Just like humans, chimpanzees have a variety of decibels in which they vocalize, though when they are loud, they are LOUD.
chimpanzee rescue
The Perks of Be(friend)ing a Wallflower
Not all of the chimps like to be in front of the camera lens equally. Lucky and Willy B, for example, will scooch right up to you and your electronic device with gusto. Others prefer to nonchalantly observe the photographer from an intermediate distance, and a few chimps will even try to sternly poke the camera lens when they’re not in the mood for a portrait session.
Then, there’s Gordo.
Lately, I’ve been making a conscious effort to get portraits of the individuals who spend less time in the spotlight, and Gordo has been the most challenging of that bunch.
Gordo is a wallflower. Despite getting along with chimpanzee companions and human caregivers alike, he exhibits some introverted tendencies. It seems like his ideal afternoon would probably be spent lounging quietly on a lofted platform with an enrichment puzzle in his hands, avoiding drama and staying out of the limelight. This makes him one of the more difficult chimpanzees to photograph.
A couple weeks ago, I saw Gordo laying among his group-mates in the indoor front rooms. Everyone was avidly grooming each other, as they tend to do in the downtime that follows breakfast. Gordo was serenely looking down the hallway, clasping his feet and soaking up the warmth from the heated floors, and we eventually made eye contact. I nodded reassuringly, and he kept staring back. I slowly reached for the camera hanging around my neck and raised it up to eye level as if to ask “can I take your picture?”
Gordo coolly remained where he was and allowed me to approach. I gently knelt in by the caging, brought the viewfinder up to my right eye, and turned the focus ring until Gordo’s auburn eyes and platinum goatee were visible in sharp detail. After I got a couple good shots, I put the camera down and simply sat in Gordo’s proximity for a little bit, enjoying the moment. It wasn’t the fervent grooming or exuberant play that we associate with the sanctuary’s more extroverted residents, but his acceptance made my day nonetheless.
Dinner Nook
We’ve been exploring some pretty big topics lately. Earlier this week I emailed the link to those who registered for the recorded discussion with Jen Feuerstein on introductions/merging groups of chimpanzees, and yesterday J.B. shared his thoughts on the difficult topic of chimpanzee medical procedures.
As a departure from those deep dives into some of the bigger challenges of caring for chimpanzees in captivity, today’s blog post is just a little story from today’s day of sanctuary.
Many of the chimpanzees have favorite dining spots, places where they take their food to enjoy at their leisure. In the greenhouse, Jamie makes a a dining nook out of the smallest and highest windowsill between the greenhouse and the playroom. When I was spot-cleaning the playroom tonight, I found Jamie happily eating dinner in her nook. Though it’s not the easiest place to get to from the ground level where Sofía had served the chimps, Jamie had managed to bring the haul of food to the sill.
One huge advantage that Jamie has being the boss of her group is that she can temporarily abandon her food and generally remain confident that no one will take it. Actually, a lot of conflicts start in her group when someone else attempts to take food that Jamie has either been given directly or that she has decided belongs to her. To Jamie, taking food is a very big misstep that requires an immediate and dramatic reaction, even if, in all fairness, it was not clear that the food was hers. If you live with Jamie, it’s safest to assume everything belongs to her and proceed with caution if you see food that appears to be available for the taking.
Tonight, while in her nook, Jamie spotted a piece of beet on the lower platform, so she left her dinner behind to retrieve it. No one came near her food or the beet that she had claimed.
So she was free to get the bonus beet and traverse back to her nook to finish dining.
As I was closing up for the day, Jamie was motioning urgently to get my attention. When she had effectively secured by gaze, she gestured again and then ran into the greenhouse. I had already locked the human door that gave me access to the outside, but she was very insistent, so I unlocked. I expected that she wanted me to deliver her some snow, but as soon as I entered the human portion of the greenhouse, I saw that there were two pieces of rutabaga on the human side of the mesh outside of her reach. I picked them up and gave them to her, and she rewarded my obedience with a very happy moan before climbing back up to her nook with her second helping.
We Meet Again
There were a lot of familiar meetings today.
First, Honey B and Lucky had a meeting with each other. Though things started off slow when they came together, they did eventually did start playing.
As some of you know, Honey B can be dialed to 11 when she plays, Lucky is usually at a 7 on a good day.
