Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

chimpanzee

Do Not Disturb!

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The chimpanzees had their proverbial “Do Not Disturb” signs hung on every door today. And given that it was cold, foggy and pouring rain all day, who wouldn’t rather stay in their cozy nest all day?

Me: “Good morning, everyone! Would you like to come to the greenhouse for breakfast while we clean your home?”

All seven chimpanzees: “No, thank you!!” With additional commentary from Missy: “No way! FORGET it! I’m staying right where I am.”

Me: “Okay, we’ll check back with you later!”

Over on the other side:

Me: Good morning, Mave, Willy B and Honey B! Would you like have breakfast in the mezzanine while we clean your home?

Mave, Willy B, and Honey B: “Absolutely not! Do NOT even THINK about moving those doors!” Every time Willy B even SAW me he ran outside to the chute!

Me: “Okay, we’ll be back later.”

This commentary pretty much repeated itself throughout the day.

Every year about this time of changing weather and slightly changing routines, we go through a rough and tumble period. Literally. In response to the humans’ attempts to shift the chimpanzees out of each area so we can enter to clean, they are more inclined to follow their own routines. And with the changes often comes a bout of the chimpanzees exhibiting more tension with one another and getting into squabbles, some big, most small, all very loud and dramatic. Given the current state of the world, I suspect most of you could relate to having more time indoors, maybe with the same people you’re always stuck with, someone trying to change this or that and well, you can see where tensions might flare.

Of course, we humans are always happy to default to the chimpanzees’ wishes, after all, it’s their home and their comfort is always the priority. It’s also one of the many important ways the chimps can makes choices about how they want their day to go. And it probably serves as some kind of enrichment for the caregivers, helps to keep the ol’ neuroplasticity flexible and firing as we have to figure out these puzzles the chimpanzees occasionally provide for us. And personally, there’s an odd sense of satisfaction when you’re able to follow their lead and somehow manage to successfully complete everything you need to. But it’s funny to listen to us. It’s easy to get sucked into flailing about, thinking, “What on earth are the chimps doing?! How will we get everything we need to done?!” “What are we going to do??!” When in reality, it happens every year and is actually entirely normal. We just conveniently forget from year to year. So looks like it’s a good thing for us to shake up that gray matter.

While the humans waited patiently for room service requests, Foxie felt that though it was not a good time for cleaning, it was a great time for playing.

Foxie! I mean, honestly, look at her beautiful self!!:

Getting ready to launch herself at the photographer because she’s super sassy and it’s super fun (notice the toes rubbing together – Foxie speak for feeling very happy and content):

Foxie loves to pass us her dolls then lie on her back and flail around. She makes these adorable snorting noises and gets pretty excited when you make them back:

I could never express to you how much I cherish this joyful soul of a chimpanzee woman:

Meanwhile, on the other side, beautiful, beloved Honey B was busy preparing to make a huge fort nest and allowed me ONE photo before she needed to get started:

Terroir

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As I drove through the canyon on my way to the sanctuary this morning, I thought of a passage from science-fiction author Jeff VanderMeer.
Natural places are no different than human cities. The old exists next to the new. Invasive species integrate with or push out native species. The landscape you see around you is the same as seeing an old cathedral next to a skyscraper.

VanderMeer’s work, perhaps best described as ecological horror, explores how humans perceive and withstand environmental changes. Watching their surroundings undergo both subtle and dramatic transitions, no matter how neutral they are at their core, alters the emotional fibers of his characters.

Driving up the sanctuary’s driveway, I could see that the contractors had just finished covering the new wing of the chimpanzee building, which is hopefully just a few months away from completion. I reminded myself that I was an intern here just a couple years ago. Now everything looks a bit different. We have a new driveway, new barn, new structures, and new wing of enclosures. There are new residents (both bovine and chimp), new staff, and new protocols. It’s hard to believe that sanctuary itself hasn’t even existed for two decades yet because it hasn’t stopped evolving.

The land where the Chimp House sits was once an uninteresting pasture, but there were saloons and homesteads all along our stretch of highway. The nearby towns were base camps for coal miners and pioneers, and the surrounding forests have been sculpted by the flames of many wildfires and saws of many loggers. If you go back far enough, the Yakima and Snoqualmie people served as stewards of these lands for thousands of years. On a grander scale, massive herds of prehistoric bison and elk grazed the icy tundra that existed before humans arrived on the scene. Now, in a plot twist that would be just as confusing to the coal miners as it would to the prehistoric bison, ten retired chimpanzees call this place their sanctuary home.

What has not changed, in my lifetime at least, is the terroir of this place. For those of you who share my apathy for wine, terroir is a French word used to describe the suite of environmental and agricultural factors contributing to a wine’s quality. Importantly, though, terroir is not something that can be measured. It’s not just a composite of rainfall, or soil, or topography. It is an amalgamation of all these things into one noticeable character, and it can only be sufficiently experienced via taste.

