

gorillas in africa sanctuary

chimps in africa sanctuary4

chimps in africa sanctuary3

mandrill in africa sanctuary

More ways to follow us

by

If you are on Facebook, you’ve probably seen a few pictures posted from our new Instagram account. If you have Instagram, please start following us @chimpsanctuary! Today, I posted this picture, with the caption “Guess who?” And I’d like to pose that question to our blog readers as well. So, go ahead and guess! After you figure it out, I will post more pictures of that chimp later today!

UPDATE: It’s Burrito 🙂 Scroll down to see his pretty cute face.

web-guess_who

If you aren’t on Facebook or Instagram, but you regularly read the blog, you might have noticed on the right hand sidebar that there’s a new link to a page called News on Apes. This is simply a feed of news stories (with links to the original articles) all in one place for any issue apes are facing in the news. If something noteworthy comes out on chimps in entertainment or biomedical research, or conservation issues for wild gorillas, chimps, and orangutans—we will post it there. Subscribe to get an email notification any time we post a link to a new article, to stay updated on what is going on with apes around the world.

web_Burrito_chin_on_hand_sit_on_bench_FR_ls_IMG_9107

web_Burrito_bite_hand_look_toward_window_FR_ls_IMG_9110

Why are orangutans endangered in the wild?

by

This guest blog is by Rich Zimmerman, Executive Director of Orangutan Outreach. Rich helped facilitate getting CSNW an iPad as part of their Apps for Apes program! He is our first guest blogger to tell us information about our red ape cousins in Asia. Rich’s experience is in helping raise awareness and funds for the projects in the field. He has accompanied a few rescue missions in Borneo but his work is mainly in New York and online—advocating on behalf of orangutans, promoting the cause and communicating the critical need to help them before it’s too late.

—

What inspired you to work with orangutans?

I’ve loved orangutans since I was a child. I went in a different direction professionally and it was only later in life—when I realized just how perilously close the orangutans were to extinction in the wild—that I decided I needed to do something to help them. After traveling to Indonesia and seeing the utter devastation to their forests and the rescue center cages full of hundreds of orphaned and displaced orangutans staring out with such sadness and desperation in their eyes, I decided to dedicate my life to helping them. I created Orangutan Outreach in 2007 as a way to raise awareness of the crisis facing wild orangutans and to raise funds for the rescue projects in Borneo and Sumatra.

Can you tell us a brief story about an individual orangutan that was personally affected by human encroachment?

Every orangutan in every rescue center has been affected by human encroachment. Whenever there is a conflict, the human always wins. Orangutans—and elephants, rhinos, tigers, monkey, you name it—always fall victim to the constant expansion of human settlement and the destruction of their habitat by logging, palm oil, and mining companies. Every baby in a rescue center was torn off his or her dying mother. These innocent babies are traumatized—just as any human baby would be if pulled from its mother. And for each infant confiscated and brought to a rehabilitation center, it’s estimated that anywhere from four to nine did not survive. It’s horrific what is being done to these creatures… for no fault of their own they are being wiped out of existence by humans.

Let me tell you two quick stories. The first is Rickina, who was rescued by our partners International Animal Rescue (IAR) when she was less than a year old. When they confiscated her she has a gaping machete wound in her skull—obviously received when the poachers killer her mother. The wound was fresh. Rickina is now doing really well—thanks to the expert care of the team at IAR Ketapang. She is quite famous online—with more than 350,000 views of her video on YouTube.

OrangutanOutreach-IAR-rickina
Baby Orangutan Rickina is being cared for at IAR Ketapang (and can be adopted!). Photo © International Animal Rescue.