All-in-all, their meeting was pretty positive and they seemed to enjoy each others company.
On the other side of the building, the weather finally provided us a break to be able to shovel parts of Young’s Hill. After a few hours of digging out Young’s Hill from the Snowmageddon snowfall by Sam, Anna, Diana, and J.B., Jamie and her group were finally able to go out onto Young’s Hill!
Here are some bonus photos from the day:
Perspective
I didn’t have a blog post planned for today. Sometimes when I’m in this blank-slate situation, I look back on the blog at previous years of the same date to see what was happening in the hopes of inspiring an idea.
I chose January 15, 2019 to find out what was up. It was a literal walk down memory lane. Then staff caregiver/now volunteer caregiver Elizabeth gave an immersive behind-the-scenes view into what a morning was like at the sanctuary. The post featured then staff caregiver/now Chimp House Manager Anna with a supporting role from then intern/now Veterinary Assistant Sofía.
Elizabeth described the medical clinic trailer, explaining that it would soon be replaced by the stationary clinic that was a big part of the first phase of the expansion at the sanctuary.
Some things haven’t changed a bit from that post three years ago. Like then, the first thing the lead caregiver does is greet the chimps and work through a brief checklist while breakfast is being prepared. Negra can still almost always be found huddled under a pile of blankets.
Some things have changed a lot, though.
Burrito no longer displays every morning, but that’s not to say that he’s completely mellowed out. Today we witnessed a conflict where he swung and ran throughout his side of the building and chased after Foxie with an impressive amount of agility, determination, and energy (conflicts are a part of chimp life and everyone is fine).
The biggest change, of course, is the number of chimpanzees in this house.
Mave, Willy B, and Honey B arrived in August, five months after that 2019 blog post was written, and Lucky, Cy, Gordo, Rayne, Dora and Terry arrived in June 2021, almost seven months ago from today.
The building has expanded accordingly, with many more spaces for the new chimpanzees to enjoy and for the humans to clean up every day after they’ve been thoroughly enjoyed.
The new playrooms and greenhouses really are chimpanzee playgrounds, but it is quite challenging to get good photos of the chimps immersed in them.
Chimpanzees appreciate being up high, and their spaces were built with that in mind. Rayne in particular spends a lot of her time on the “leaves” of the artificial trees in the playroom.
Dora and Rayne were high up grooming on one of the leaves this afternoon. Normally, I would delete photos like the ones below, but I’m presenting them to show how difficult it is to get good photos of the chimps in these enriching spots.
Meanwhile, Honey B was inviting me to a game of chase in her greenhouse, where, despite the feet of snow outside, the grass and bamboo are still green.
I had to physically count on my fingers to verify that 2019 was just three years ago and to take a moment to appreciate all that supporters of Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest have made possible. I’m in awe.
Included in this post is the featured (top) photo of Honey B that I also took today to demonstrate that the camera and the camera person is capable of taking a decent photo.
If the chimpanzees choose to be in private spots of their home that we can’t quite reach with our cameras, that’s okay with us. We can all be certain, even without frequent photographic evidence, that they value every aspect of their home that’s been carefully designed and built to chimpanzee specification.
Let’s Talk About Enrichment
Taking care of chimpanzees is more than cleaning enclosures and serving them meals. There’s a lot more that goes into it. We also ensure the chimpanzees are well mentally. This is usually through the form of enrichment. Enrichment is a way to provide mental stimulation and promote natural behaviors. In layman’s terms, enrichment is a way to try to curb boredom. When animals become bored, some abnormal or stressed-related behaviors can start to develop.
Here, we try very hard to keep all 16 residents enriched to the best of our abilities. But what does that look like? Traditionally in the animal care field, enrichment comes in a few staple categories:
- Cognitive
- Physical Habitat
- Social
- Food
- Sensory
Cognitive enrichment is the form of enrichment you have seen here many times. These are the food puzzles the chimpanzees get throughout the day. These are the toys some interact with. This is a way for the chimpanzees problem solve and give them a level of control of their environment. With the food puzzles, its a way to problem solve a situation in order to achieve the reward.
Physical Habitat is the how the enclosure is set up. Not only should an enclosure probably look visible appealing for the chimpanzees, but it should be functional as well. Young’s Hill has a plethora of structures the chimpanzees can climb, swing, and sit on to look out on to the surrounding areas. In the indoor enclosures, firehose is a great addition to their physical habitat.