One of the ecologists in VanderMeer’s novels uses the concept when describing a mysterious landscape, the feeling of which he cannot sufficiently explain using scientific language alone. It resonated with me when I first read it because it makes so much sense. I thought of all the places I’ve been lucky enough to live and work in, including this sanctuary, and recalled the unmistakable terroir of each. I wish the followers and donors, many of whom have never even visited this part of the country, could all come to this place and (without disturbing the residents) experience it for themselves. There’s nothing quite like walking around a dew-covered Young’s Hill in the morning and hearing a chorus of anticipatory pant-hoots rise up from the Chimp House, and words don’t do that experience any justice.

I know that having you all visit wouldn’t be possible, even in the absence of a global pandemic, so I hope you will all be content to view some photos that I’ve recently taken of this beautiful place as it continues to evolve into something else.

 

The Snow Diet

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It seems Burrito was unable to eat all of the snow in his two-acre enclosure yesterday so today he and the gang were back at it.

Burrito sampled the snow at various locations but decided to return to the same platform where he and Foxie shared a snack yesterday. And again, he patiently waited his turn until Foxie had her fill.

Missy took a brief moment to spy on her neighbors and the ongoing construction before scaling a climbing structure in search of the white stuff.

People often ask us if we ever put sugar or fruit on top of snow for the chimps. We certainly have, but the chimps seem to really enjoy – and maybe even prefer – snow all by itself. As caregivers, we are always trying to balance keeping the chimps enriched with keeping them healthy. And one of the few things squarely in the center of that Venn diagram is a zero-calorie snack that falls from the sky and keeps the chimps entertained for hours each day.

I only wish I enjoyed it as much as they do.

Happy Birthday, Mari!

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Today was sponsored by Lynn Wilson in celebration of Mari and her special day!

“This is a happy birthday gift to Mari. She loves all of the chimps and cows at the sanctuary. She has also been able to interact with the three from the Waystation. Have a great birthday Mari.”

Lynn, thank you so much for such a compassionate gift for Mari, the chimpanzees and the bovines! We appreciate you choosing to share her special day in this way.

Happy Birthday, Mari! Thanks for loving the chimpanzees and the cattle. We hope this day is filled with wonder and magic you couldn’t have imagined!

Mave:

Honey B:

Betsy, Nutmeg, Meredith and Honey:

Burrito hopes you get lots of snow snacks 🙂

There are rules

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Jamie has rules. These rules are created for the humans and as such we are expected to follow them, without question, no shortcuts. These rules are created by Jamie and are subject to change without notice. We’re just along for the ride. 🙂

The past couple of days the chimpanzees cannot get enough of Young’s Hill! Reminiscent of summers past, Jamie has been taking near constant spins around the hill, accompanied by her human caregivers and delightfully, many of the other chimpanzees. The daytime temperatures have been hovering in the low to mid 30’s and somehow this has completely invigorated them all. Perhaps they know what’s on the horizon, literally, as at this point snow is due to start tonight and stick around off and on for the next week at least. But I digress. Back to the rules.

As many of you may know, Jamie often asks us to fetch the utility Gator to race with her around the hill. She used to like the humans to ride in the Gator while wearing her boots. But with me at least, this rule has changed a bit into wanting to have one human drive the Gator AND one human run with her ahead of the Gator. Though it’s always been the obvious rule that the Gator never wins these races, she’s adjusted the rule more recently to seemingly want to run away from the Gator, well ahead of it reaching her and her human companion. Now here’s a specific scenario where she gets very specific with her rules:

Jamie and Burrito will be racing up the hill with two caregivers. Half way up the hill Jamie will decide one of the humans needs to return to the barn and fetch the Gator. She indicates this by walking back down the hill, looking toward the barn and shaking her fist. Jamie speak for “Go get the Gator!” “Now!” She will rarely be deterred from this. Next rule is the absolute.very.second one human leaves to fetch said Gator, Jamie looks at the other human as if to say, “Ruuuunnn!!!” and you are expected to RUN and get as far ahead of the Gator as possible before it even leaves the barn. (Unfortunately for this human, this is also the uphill part). This reminds me a little bit of those silly old games where you’re trying to see how fast you can unlock your door as you pretend a murderer is after you. You know that game, right? No? Well, anyway…

And what if the humans try to skip the rules? Well, you’re going to have to go back to the beginning and do it right. After several runs up and around the hill, this human tried to take a short cut at one point and hitch a lift on the Gator with Chad, at least for uphill portion. We went a short distance, then Jamie abruptly stopped, turned around and marched us back down the hill to the starting point where she gestured for me to get out of the Gator and then run with her ahead of it! Humans need a lot of supervision. At least this one, I guess.

We never know for sure what’s going on in that brilliant, kaleidoscopic mind of hers, but we couldn’t be more thrilled to get to tag along.

