I just found out we were nominated for Pawcurious’ 2010 Brodies for excellence in pet blogging. We were nominated for the best animal blog (non-cat/dog). Thanks for the nomination! Now the judges are going to select a smaller group of finalists. There are some really great blogs on the list! Check them out on the Pawcurious site.
Animal Welfare
Boys will be boys
The other day, Burrito and JB had a marathon play session. Tug of war is one of Burrito’s favorite games, and you’ll notice a lot of it in the video below. Of course, tug of war between chimps and humans is no real competition at all. Burrito has to play down his superior strength to accommodate our relative physical weakness (and we have to be prepared to let go at any time so we don’t get pulled into the caging!).
Negra’s son Noah
CSNW supporter Jennifer Douglas and her husband James are sponsoring the migration of Noah on behalf of his mother Negra. Check out the photo of Noah below – he looks so much like his mom!!
Noah currently lives at the Save the Chimps facility in New Mexico which was formerly owned by the Coulston Foundation – a notoriously horrid research facility that closed down when Save the Chimps stepped in to rescue the chimpanzees. Like all of the chimpanzees at the former Coulston Foundation laboratory, Noah will be making the journey to Florida where he will live on an island with a large group of chimpanzees. We’re so pleased that Jennifer and James and so many of you are reaching out to help the relatives of the Cle Elum Seven in other sanctuaries.
Thanks to Candy Crannell for alerting us that Noah is now on the Save the Chimps website, and for sponsoring the migration of Foxie’s daughter Angie (who also looks remarkably like her mother). Also check out Negra’s daughter Angel from this previous post. Many of the sons and daughters of the Cle Elum Seven are now at Save the Chimps, so more on relatives soon!
Negra thanks you
Below is the photo of Negra taken on the first day she was in sanctuary and a photo taken just an hour ago. Negra continues to change. She’s been very playful and more active this winter than last. She still avoids conflict and likes to have blankets over her head. She has her favorite foods. And she still loves to see humans dance for her.
Negra’s continued signs of contentment are all because of the support that we have had from so many. Without individual donations, the sanctuary and the quality care that we provide would still be a figment of our imaginations. So much has happened in such a short amount of time, thanks to you all!
Today I wanted to say a special birthday thanks from Negra to a couple of people who are helping to get the stories of the Cle Elum Seven out into the world. Kathy Cochran, whose birthday is today and Margaret Parkinson, who celebrated her birthday on December 31st. These two remarkable ladies collaborated to create the book, Sanctuary: Year One that we have for sale in our online store. Thank you both and happy birthdays!
Negra on her first day at the sanctuary, after living in laboratories for decades
Negra tonight, finishing up the seeds from her night bag
B-day
I think it’s safe to say that Burrito has had a pretty terrific birthday. Since the guy is all about food, we decided to make his day all about food, too. At 8:30 I invited the chimps into the front rooms for breakfast. Everyone came in (though Jamie almost decided against it — she was enjoying watching the greenhouse construction outside from a window in the playroom loft), so volunteer Denice served a tasty breakfast while I started the playroom clean-up. After breakfast, Denice joined me in the playroom to finish up cleaning. By about 10:45, the playroom was clean and blankets, birthday presents from Cle Elum Seven friend Robbi, and a forage of fruit, nuts, and Cheerio necklaces were set out.
While the chimps enjoyed the treats in the playroom, we cleaned the front rooms, and then the real fun began. Today we did away with our usual three-meal-a-day schedule in favor of frequent snacks, so that Burrito could enjoy his favorite time of day (mealtime!) all day long. He was pretty pleased with the idea, as you’ll see in this all-Burrito video (thanks so much to supporter and friend Tamela for the awesome new camera!).
Everyone’s excited about Burrito’s birthday
MailChimp changed their login page to wish Burrito a Happy Birthday! Check it out here.
We have cool new benefits for Chimpanzee Pal sponsors, so if you’d like to sponsor Burrito, like MailChimp does, learn more: https://chimpsnw.org/you_can_help/donate/#ChimpPal
We’ll post all about Burrito’s festivities soon. We decided to make his day all about food (of course!), and his friend Robbi brought some presents too.
Nesting, Nesting, Nesting…
Today, Jamie built herself yet another nest using a blanket and a box. This sparked a conversation between Diana and I about the similarities and differences of nesting behavior of captive vs. free-living chimpanzees. We couldn’t find many videos on the internet of free-living chimpanzees nesting, however, Jane Goodall’s Discover Chimpanzees Website has a behavior glossary, complete with video footage of the chimpanzees in Gombe engaging in a variety of behaviors, including this clip of nesting. If you compare the following video clips of Jody, Missy and Jamie (in order of appearance) to the video clip from the Discover Chimpanzees Website, you can see many similarities. Notice how the free-living chimpanzee (named Fifi) pulls the branches into her nest and pushes them down to make her bed more comfortable. It truly is an exact science.