Another amazing story is Gober, a blind, older female orangutan being cared for by our partners Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Programme (SOCP). When she was caught eating fruit in the garden of a local villager she was going to be killed. Instead she was rescued and brought to the SOCP quarantine center. She had cataracts and could barely see. She was housed in a cage next to a younger male orangutan (named Leuser) who had been shot with a pellet gun more than a hundred times by local villagers. He was totally blind and the fact that he’d even survived is testament to the phenomenal will to live of orangutans. Well, orangutans never cease to amaze… nine months later Gober gave birth to beautiful twins, Ganteng and Ginting. Twins are extremely rare among orangutans—which makes sense given the fact that in the wild they spend their lives high up in the treetops. Imagine trying to move around in the canopy carrying two babies! Gober had successful cataract surgery and her sight has been partially restored. Hopefully she and the twins will be released back into the wild later this year!

OrangutanOutreach-SOCP-gober
Gober & the Twins are being cared for by SOCP (and can be adopted!) Photo © Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Programme.

Why are orangutans endangered in the wild?

The expansionary activities of the timber, mining and palm oil industries have led to a catastrophic decrease in wild orangutan populations. Palm oil has been the main contributor to the orangutan genocide in the last decade. Around 90% of the global supply of palm oil comes from Indonesia & Malaysia and this has come at a tremendous cost for biodiversity. Indonesian forests are being burned to the ground—releasing so much carbon into the atmosphere that Indonesia now ranks only behind China and US in carbon emissions—and it is barely industrialized. The UNEP estimates that the forests of Indonesia are being cleared at a rate of six football fields per minute, every minute of every day.

The palm oil industry is guilty of truly heinous ecological atrocities. The forests of Borneo and Sumatra are the only place where these gentle, intelligent creatures live, and the cultivation of palm oil has directly led to the brutal deaths of thousands of individuals as the industry has expanded into previously undisturbed areas of rainforest at an alarming rate.

When the forest is cleared, adult orangutans are killed on sight. These peaceful, sentient beings who share approximately 97% of our DNA are shot, macheted, beaten, burned, mutilated, tortured and often eaten. Babies are literally torn off their dying mothers so they can be sold on the black market as illegal pets to wealthy families who see them as status symbols of their own power and prestige. This has been documented time and again.

OrangutanOutreach-deforestation-1200w
Surveying deforestation in West Kalimantan (Indonesian Borneo). Photo © Orangutan Outreach

Have you seen any recovery of wild orphaned orangutans (e.g. is reintroduction possible)?

Reintroduction is very possible! Over the last year and a half, our partners at BOS have released more than 100 rehabilitated orangutans into a safe and secure forest deep in the heart of Borneo—far away from bulldozers and oil palm companies. And the population is flourishing! While there has been one death reported there have been multiple births recorded by the post-release monitoring team. The cycle of life continues in the forest for the world’s first re-created orangutan population. It takes roughly 250-300 individuals to create a stable population so there are many releases to go before the forest has reached carrying capacity according to strict IUCN guidelines. What BOS needs now is to find more forests to release more orangutans. There are still around 600 orangutans being cared for at the Nyaru Menteng Facility. They also have orangutans in East Kalimantan who are gradually being released into a separate forest. IAR is doing the same in West Kalimantan. They’ve been able to release orangutans from their excellent new facility in Ketapang. SOCP has a successful release program in Northern Sumatra. All these projects and programs are ongoing—and are only possible due to the generosity of donors.

OrangutanOutreach-BOS-Releases
BOS Nyaru Menteng Orangutan Release Photo © Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation.

Margot

by

This post is by a new guest blogger, Gwendy Reyes-Illg. She is an emergency veterinarian in Loveland, Colorado and serves on the Leadership Council of the Humane Society Veterinary Medical Association. She has visited and volunteered her services to several primate sanctuaries in the United States and Africa. Currently Dr. Reyes-Illg is pursuing a master’s degree in Animal and Environmental Ethics at Colorado State University. In a few years, she plans to relocate permanently to Africa to help primate sanctuaries and their surrounding communities. We asked her a few questions about her work—the first of which are answered here, and the rest will be in a follow-up post soon. WARNING: one possibly disturbing image is included in this entry as a link in the text.