As I revved the Gator (because that’s the most exciting part) and did my best to drive steady, poor Chad was tasked with capturing this wild, blur of a woman from the passenger seat and somehow managed capturing her in all her crazy excited, hair-standing on end, charging across the hill glory:

As Anthony accurately put it today while looking at this photo, Jamie is a hurricane of a chimp woman. Indeed she is. And we love her so. What a privilege to be caught up in her wild winds with her.

The construction guys are working so hard to get the roof on before the snows fly and watched us storming around the hill again and again. I can only imagine what goes through their minds. They asked who ended up winning. Of course, we all know the answer to that. 🙂

Riding the Waves

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The chimpanzees began their morning with a raucous exchange of displays between the two neighboring groups. Screams, barks, drumming and hoots reverberated throughout the Chimp House. The neighbor effect is very real.

The following breakfast services were predictably tense. On one side of the building, Jamie was irate that the poor human caregiver wouldn’t give her someone else’s chow bag. The white paper bag sat awkwardly in the bottom of the food chute as Jamie loudly won the ensuing argument, but Negra quietly absconded with the prize during the chaos. In the Mezzanine, Willy B flexed his dominance by intimidating the female chimps and claiming Mave’s chow bags. Willy has grown more patient and tolerant in his time here, possibly due to our efforts to promote cooperative feeding. However, like all high-ranking chimps, he still needs to assert himself occasionally. This morning was one of those moments.

Generally speaking, chimpanzee behavior is characterized by short chaotic episodes during which the social hierarchy is challenged. These conflicts can either reform existing relationship dynamics or reinforce them. Instability and tension, however, are not just unpleasant; they’re downright exhausting. Adrenaline is unsustainable and requires a long reset afterwards. For this and many other reasons, chimps spend most of their time engaged in relatively peaceful activities such as grooming, foraging, and rest. I don’t know if chimpanzees have a “love language,” but low-key quality time would probably be it.

Given today’s hectic beginning, it was not surprising that the sanctuary’s residents had calmed down by lunch. The Seven were all about doing laps around Young’s Hill, while Honey B and Mave spent a large chunk of the day grooming and playing chase. Once our team was finished scrubbing enclosures for the day, I took a moment to go sit just outside the caging in the Mezzanine and observe the chimps. Willy B was the only chimp up there, lazily turning over some blankets and toys that had just been distributed by caregivers.

Willy B stared at me for a second, made a gentle hoo, and retrieved a fluffy blue blanket that had been draped over the nearby bench. He dragged it towards me with his knuckles, stopping only when the edges of the blanket were pushed up against the bottom of the steel mesh that separated us. Willy then leaned forward and, like a collapsing Imperial AT-AT, took a gargantuan nose dive into the shaggy pile.

He laid there for some time, face buried in the folds of the blanket. It was difficult to tell if it was a moment of pure exhaustion or zen-like bliss. I followed suit, sprawling out on the smooth heated floor. He lifted his head to reveal his brown eyes, which briefly showed a flash of skepticism, before apparently deciding that it was okay for me to join him on the floor. As I laid on my back, looking up at the passing clouds through the Mezzanine’s skylights, Willy began to take longer and longer blinks until he slowly fell asleep.

Even though I’m used to the routine by now, I noted how odd it felt to see Willy B gradually drift off into a light nap. He seemed to be at ease amid his surroundings despite being a hurricane of hair and muscle just hours earlier. I also felt slightly honored that he had chosen to be in my proximity without asking for anything else. I reminded myself that the never-ending waves of chimpanzee emotion, with peaks of chaos and troughs of serenity, are not something to be necessarily battled against. Rather, they are all part of the chimpanzee experience, adding value to each other. As Anna once told me when I was learning to manage the complex dynamics among these unique chimp individuals, “you’ve gotta ride the waves.”

I decided not to take any photos of Willy B’s nap; doing so would have likely caused him to sit up and stare into the camera lens. Instead, here are some photos our team has taken of chimpanzees resting during the peaceful eyes that separate many tumultuous storms.

   

   

Have a great night, everyone!

Chimp feet are pretty handy

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Recently, Edie asked: I am amazed when I see pictures of their feet-they seem so versatile! Do they ever use their feet like hands?

Chimpanzee feet are pretty amazing indeed. Unlike our own, they are prehensile, meaning they have the ability to grasp. This is because their big toes are opposable, like our thumbs.

Annie, holding her hand with her foot

This is presumably an adaptation to aid in climbing, like when scaling tree trunks:

Or when clinging to vines and small branches:

They can also aid in maintaining balance when perched precariously above the ground:

But they can also function like an extra set of hands when necessary. Gathering tomatoes? With prehensile feet you can haul twice as many.

Difficult Kong puzzle? Why not let your feet do some of the work and free up both hands?

Wondering where to put your doll when you are eating lunch suspended from the caging? You can trust that Dora the Explorer will remain safely in the grip of your opposable toe.

The dexterity of chimpanzee feet also makes them great for tickling.

I hope all chimpanzees stop once and a while to appreciate having such useful feet.