Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

animal protection

Females in Charge

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We’re getting ready for the small groundbreaking ceremony this afternoon! The actual construction on Phase 1 of the expansion will start in a little over two weeks, but today we’re having a ceremonial start to this huge project. I can’t even express how happy we are to have arrived at this day and how incredibly grateful I am for every single person who has donated these last two years as we fundraised to begin this project.

We have a lot of work ahead of us, but it’s amazing to be finally at the first step towards bringing more chimpanzees home.

 

In the meantime, I bring you my thoughts this morning as I walked around Young’s Hill with Jamie, Missy, Jody, and Foxie walking together on the inside of their habitat…

In the wild, chimpanzees societies are patriarchal. With their might, size, and testosterone, even low-ranking adult males are said to outrank all of the adult females in any given group. In captivity, things are often quite different. Every group of chimpanzees that I have worked with for an extended period of time has had a strong female that clearly called many of the shots and at least occasionally put their foot down with males in the group.

Maybe it’s because the chimpanzees I’ve known have not been socialized into a normal chimpanzee society – they were raised in human environments or spent much of their time living alone or in pairs within laboratory settings. Or maybe part of it is that chimpanzees are flexible and adaptable, figuring their relationships out as they go rather than having a rigid, strictly biologically-driven social order. Most likely it’s a bit of this and a bit of that.

Even though it’s not what they would be doing in the wild, and it would likely be much better if they were living in a more balanced male-to-female group, I can’t help but admire the female power that exists at the sanctuary.

Like today, when this all-female patrol walked around the perimeter of their territory.

More firsts after ten years

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The featured photo (the one at the top of the page) literally brought tears to my eyes this morning. Well, not the photo itself, but seeing Negra in the grass with that very relaxed face. She has come so far in the last ten years, and has made new strides just in the last two weeks since I wrote about her (and Foxie’s and Annie’s) independence. And she’s not the only one (there’s a bonus Burrito story down below the photos of Negra).

Two days ago, following our PRT session, I was starting on a walk with Jamie, when I noticed an unmistakable figure ahead. Though I knew it could only be Negra, I really questioned my eyes when I saw this chimpanzee person climb into the hammock. Luckily I had the camera with me and was able to get evidence of what I believe is a first-ever event.

 

Negra’s main purpose on the hill these days is to find prickly lettuce. She sets off on these expeditions with a certain amount of determination, so it was very special that she stopped and took in the view from this new perspective. And just look at her face in that photo of her in the hammock and the featured photo – she is relaxed, content, and at home.

After this pause, she continued on her journey:

 

almost disappearing into the sea of grass:

 

Once she happened upon a spot to forage for the plants she is so fond of, she disappeared again, this time into a sea of wild mustard:

 

I moved to get a better angle (Jamie was being quite patient with me taking photos of Negra, waiting to continue the walk we had begun):

 

Here’s one for perspective. Negra is at the very top of the hill, beyond the tower structures:

 

Lately on these treks, another chimpanzee, usually Jody (below) or Missy, will join Negra. Perhaps they are ensuring everything is okay, or maybe they are hoping to share in her harvest:

 

At 45, after decades of living in confinement, Negra proves that it is never too late for anyone to try something new and become something you never thought you would be.

 

Perhaps Burrito has been observing Negra’s new sense of adventure because today he climbed up onto to the bar structure!

Sometimes I don’t notice when someone hasn’t done something until I see them do it for the first time.

 

I am pretty sure that Foxie was aware that this was a new occasion because she was very excited to see Burrito up there next to her.

 

and he seemed pleased with the experience too:

 

What a fantastic week of firsts as we head into tomorrow’s celebration of the ten year anniversary of the chimpanzees’ arrival to Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest.

 

Social Primates

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While volunteers Chelsea, Erin, and Kailie were finishing up the big clean of the playroom today, I went in search of some chimpanzees.

I found all seven of them on the “top bunk” of the structure in the greenhouse. I was able to watch them for twenty minutes or so as they rested and groomed. There were frequent switches of grooming partners, with everyone receiving and giving attention at various times and then sitting quietly grooming themselves or dozing off.

It’s incredibly heartening to witness this rag-tag bunch interacting like a true chimpanzee family group. They definitely don’t always get along (no primates do, if we’re being honest), but these times of togetherness are a big part of who they have become. Even when they were focusing on themselves, they were just inches away from one other.

 

Here are a few photos of Missy and Jamie:

 

Burrito's 35th Birthday Bash!