—

How long have you been working in the field, and how did you get started there? What do you find most rewarding about working with chimpanzees and gorillas?

I’ve been working with apes for the past 13 years. As a college student, I took a semester off to intern at the Center for Great Apes in Wauchula, FL, a sanctuary for chimpanzees and orangutans rescued or retired from the entertainment and pets trades. I have loved animals and advocated for them for as long as I can remember—by age 10, I was an ethical vegetarian—so my heart was already set on spending my life working with and for animals.

A documentary about Jane Goodall, along with the book The Great Ape Project, inspired me to focus on apes. Fascinating creatures in their own right, apes also serve as a natural “bridge” for extending moral consideration beyond our own species. In veterinary school, I always tried to imagine how I could adapt what I was learning to primate sanctuaries, especially those in remote areas with limited resources.

Now, as a veterinarian, what is most rewarding for me is the moments of connection that I have with individual primates. After an anesthetic procedure, I often sit with the patient while he or she wakes up to make sure they are recovering well. This is a quiet time where they are away from their group. Even chimpanzees who are normally pretty shy with humans will come out of their shell a bit, and reach out a hand to be held. Given how strong and intimidating chimpanzees can be when emotionally aroused, I am always amazed at the gentleness with which many of them groom and touch.

Tell us about an individual ape personally affected by human encroachment, and how you were involved in their recovery.

Unlike most apes in North American sanctuaries, almost all the chimpanzees and gorillas in African sanctuaries were born in the wild. They were taken from the forest when the mothers they were clinging to were killed so their bodies could be sold as “bushmeat.” Though ape meat is illegal, it can be sold at a high price because, for some, consuming it is a status symbol. Even some restaurants in Europe and North America have been caught serving ape meat.

Infants’ small size means that they fetch a higher price when sold alive, as “pets” or tourist attractions. After the horrors of being torn from their mothers, many infants die of their wounds, neglect, or illnesses they contract from their captors. The survivors are often tied by the waist or chained by the neck in private homes or hotels. The rare lucky survivors wind up in one of dozens of sanctuaries throughout Africa after being confiscated by authorities or surrendered by people who have purchased them.

Margot, a four-year-old “little girl,” is one chimpanzee I got to know especially well during my last time in Africa. She was confiscated from a poacher in 2011 and arrived at the Sanaga-Yong Chimpanzee Rescue Center with several shotgun wounds to her face—probably from the same gun that killed her mother. As a result, she had a broken jaw, as well as a hole in the roof of her mouth (palate) that connected to her nose. While most of her wounds healed soon after her arrival, the hole in her palate proved very difficult to surgically repair. Both a human surgeon and a veterinarian attempted to close the hole, but two surgeries later, it was still there, and Margot was frequently developing respiratory infections from aspiration.

margot surgery

Before my last volunteer trip, the sanctuary director and I consulted with several maxillofacial surgeons to develop a new surgical plan and get the special supplies I would need for what we hoped would be Margot’s final surgery. Margot was gently anesthetized and carefully monitored and tended to by Nicholas, the Cameroonian veterinary technician, while I performed the surgery. Afterward, she had to eat an all liquid diet and take several different medications to prevent pain and infection. We were worried Margot or one of the other chimpanzees in her group might pull out the stitches before the repair had healed so, instead of going out into the forest everyday with the others, Margot had to stay inside with a caregiver for two weeks. She was not happy about this!

Despite the disruption of her routine and missing her chimpanzee friends, Margot was a very good patient. Every day or two, I visited her, played for a bit and tried to get a peek at how the repair was holding up. Margot was so gentle and tolerant, even with everything she was going through—and all she had survived in her short life. At last check, it looks like the surgery has been a success! The hole was finally closed. Margot will have another check-up soon, to make sure everything is continuing to heal well.