Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

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book

Story Time with Rayne and Cy

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This morning, caregiver Kelsi and I took turns reading a dinosaur story to Rayne and Cy. Cy enjoyed listening to us butcher their scientific names, while Rayne seemed to enjoy the pop-up pictures. Afterwards, we let Rayne have the book (Cy didn’t seem that interested anyways) and she enjoyed flipping through it at her own pace. She really loves these types of books! Anytime we put them in the enclosures, she always ends up with it. They don’t last very long without getting ripped up, but it’s fun while it lasts.

Exciting news!

We’re excited to announce that we want you to help us choose the cover photo for our 2025 CSNW Calendar! You can vote once every 24-hours through the end of October, with the poll closing at 11:59pm PT on Jamie-ween!

I Love Lucy the Bonobo

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Jamie is a person of particular tastes. She knows what she likes, and what she likes she really likes. One item that she really likes is the book series of Lucy the Bonobo.

You may have seen these books in the blog, when we do a shameless plug for our Amazon wish list (which this is also a shameless plug and you’ll see why soon), social media, and other places.

If you have been following for the past year or two, then you might also know Cy is a literary lover. Cy, however, has more of a taste for celebrity gossip magazines. He is, however, not the only one in his group who likes to thumb through books and magazines.

I realized today we haven’t touched upon the other “reader” in the group other than maybe a casual mention here and there.

For a long while now, we knew Rayne tends to seek out the cardboard children’s books to flip through, though she does have a “eat after reading” mindset. Lately, however, we began putting some Lucy books in her group’s daily enrichment. Rayne has taken a liking to Lucy as well! We have been noticing her carrying around Lucy books a lot lately. Unlike the cardboard children’s book, she has not adhered to her “eat after reading” policy. She leaves them intact and holds onto them as long as possible. Even taking them out onto the Bray with her.

It was this morning when I saw her holding the previous days’ Lucy book close to her chest that sparked the inspiration for today’s blog.

She even kept one to take with her to her nest later on in the day.

Hopefully now you know why this blog is a shameless plug for our wish lists. With two Lucy fans, we are going to need to have a stockpile ready.

In fact, we might have three Lucy fans in our midst! Several times today, I have seen Lucky carrying one around!

Unfortunately for Lucky, every time I saw her flipping through one, Rayne would come by and take it from her sooner or later.

Only time will tell if Rayne’s Lucy fascination will stick and if Lucky will be able to showcase her admiration of Lucy more.

So please help us keep our stock plentiful if you can!

Bonus Photos

“Mavey see, Mavey do!” Today, Mora had a leg up, literally.

Okay. Okay. Okay. In reality, if anybody copied anybody here, it was Dora copying a Queen of Relaxation.

And of course, our very own handsomely lovable Teeny Tiny Terry!

Cy’s 33rd Birthday Celebration

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There’s a lot of love going out to Cy today on his 33rd birthday. Thank you to everyone who sponsored the day in his honor, made donations in his name, and purchased the limited edition Cy’s book club merchandise!

Today was also the first day of Daylight Savings Time. For CSNW, that means that, while we turn the clocks back like everyone else, we keep on the same actual time schedule for the chimp house. So, expect your blog posts an hour later than “usual” (or even later if I’m writing the blog, especially if it’s a party day).

If you haven’t already, please do think of Cy this evening and wish him a happy birthday in your heart. We don’t know what we’d do without him and his leadership over the sometimes rowdy group of nine!

 

the more you know

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Earlier this month, Anna revealed a half-sibling pair that we were not previously aware of (see this blog post for details if you missed it, but try to guess first just for fun).

Along with that information, we learned of the actual birthdays for Willy B and Mave!

It’s possible we could have had this information before, but their medical records did not include their dates of birth and I assumed they were unknown. So, I forged ahead and chose celebrated birthdays for Mave and Willy B, like we did for Negra, Jody, Jamie, and Annie, whose birthdays are unknown to us.

If you have a CSNW calendar, or have looked at their individual pages on our website, you might know that Willy B‘s celebrated birthday is coming up on March 1st. However, now we know that his actual date of birth is November 30th (1990).

We chose May 27th to celebrate Mave‘s birthday, but now we know that her actual birthday is September 25th (1989).

So, what are we to do for their celebrations this year?

It seemed only right that this year we celebrate both Willy B and Mave’s “calendar birthdays” as well as their real birthdays. No one is going to complain about two more parties, right?!