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As the video illustrates, Burrito was in high spirits today as we celebrated his 35th birthday. He is the epitome of being young at heart. Just when you think you couldn’t love him any more he does something else to irrevocably endear himself, like eating lettuce with never-before-seen abandon or practically jumping right out of his skin with excitement.

 

 

 

Happy Birthday Burrito from Kimberly Fleming!

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Burrito’s friend Kimberly sponsored today in his honor! It’s pretty difficult to believe that goofy, playful,  rambunctious Burrito is 35 today. He’s come a long way since he and the six female chimpanzees arrived at the sanctuary in 2008. He had a lot to overcome – you can read about his history on this page.

We are catering the day to him today and will post later about how we celebrated Burrito’s birthday in the way we think he would appreciate the most.

Thank you for sponsoring the day for the one and only lovable Burrito Chimpanzee, Kimberly.

 

Christmas Deconstructed

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Hopefully you’ve watched the video (several times) of the chimps’ holiday party yesterday – it was a pretty amazing day for all of the chimpanzees and the humans who were here to celebrate with them.

The chimps’ friends really know what makes for a great party! A good 98% of the decorations, food, gifts, and blankets were donated from friends near and far.

I thought it would be fun to share some of the still photos from yesterday to deconstruct the party a bit and tell you more about the day.

The first thing to deconstruct is the party food. We are pretty strict about the chimps’ diet. The vast majority of what the chimps eat is fresh produce, supplemented with nuts, seeds, and a small amount of commercially-made “primate chow.” We do not give them food that has added sugar or salt, and we give them very little processed food other than the primate chow. We want the chimpanzees here to be as healthy as possible, so we see their diet as preventative health care.

A few times a year, for special occasions, we bend the rules just a little bit, though you still won’t see the chimps here eating candy. As you can tell from the food squeaks, they are pretty pleased with what we offer.

One thing that dawned on me when we had the Jungle Solstice party last week is that a big part of the chimps’ excitement is not necessarily what the food is, but the fact that we bring out plates for parties. It seems like such a small thing, but I think they have realized that paper plates = party, so and they get excited even if the food on the plates is what they would normally be served on a random day.

 

Their Christmas plates this year had baked potatoes, Brussels sprouts, and cut-up fresh pomegranate:

 

For the bending-the-rules food, we also included slices of Field Roast’s Celebration Roast:

 

The champagne flutes (another “hey, it’s a party” signal) were filled with slightly watered down non-alcoholic sparkling cranberry cider (no sugar added):

 

Kelsi made the drinks extra fancy by adding a few pomegranate arils to each glass:

 

The other breaking-the-rules food that’s become a tradition for the holiday party is dinner rolls. Many of the chimpanzees go straight for the rolls, leaving some of the other food on the plate as seconds. That’s what sneaky Missy was “stealing” in the video from yesterday:

 

Negra is possibly the biggest fan of bread that I know, so she is always pleased to have this extra special treat. Knowing that, some cut up dinner roll pieces were placed in one of her favorite spots up on the catwalk:

 

The prize pineapple top that you saw Jody with in the video was a leftover from their breakfast. Jody made sure it was okay with Jamie before she took it upstairs to eat in private:

 

So, what about the presents?! Well, the trick with presents for most chimpanzees is to hide a bit of food in them. So, most of the bags and little boxes you saw had a nut or some other small not-breaking-the-rules food.

 

That’s not to say that the chimpanzees don’t appreciate new non-food objects, it’s just that food tends to be more universally exciting.

Jamie was very pleased to get two new pairs of boots yesterday, in addition to several books:

 

And Foxie got so many new dolls that I lost count. I don’t have a good photo of her with a new doll – suffice it to say that she was very happy with all of them! She handed me a new Strawberry Shortcake doll first thing this morning and then did some playful spins.

 

Today, the chimpanzees are resting up after the big celebration. Here’s Jamie, sound asleep, using her new boots as a pillow, with one of her favorite new books by her side:

 

The humans had a lot of clean up to do this morning after that extravaganza, which we did quite happily!

And Katelyn is busy in the office preparing thank you notes for all of the generous friends of the chimpanzees. Luckily part-time office cat LouLou is honing her computer skills to lend Katelyn a hand.

So, if you get an email that says, “rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?????????????????????” from Katelyn, you’ll know why.

 

Thank you to everyone who made yesterday, today, and all of the days of 2017 so very wonderful for all of the primates at the sanctuary!