Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest
Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary
I just found out we were nominated for Pawcurious’ 2010 Brodies for excellence in pet blogging. We were nominated for the best animal blog (non-cat/dog). Thanks for the nomination! Now the judges are going to select a smaller group of finalists. There are some really great blogs on the list! Check them out on the Pawcurious site.
CSNW supporter Jennifer Douglas and her husband James are sponsoring the migration of Noah on behalf of his mother Negra. Check out the photo of Noah below – he looks so much like his mom!!
![Noah (STC) [Bubba's Family]](https://chimpsnw.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Noah-STC-Bubbas-Family1.jpg "Noah (STC) [Bubba's Family]")
Noah currently lives at the Save the Chimps facility in New Mexico which was formerly owned by the Coulston Foundation – a notoriously horrid research facility that closed down when Save the Chimps stepped in to rescue the chimpanzees. Like all of the chimpanzees at the former Coulston Foundation laboratory, Noah will be making the journey to Florida where he will live on an island with a large group of chimpanzees. We’re so pleased that Jennifer and James and so many of you are reaching out to help the relatives of the Cle Elum Seven in other sanctuaries.
Thanks to Candy Crannell for alerting us that Noah is now on the Save the Chimps website, and for sponsoring the migration of Foxie’s daughter Angie (who also looks remarkably like her mother). Also check out Negra’s daughter Angel from this previous post. Many of the sons and daughters of the Cle Elum Seven are now at Save the Chimps, so more on relatives soon!
Although we have never witnessed Burrito build his own nest with blankets, as we have mentioned in other blog posts, he will often sleep in someone elses’ nest. Today, I caught Burrito engaging a behavior we, at CSNW, call Phantom Nesting. This is a behavior both he and Foxie occasionally do, which involves clapping and running their clasped hands along the fence, the wall, and/or the floor. Interestingly, this is not a behavior that is seen in the wild, and is rarely seen at all. As far as we know, the behavior has only been observed in a few captive individuals, but definitely seems to be related to nesting.
*Editor’s Note (from Diana): we don’t know much about this behavior. We’d love to hear from others who work with chimpanzees both in captivity and in the wild to find out if you’ve observed nesting behavior in the absence of “normal” nesting material and/or if you’ve seen the same clapping and arm movements described above and shown in the video below.
Below is the photo of Negra taken on the first day she was in sanctuary and a photo taken just an hour ago. Negra continues to change. She’s been very playful and more active this winter than last. She still avoids conflict and likes to have blankets over her head. She has her favorite foods. And she still loves to see humans dance for her.
Negra’s continued signs of contentment are all because of the support that we have had from so many. Without individual donations, the sanctuary and the quality care that we provide would still be a figment of our imaginations. So much has happened in such a short amount of time, thanks to you all!
Today I wanted to say a special birthday thanks from Negra to a couple of people who are helping to get the stories of the Cle Elum Seven out into the world. Kathy Cochran, whose birthday is today and Margaret Parkinson, who celebrated her birthday on December 31st. These two remarkable ladies collaborated to create the book, Sanctuary: Year One that we have for sale in our online store. Thank you both and happy birthdays!
Negra on her first day at the sanctuary, after living in laboratories for decades
Negra tonight, finishing up the seeds from her night bag
MailChimp changed their login page to wish Burrito a Happy Birthday! Check it out here.
We have cool new benefits for Chimpanzee Pal sponsors, so if you’d like to sponsor Burrito, like MailChimp does, learn more: https://chimpsnw.org/you_can_help/donate/#ChimpPal
We’ll post all about Burrito’s festivities soon. We decided to make his day all about food (of course!), and his friend Robbi brought some presents too.
Today, Jamie built herself yet another nest using a blanket and a box. This sparked a conversation between Diana and I about the similarities and differences of nesting behavior of captive vs. free-living chimpanzees. We couldn’t find many videos on the internet of free-living chimpanzees nesting, however, Jane Goodall’s Discover Chimpanzees Website has a behavior glossary, complete with video footage of the chimpanzees in Gombe engaging in a variety of behaviors, including this clip of nesting. If you compare the following video clips of Jody, Missy and Jamie (in order of appearance) to the video clip from the Discover Chimpanzees Website, you can see many similarities. Notice how the free-living chimpanzee (named Fifi) pulls the branches into her nest and pushes them down to make her bed more comfortable. It truly is an exact science.
Here’s a video all about Burrito in celebration of his 27th birthday which is on January 6th. Please share with others!
Thank you to everyone who has supported Burrito by being his Chimpanzee Pal and overall friend.
Happy 2010 everyone!
I’m trying out Vimeo (video below). The video is also on You Tube.
All About Burrito at Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest from Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest on Vimeo.