In the two new playrooms and greenhouses currently occupied by Willy B’s group and Cy’s group, there are two artificial trees the chimpanzees can climb up and relax on their platforms.
Social enrichment is the relationship the chimpanzees have with others, chimpanzees and humans. It can be enriching to interact with a chimpanzee from another group, even if it is just through the window.
As you know, we have been in the process of integrating Cy and Willy B’s group into one. Though these times can be stressful, seeing some of the chimpanzees come together and form bonds is the most heartwarming feeling a caregiver can get.
Food can be exciting and enriching, but food on it’s own is just something you eat to satisfy an empty belly. What can make food more enriching is introducing new foods or presenting it in new ways. We are continuously trying to find new foods to introduce to the chimpanzees. We also try to present the food in different ways. Besides hand serving we also set up forages. Typically when the weather is nice, we set up forages on Young’s Hill. This promotes a chimpanzee’s natural behavior to move around and search for their food.
Another type of forage presented in an exciting way is the parties we throw.
Sensory enrichment includes those which allow the chimpanzees to utilize their sense of touch, smell, auditory, and vision. We try to provide them with novel ways to utilize these senses.
As some know, Willy B loves screen time. This is one way we provide him with both a visual and auditory enrichment.
Is everything we do a hit? No. Is what is good for one group good for the other? No. Do we continuously try to find ways to ensure every chimpanzee is enriched based on their personal preference and likes? Absolutely! Though this can be a very challenging task to cater enrichment for 16 very different personalities and likes, it is absolutely worth it. It is part of the job I personally love.
Here are some bonus photos I took of Rayne today:
And Dora!
What Now?
Here’s something positive – the chimpanzees are really enjoying the snow snacks that are the result of Snowmageddon 2022!
I tried to get some good photos, but when photo opportunities presented themselves, the chimps were in motion and I only had a cell phone on me. so I only captured the cover photo of this blog post, this blurry image of Foxie who had just retrieved a mouthful of snow from her front rooms and was headed up to the loft in her playroom:
and Gordo who had brought snow from his playroom to the front rooms on that side of the building. He deposited the snow on the floor, and left a bit for Cy to enjoy (see main photo above).
I can’t say that the humans are enjoying the snow quite as much as the chimpanzees right now. Though the last few days have been an adventure, and we’ve certainly laughed a lot, it’s proving to be a logistical challenge to figure out where, exactly, to put all of this stuff. More looms above on the roof, not-so-subtly threatening to upend the progress we’ve made.
Look at the form on Kelsi. Is shoveling an Olympic event? I give her 10/10.
Young’s Hill is inaccessible for a few reasons: 1) there’s so much snow everywhere! The chimps would be chest deep in it, so they have to wait until we can get in there to create a pathway for them. 2) we haven’t yet been able to shovel a pathway for ourselves to the door that opens onto the hill, even if we could let the chimps out. 3) the snow is weighing down the electric fence wires, weakening the system.
More good news, though: we are fully prepared for winter storms. Though it will be a bit before full outdoor access is possible, all of the chimpanzees have lots of indoor space, blankets, toys, food puzzles, movies, and humans plus their partners who drive through the biggest snowstorm in decades to help the onsite staff take care of them.
In addition to all that, they have their indoor/outdoor greenhouses! I’m kicking myself for not getting photos yesterday of the chimpanzees in the new greenhouses (I did get a little video clip of Mave that I posted to our Instagram). We have a new heater that we turned on for an hour or so yesterday, and then the sun kept those tall enclosures warm for the rest of the day. I cleaned the greenhouses this morning and can attest to the fact that they were well used the day before.
All sixteen of the chimpanzees here are the product of very unfortunate circumstances. They shouldn’t be in Cle Elum, Washington. They shouldn’t have been used in medical research. They shouldn’t be in captivity at all. However, given their unfortunate histories, they are extremely fortunate chimpanzees now. And all of us are immensely fortunate to know them.
Even though I can’t shake the feeling that the snow lurking out every window and door is taunting me in some way…
I know it will not last forever. Spring will come, sure as it does every year. We have so much to look forward to as we hunker down and appreciate everything we have, including unlimited snow snacking.
