Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

chimpanzee retirement

For Patti Sims and Anne Roberson

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Mary Ann Baltich has sponsored today in honor of Anne Roberson and Patti Sims.  Anne and Patti are coworkers and friends who are both longtime supporters of the chimpanzees, and this year they started volunteering together at the sanctuary.  Mary Ann said, “Thanksgiving seems like an appropriate time to thank them for all the work they do and support they provide!”

We’re thankful today for Mary Ann’s generosity, and for all the love and support Anne and Patti have shared with us and with the Cle Elum Seven!

Take Action Tuesday: Decision in Las Vegas tomorrow

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Recently, Converse shoes had a poster in the UK subways featuring a fear-grimacing chimpanzee. After hearing from concerned advocates, they pulled the ads! And, they agreed to never use primates in promotions again. This great news demonstrates that letter writing really is very powerful, and every letter counts.

Since your letters make a difference for our chimpanzee friends, please take a minute to write a letter to the Clark County commissioners to urge them to deny Mike Casey’s permit application to continue to house his chimps in a residential neighborhood in Las Vegas. If you have already written a letter, please share the alert! You can use the sample letter as an example, or use your own words. Be sure to emphasize that this is not only a public safety concern, but it also the right thing to do. Chimpanzees don’t belong in back yards, at birthday parties, at car dealer openings, or on film sets. Captive chimpanzees suffer in these situations, and they belong in sanctuaries that can meet their needs. They get better when they get to a sanctuary (see Jamie below for proof of that). There is sanctuary space available for these chimps.

Here are just two examples of the way chimpanzees are affected by being in Mike Casey’s life:

  • Travis, born at Mike Casey’s former facility in Missouri and sold as a “pet” to a woman in suburban Connecticut, escaped from his owner, mauled a woman, and died after being stabbed by his owner with a butcher knife and then shot by police.
  • A trainer hit a chimpanzee on the German set of the movie Speed Racer (a production for which Mike Casey’s company was responsible) in front of an “animal welfare” monitor. You can read the full review at AHAfilm.org (and look for ratings and reviews – they don’t make it easy to link to specific reviews!).

The hearing is tomorrow – so don’t wait, write your letter today!

And for a reminder of what sanctuary can do, take Jamie (a former “entertainer”). Here she was in June 2008, shortly after her arrival:

Jamie

And here she is now:

Speak up on behalf of Jamie and all the chimpanzees out there who still need our help.

First snow

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Today is the first truly snowy day of the season.  This morning, as we were getting ready to let the chimpanzees out onto Young’s Hill, Jody gazed out the window longingly while food grunting (snow is a delicacy for the Cle Elum Seven).  Nobody has ventured too far outside yet – I guess even delicious snow isn’t worth freezing feet – but they’ve been spending the morning standing at the door to Young’s Hill and reaching outside for a handful to enjoy in the relative warmth of the greenhouse.

Annie:

Jamie:

Missy:

Foxie mid-yawn

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I guess yesterday’s Jamie-ween party was just so exhausting, Foxie couldn’t help but take a big yawn. Here she is holding the Dora doll donated by Bailey as mentioned in yesterday’s blog.

Take Action Tuesday: Washoe and captive chimps

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Today marks five years since Washoe, the first nonhuman to use a human language, passed away in Ellensburg (just 25 minutes from Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest where the Cle Elum Seven live). Like Negra, Annie, and possibly Jody, Washoe was captured from Africa. She was supposed to be used in the space program, but when that didn’t work out, she was instead the center of a language project. Now we know that captivity is never a good place for chimpanzees. When Washoe became too strong to handle, she had to live in a cage for the rest of her years. Sadly, that is the fate of any captive chimpanzee—those living as pets or used in entertainment will eventually have to be imprisoned for a crime they didn’t commit because they simply are not meant to live in a human world. Biomedical chimpanzees are already in cages, some no bigger than a coat closet.

I first started working with Washoe and her family in 2005 as a college student. She taught me humility and to take everyone on their own terms, and she blurred the line between animals and humans. The way I see the world and my place in it has definitely changed forever—it was because of her that I realized how amazing these beings are and became a chimpanzee advocate. I met the Cle Elum Seven shortly after they came to CSNW in 2008, and was moved at how resilient and forgiving they were after everything they’ve been through. Annie, Burrito, Foxie, Jamie, Jody, Missy, and Negra have been an inspiration. They have been through so much, yet they still find time to laugh and play. They can finally walk outside with sun overhead and grass under their feet—something we definitely take for granted. I can’t imagine living my entire life inside bars and I am so proud of the Cle Elum Seven for how brave they have become in the last four years. I know it is our duty to give them and all other captive chimps a good life. We took them from their natural and rightful environment from the forests of Africa, stuck them in cages, bred them, and exploited them for a cheap laugh or invasive research, all without regard to how they are just like you or me. They are beings who deserve to be taken on their terms, treated as equals—not forced to perform on TV or be injected with viruses because of humans believing they are superior.

Let’s speak up for captive chimps. Let’s release them from biomedical research. Let’s get companies and productions to stop using chimpanzees in their advertisements or movies. Since we can never return them to Africa, let’s at least give them a better life in a sanctuary where they can be taken on their terms, treated not as lesser beings but where their needs are of the utmost importance.

Help 100 chimpanzees get to a sanctuary by signing this petition—we need 1,250 more signatures to reach our goal of 5000! Write a letter to this TV show that teaches kids it’s OK to have a pet chimp. And don’t forget to join our Take Action: Eyes on Apes list to stay up-to-date on issues and action alerts!

 

Negra approaches her cabin

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As J.B. mentioned in yesterday’s blog, Jackie and I caught Negra approaching her new cabin. Unfortunately I didn’t have our camera on me and didn’t want to miss the shot—so this was taken on my phone. I apologize that it is not the best quality and the chimps are pretty small. But, it is super awesome to see Negra sizing up her cabin and getting reassurance from Foxie and Jody. At one point all seven chimps were in the shot. I thought that was also super awesome so I took a screen shot and labeled all the chimps so you can see them all at once.

I can’t wait until Negra makes it all the way inside the cabin!

 

The Lone Ranger

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It seems like just yesterday that Young’s Hill was only weeks old and many of the chimpanzees were still finding their own comfort level with the wide open spaces. Missy and Jamie took to the hill right away, but everyone else took their time getting adjusted. In the beginning, Annie would sit in the greenhouse and anxiously bounce her feet while waiting for her best friend Missy to return from her adventures outside. After awhile, Annie would venture out with Missy (and only with Missy) but wouldn’t leave Missy’s side. I remember one day early on when Annie and Missy had walked about a third of the way up the hill and were foraging in a patch of grass near a climbing structure. After awhile Missy started to head down the hill toward the greenhouse, but Annie was so immersed in her foraging that she didn’t notice. When she finally looked up and realized she had been left behind, she hightailed it down the hill toward the building, running faster than I had ever seen her move.

But it seems all she needed was a little time, because these days we spot Annie spending a considerable amount of solo time on the hill. In fact, she looks like she belongs out there.