Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Today in honor of Pam Lehnert

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Happy day, Pam! Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest celebrates you today, thanks to your friend Jill. The humans and chimpanzees appreciate everything you do for them every day!

Blog readers and event-goers should remember Pam for her ability to transform a space into something spectacular – she’s done it for our auction 2 years in a row now. In addition to her beyond-creative event set-up, she helped with procurement, organizing all of the donor files, writing and editing parts of the catalog, and just about every aspect of the auction. That $100,000 would not have been a reality without her help. So, thank you, Pam and a big, big Happy Birthday to you.

I know Pam admires Jody’s ability to relax, so here’s a photo of Jody in one of her “yoga poses:”

Jody doing "yoga"

Anyone can honor a loved one! Visit the Sponsor-a-Day section of our donation info page.

The first bamboo

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Here are some photos of the first planted bamboo grove on Young’s Hill.

The view looking down the hill toward the chimp house:

The view looking up the hill away from the chimp house:

The bamboo will allow the chimps to hide pretty well. Here’s the perspective of a hypothetical chimp who may want to spy on the chimp house without being seen:

Nest grunts

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Recently there was a discussion on our Facebook page about Nest Grunts. When the chimps are getting settled into their nests at night they will often make a hoohuhhoohuh sound which is called a nest grunt. Chimps in the wild will often make these vocalizations to check in with each other before bedtime. We’ve been trying to catch the vocalization on tape for the blog for some time now, and we were finally successful! It’s definitely one of my favorite times of the night.

In the comfort of your own home

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It may be sunny and beautiful right now, but this morning was very chilly and gray. It was definitely one of those mornings where all you want to do is curl up on the couch with your favorite blanket and watch a movie. So, it was no surprise when Missy decided to skip breakfast and stayed in her giant nest in the playroom. I certainly don’t blame her, but that meant cleaning the playroom was slightly delayed. Being behind in our routine did not stop the chimps from being adorably distracting. Jamie was looking quite bored, so I poured a little bit of (non-toxic) soapy water on the floor in one of the front rooms and gave her a couple of brushes. She cleaned a very large portion of the room and worked on it for nearly an hour (am I losing job security?). As if that wasn’t cute enough, Burrito spent some quality time with blankets today, which is something that we just don’t see from him very often.

The first blanket I saw him “cuddling” with is one that has a skull and crossbones on it 🙂

Then, Missy distracted him with a playful game of chase. He later returned to the same spot with a different blanket:

And then it got chilly, so he moved into the front rooms. I would say it was a very good morning to curl up with a blanket!