Jody and Missy were having a rousing wrestling match this morning when a third party insisted on being included in the game. Missy is a popular chimp friend to have!
chimpanzee sanctuary
Facial Expressions
Just like humans, chimpanzees use a wide variety of facial expressions to display their emotions. Since we often think of chimps as so similar to humans, you can see how easy it might be for newcomers to chimpanzee behavior to misinterpret some of the photos they might see out there of chimps seemingly grinning happily for the photographer. Here’s a little tour of some chimpanzee facial expressions we see on a daily basis and the meanings behind them.
A typical relaxed face, as demonstrated by Negra:
Jody has the best relaxed face, drooped lip expressions:
Here’s Burrito’s sneer face. In this case he seems to be uncomfortable with the long grass poking him in the face or the prickly vegetation underfoot:
Negra’s pout face. She often pouts when she is uneasy in a situation or she is trying to assert her dominance and take something from another chimpanzee. One way or another, she usually receives a lot of reassurance from her friends when she is pouting and whimpering:
Here are two happy chimpanzees (Missy and Annie) displaying giant play faces. Notice how their top lips cover their top teeth and their bottom teeth are exposed. This is how you smile like a chimpanzee!
Now compare those happy smiles to these full open grin fear grimaces that Annie and Jamie are showing here. I can almost hear them screaming at each other (maybe over a food disagreement?).:
Needless to say, they aren’t happy in this photo. We’ve probably all seen photos of young chimps dressed up in costumes and posing on the cover of greeting cards or in commercials with similar fearful expressions as Annie and Jamie. To learn more about how you can advocate on the behalf of these chimpanzees, follow this link and thank you for taking the time to share your knowledge with others.
In memory of Ron and Betty Kreushcher
A day of sanctuary was sponsored by Ronalyn Huenergard who shared this note about her gift:
“This donation is in memory of my parents, Ron and Betty Kreuscher on their wedding anniversary, They were very proud of their 3 children, 8 grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren.”
Ronalyn, thank you so much for giving us the opportunity to share in your special memories of your parents and for making a difference in the chimpanzees’ lives as you honor Ron and Betty. We so appreciate you thinking of the chimps in this way. We’re wishing you and your family a day filled with joyful and comforting memories.
A Burrito and Jody classic:
How’s your chimp ID?
One of the first things new chimp house volunteers start learning is how to identify each of the chimpanzees. When you’re meeting a group of chimps for the first time (or the first ten times), they can often look frustratingly similar to one another. Eventually, of course, they start to look like individuals and you wonder how you could ever have mixed them up. But there’s a definite learning curve.
It helps to be able to spend some time just staring at each chimpanzee, so I just made these videos for our volunteers, in which you can see each of the seven chimpanzees from every angle, just being themselves. I thought some of our blog followers might appreciate them also. And if you’re not interested in working on your chimp ID, the videos make seven good excuses just to look at each of these beautiful chimps for several minutes.
(For extra credit, click on each name below to learn some identifying physical characteristics for each individual).
Jody:
Late summer days
Typically September is our guaranteed best weather of the year. Well, in our opinions. 🙂 The heat dies down along with the winds, mornings and evenings are cool, but the days sunny and warm. The green of summer is becoming flecked with gold, red and orange. It’s that perfect blend of summer and autumn. The fifth season, betwixt and between. But this year, September has been a little more cold and rainy than usual. Yesterday was so unexpectedly cold! Today we’re back to bluebird skies and a warm sun despite a brisk, damp morning. The chimps have been full of joy and shenanigans all day. Especially Foxie. She’s been full of pirouettes, backflips, cartwheels from the top to the bottom of the caging, playing chase, and just being the most joyful being. Even the normally serious boss lady, Jamie, has been extra silly and happy. Here are some of the things the chimps got up to today:
Annie and Missy were first to the top of a structure after breakfast to take in the view:
Negra enjoyed a moment in the sun:
Foxie decided to play Spider-chimp and take the more adventurous way up the newest structure:
Foxie was sneering all the way back to the greenhouse because she was annoyed by the tall grass in her face and even more so, her nemeses…the grasshoppers! Oh, she hates those grasshoppers!
And some bonus photos from a few days ago of Jody luxuriating in the turtle pool, because obviously you had to see these:
Jody’s Family
It was just three weeks ago that we separated Jody from the group in order to stitch an injury to her eyelid. If you didn’t know it had happened, you probably wouldn’t notice that her left eye looks a little different. I suspect in another three weeks even we won’t be able to tell which eye it was.
(Incidentally, when I saw the photo above, I immediately thought of this photo of Jody’s daughter Andrea who lives at Save the Chimps in Florida. Like mother, like daughter!)
Dr. Erin did a great job of the procedure, no doubt. Plus chimpanzees have this uncanny ability to heal very quickly (thank goodness!).
I keep thinking back to the days after the procedure and how each step was an affirmation of why Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest exists and the role of the humans at the sanctuary.
When the injury happened, Jody was clearly irritated that her eyelid was kind of just hanging there (sorry for that graphic image), though she was not irritated enough that she ignored the rest of her lunch. On the contrary, she went right back to eating when the fighting had stopped.
The humans figured out pretty quickly that we needed to fix her eyelid because it serves such an important function of protecting the eye. After a little while, Jody seemed to agree with us, and she did not protest when we invited her to be separated from the other chimpanzees with the doors closing behind her.
I really believe that she knew she needed our help.
It took her the whole next day after the procedure to completely recover from the anesthesia, and she allowed me to sit with her (on the other side of the caging) and offer her sips of water in between her naps.
The day after that, however, she wanted to be back with the other chimpanzees.
We reunited them the next day, but then separated Jody again when Dr. Erin decided she needed some time away from Dr. Missy and any other overly zealous grooming partners.
Though it wasn’t an issue to separate Jody, she was definitely not as content to spend time by herself this time around. She was constantly watching what the group was doing, vocalizing along with them, and hopeful that she would be back with them each time we operated the doors. After a couple more days of healing, there was another reunion, and this time it lasted.
Here’s what I love about Jody’s reaction to all that happened: She accepted our help and let us pamper her a little, but the second she felt even halfway better, she wanted to be with her people. The humans are not her people. She has a family of chimpanzees – they are her people. She’s not related to any of them, but they are her family.
She wanted to be back with them even after sustaining a pretty intense injury during a fight with these same people.
And that explains the role of the humans at the sanctuary. We are protectors and sometimes fixers, up to a point. We make sure that the chimpanzees have food, medical care, and an interesting and comfortable environment.
But the truth is that they need each more than they need us. They have their own lives to lead.
That is one of the reasons why we are working hard on the Bring Them Home Expansion Campaign in order to bring more chimpanzees to the sanctuary. We don’t know how long these seven chimpanzees will be here, but we know that as long as they are alive, they will need a family of other chimpanzees.
For Giving Day for Apes this year, we are highlighting the expansion campaign. We hope you will join in the donating on September 25th to help expand the family at Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest and be a part of providing them with what the really need.
Missy
Missy came alarmingly close to never making it out of the research lab. She almost died while recovering from a hysterectomy shortly before moving to the sanctuary. Missy is so full of life these days that it’s easy to forget that if things had played out just a little differently, we never would have had the opportunity to get to know and love her. What a loss it would have been.
Missy is who we all want to be. She is fearless, cool, and adventurous. She’s strong and athletic, with a penchant for daredevilry. She has a silly sense of humor and is fiercely loyal to her friends. Though she does on occasion honor us with her attention, she usually prefers chimp company. And that’s fine with us – we’re just glad she’s in our world.
