Chimpanzees definitely don’t make good pets, but troll dolls do!
Animal Welfare
Greeting
Chimpanzees give each other really sweet greetings after they’ve been separated for some amount of time. Jody spent all afternoon on the hill yesterday by herself, and when she started heading back Annie was getting pretty excited. I didn’t catch a very long video, but I did get a quick snippet of Annie’s sweet greeting with Jody. I wanted to include some explanations of Annie’s greeting behaviors, so you may have to watch the video twice!
Typically less-dominant individuals greet more-dominant members of a group. Although Jody isn’t the leader, she is more dominant than Annie (although Annie is definitely asserting herself and has much more confidence these days than she did when they first arrived). In the video, you’ll see Annie bipedally (up on her feet) swagger with her hair standing on end (pilo erect). These behaviors are indicative of a high arousal state, basically meaning she’s excited. Then you’ll see her crouch down and run toward Jody. The crouching down is a sign of submission, and it shows Annie’s respect for Jody. When she contacts Jody she gives her a hug and simultaneously offers an open mouth kiss (it’s hard to see, but that is what she’s doing!) And finally as they head back into the greenhouse together, Annie dabs Jody’s back.
Even though this all occurred in just 15 seconds or so, there’s a lot of communication going on! Chimpanzees are really amazing and complex beings.
Peek-a-boo
Hill grass
Grass has always been a favorite treat for the Cle Elum Seven, so it’s been interesting to watch their reactions to the grass on Young’s Hill.
Annie loves to eat grass, but seems very uncomfortable walking on it. I’ve been referring to her as our resident gibbon- she walks bipedally and holds her hands out a bit from her sides and her gait is almost more of a waddle than a walk. I can’t say exactly why she does this, but I’m sure it feels strange to walk barefoot on grass after years and years of nothing but concrete.
Jamie, on the other hand, is a natural out there.
And how fun is it to harvest your own treat!?
Missy and Jody:
Missy:
Jamie:
Most Vigilant Person
I am officially giving the MVP award to Foxie, who has been making it farther and farther everyday on Young’s Hill. She’s gotten some encouragement and motivation from her friends, but today I put out some pieces of pineapple as a forage, and that seemed to be enough incentive for her to make it almost twice as far as she’s gone in the last few weeks! She made it almost all the way to the first platform. Yay, Foxie!
Cirque du Soleil at CSNW
Foxie is our resident acrobat here at the sanctuary. She’s always hanging upside down or doing pirouettes, and loves to engage us in active games where she will do all sorts of different gymnastics. Jamie, as many of our regular blog readers know, is the resident trickster—it’s appropriate that her birthday is on Halloween (just a couple weeks away!)
Watch Foxie being a goof and wait for Jamie to interrupt…
Back to the basics
As exciting as all these posts are about the hill, since not everyone is going out on the hill all the time, it’s resulted in some blog posting-neglect of certain folks. So here’s a photo I took of adorable Burrito this afternoon hanging out in the greenhouse, just like “the old days”. He and Negra are definitely creatures of habit.