Speaking of parties and birthdays, don’t waste any more time if you haven’t yet purchased a limited-edition Cy’s Book Club t-shirt and/or tote bag in honor of Cy‘s birthday on March 12th

 

Below are some classic photos of these two birthday guys, but first, a very brief story from today. After morning cleaning, Cy was clearly looking for some “reading” material. I brought out a book for him. See photo below of the book’s cover:

I knew there was a risk that Cy would find something in the pages of the book that he found alarming. What I didn’t count on was that he would fixate on the smallest photos. The inside cover of the book features very small images of other books in the series (see below). While he looked closely at those small photos he frequently let out one of his unique “scary image alarm calls.”

Willy B and Rayne immediately came to his side. Based on their reactions, the other chimpanzees in his group are as perplexed as we humans are about Cy’s reaction to certain images, but it’s nice that they want to assist or just be near him when he’s alarm calling at an image in a magazine or book.

Willy B really seems to look up to Cy (we can understand why, propensity to overreact to images aside). Here are a few photos of the two of them together:

 

Chimpanzees who collect

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Personally, I’ve never been much of a collector. I am not very neat, but I do enjoy when my surroundings are clutter-free. There’s a particular joy I get out of getting rid of things and thereby decreasing rather than increasing my possessions. But I’m fascinated by collectors and those who clearly get a unique satisfaction in their things.

It’s all the more fascinating to care for two chimpanzee collectors. Foxie is pretty famous for her doll collection, and most people who have been tuning in to our blog for a while know that Jamie loves cowboy boots. You might have also learned that she can be pretty into books too; when the two combine – books about cowboy boots – well, that must be something akin to heaven for her.

For a couple of weeks now, she’s been carrying around a book called Texas Boots purchased by a Jamie-fan through our Amazon.com wish list.

To say that she loves this book might be an understatement or a mischaracterization. Maybe there’s a particular word that describes the feeling collectors have for their things that transcends mere everyday love.

One interesting aspect of both Jamie’s and Foxie’s collections and how they interact with their chosen objects is that they share them with the humans. Jamie wants the staff and volunteers to put on her most cherished boots. Foxie passes her dolls to trusted caregivers for safekeeping and games of toss.

And now Jamie slides her beloved books and magazines under the caging so that we can carry them with us while we follow her around the outdoor expanse of Young’s Hill on her walks or just back and forth through the building.

This is the new routine.

Earlier this week, she passed me the Texas Boots book after we had finished up a session of Positive Reinforcement Training. I expected that we would carry out our usual post-PRT routine and walk around the hill, but it was a little dreary outside. So, instead, I sat on the other side of the caging with Jamie in the greenhouse and turned the pages of the book for her to see. She would focus longer on the images of people wearing boots, and she would nod her head when I turned a page, which is generally Jamie-speak for, “yes, I like that.” After flipping through the book a couple of times, I offered to give it back to her, and she took it.

She tucked it under her arm and continued to sit on the other side of the caging. We sat in contented silence in each other’s company like that for about five minutes (which is a really long time for an active chimpanzee!), until she got up to go about other activities.

It was one of the finest moments I’ve ever had with another being of any kind.

Jamie certainly has a way of implanting the desire to find more things that she likes – to fill her life with these moments of satisfaction that I can’t say that I completely understand, but that I appreciate beyond words.

Her boots, all of them donated to her, have been outgrowing their plastic bins for a while now, and it just so happened that the boot closet we were using for staff cleaning boots was emptied now that we have more space in Phase 1 of the expansion. So, I had the idea that we should put Jamie’s boots and other sundry things in that closet.

It’s in the perfect location because Jamie can see it from the playroom loft.

I had moved Jamie’s things into the closet when Anna was on vacation last week. Anna returned on Tuesday, and Jamie wasted no time in pointing out to Anna this exciting new home for her personal treasures. In case you too want to add to Jamie’s collection, I’ve added some more books to our wish list. When we receive items, we will put them in her closet so she can point them out for us to get for her.

In case you are worried that the other chimpanzees feel left out, I think they are just as mystified by Jamie’s attraction to certain objects as I am. Once in a while, I see Missy flipping through a book, and I even gave one to Burrito last week, which he unceremoniously tossed to the ground and walked away.

I guess you have to be a collector to get it.