Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

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Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

5th Annual Love a Chimpanzee Day!

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Five years ago, our long time supporter, Monica Best, lovingly crowned April 23rd as “Love a Chimpanzee Day” and has sponsored this day for the chimpanzees every year since! And given the fact that today also happens to be Monica’s birthday, it’s even more incredible that she would create a special day in honor of the chimpanzees! In keeping with the celebration of some very special beings, Monica shared that she would also like today’s day of sanctuary to be in memory of her grandmother, Dorothy, and our dear friend, Dr. Mel Richardson.

Monica, thank you so much for honoring the chimpanzees in such a special way! May all the love and kindness you share with others come back to you tenfold. And from all of the primates here at CSNW, we wish you the happiest of birthdays! We hope your day is a Negra style celebration of life with a cozy nest to lounge and nap in, and good treats that make you food squeak.

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Happy Earth Day!

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One thing is for sure—the chimpanzees definitely don’t take their environment for granted. Here are some pictures that demonstrate how Missy is enjoying the spring weather these days!

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Fascinating Mouths

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Maybe it’s just me but I find chimpanzee mouths to be pretty captivating. Not only are they particularly expressive but they are also exceptionally useful. Chimpanzees have prehensile lips which Debbie described beautifully in this past blog post. That means that mouths are just as good, if not even better than, hands and fingers for tool use and object manipulation. In fact, it can be downright splendid to watch the chimpanzees use their lips with such precision and finesse whether it’s for exploration, grooming, play, or food related.

Here is Jamie using her mouth and teeth to help her get the trash can open:
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I found Annie’s mouth to be spectacularly expressive in this picture. Here she is the midst of a morning forage, searching for more fruit:
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Negra using her lips to carry as many orange peels as she can find:
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Here is Missy grooming herself by inspecting her own lip:
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Jody carrying off a bowl in her mouth while her hands are otherwise occupied with climbing:
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Foxie enjoying snow from a forage a while back. Maybe this helps to prevent brain freeze?
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And, here is Burrito, ever the charmer, with an invitation to play:
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Happy Easter!

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I will admit that we went a little over the top for today’s Easter party, but it just kind of happened. A couple of days ago we got a delivery of three (large!) boxes of Easter party supplies and favors from supporter Jayne R. It was everything we needed to throw the chimpanzees an amazing Easter party. And then this morning volunteer caregivers Stephanie and Patti showed up for their shift in the chimp house with their arms weighed down with piñatas, veggies, and other goodies. The chimps really do have the best friends, near and far.

We started the morning with a party in the greenhouse. The piñatas, as always, were a hit.

Annie:

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Missy:

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Jamie had to lie on her belly in the hammock to reach the piñata hanging underneath, but it was worth the effort:

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Negra loved the treat tubes and other enrichment that Jayne sent:

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Missy did, too:

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Burrito:

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Jody:

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Jamie:

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Foxie checked out the new goods:

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and found a new Dora the Explorer! Thanks, Jayne!

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Foxie took Dora for a stroll on Young’s Hill:

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Negra was more interested in the veggies we “planted” in the ground all over the hill:

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Jody harvested a carrot from the treat rock:

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and another:

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Her arms were so full that she had trouble managing her haul, and had to stop every few feet to regroup:

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But she worked it out:

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Thanks again to Jayne, Patti, and Steph. Happy Easter, everyone!

Whole apple forage

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Jamie really cleaned up in today’s breakfast forage. We put out whole apples and she was absolutely beside herself—carrying them around in hand and in foot. Thankfully the other chimps were able to get some as well—I posted photos of Annie, Burrito, and Missy on their Facebook pages. I saw Foxie and Jody with some too but couldn’t get a good photo. And Negra? Well, she was preoccupied with the peanuts that were scattered around. Not surprising at all 🙂

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How Apps for Apes helps conservation

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In his first post, Rich Zimmerman introduced us to the plight of free-living orangutans in Indonesia. Here he tells us how his program, Orangutan Outreach, has helped with some of the issues orangutans face and how Apps for Apes helps raise awareness for those efforts.

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How has your work with Orangutan Outreach influenced conservation efforts in Indonesia?

Since its inception, Orangutan Outreach has been able to make a notable impact in the ongoing struggle to save the orangutans. Over the past few years we’ve been able to make substantial financial contributions to our strategic partners in the field, including Borneo Orangutan Survival (BOS), IAR, Center for Orangutan Protection (COP) and SOCP. These funds go to rescuing, caring for, relocating, rehabilitating, and releasing individual orangutans back to the forest in Borneo and Sumatra. Working with our partners in the field, we’ve helped fund the rescue of individuals who, without our help, would otherwise have perished or been smuggled out of Indonesia by illegal animal traders. Our support has contributed immensely to the success of the BOS Nyaru Menteng orangutan releases. This release program is the first of its kind in history. BOS is literally re-creating a genetically stable population of orangutans in the wild and we are honored to be able to help them.

In addition to the work on the ground, Orangutan Outreach does a lot of online advocacy on behalf of the orangutans via our website, and our social media networks: Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and YouTube. We’ve been able to bring people together from all over and create hubs of support among our fans and followers.

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Rich helping to educate the public about the plight of orangutans. Photo © Orangutan Outreach.

Tell us a little bit about the Apps for Apes program and how this helps both captive and wild orangutans.

Apps for Apes was started a few years ago as a way to provide enrichment to orangutans in zoos and sanctuaries—and has now expanded to include chimpanzees! Apes are highly intelligent creatures who require mental stimulation to keep from growing bored and depressed. Every ape is a unique individual with his or her own particular likes and dislikes, and the quality of life of apes living in zoos and sanctuaries is highly dependent on the amount and type of enrichment they receive on a daily basis. With the Apps for Apes project, we are providing iPads to ape caregivers in order to provide them with unlimited enrichment opportunities. They have access to music, musical instruments, cognitive games, art, painting, drawing, photos and videos. I should also point out that we do not spend a penny on Apps for Apes. All iPads are donated. NatGeo gave us several dozen last year when they upgraded their field staff!

Apps for Apes has three goals: 1) to provide stimulating enrichment & immediate gratification for the apes using iPads, 2) to raise awareness among zoo visitors of the critical need to protect orangutans in the wild, and 3) to promote the conservation efforts of Orangutan Outreach. For Apps for Apes to be truly successful we need to achieve ALL the goals. It’s wonderful to provide something fun for a captive ape, but we want to take it further. We want the iPad enrichment sessions to become ‘teachable moments’. Whether via live caregiver talks or stories on the news, we have a golden opportunity to get people to think about orangutans—to see them as amazing, intelligent beings who are being brutally killed in the wild—and to help them! That’s our larger goal of Apps for Apes—for the apes in captivity to truly become ambassadors for their cousins in the wild.

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Puppe and her son Budi at the Toronto Zoo with their keeper Matthew Berridge.  Photos © Tom Pandi for Orangutan Outreach.

What can we do at home to help with conservation efforts?

People should try their best to avoid products that contain palm oil—and spread the word to all their friends. While boycotting all products that contain palm oil is not feasible, one can always make choices in what they buy. Consumers have power. By letting companies know you won’t buy products that contribute to the destruction of orangutan habitat you are making a powerful statement! Hopefully soon—but only with outside pressure from environmental groups—there will be products that only contain palm oil that is certifiably sustainable and that has not led to the deteriorating population of orangutans. Until then, use extreme caution when shopping, and read those labels!

A really fun way for people to get involved with orangutan conservation is by adopting an orangutan on our website. The adoptions are virtual—the orangutans stay at the care center (Believe me… people ask!). Adopting an orangutan is a great way for someone to follow along as their adoptee grows up. Donations are critical to keep the projects going, but spreading awareness is also key. People can’t act if they don’t know what’s happening far away in Borneo and Sumatra. We need people to share our website with their friends, join us on Facebook and spread the word. We have lots of online materials for young people to use in school. We cannot save the orangutans alone—only together can we make a difference!

CSNW was fortunate enough to be included in the Apps for Apes program and very much appreciate the iPad we received. Since then, we also got one from Shari H. so now the chimpanzees have two iPads! Now one person can keep Jamie occupied and someone else can play with the other chimps—perfect! Here’s a video of the chimps with their iPads: