The other day, Burrito and JB had a marathon play session. Tug of war is one of Burrito’s favorite games, and you’ll notice a lot of it in the video below. Of course, tug of war between chimps and humans is no real competition at all. Burrito has to play down his superior strength to accommodate our relative physical weakness (and we have to be prepared to let go at any time so we don’t get pulled into the caging!).
Cle Elum 7
Phantom Nesting
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.
Negra thanks you
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
Everyone’s excited about Burrito’s birthday
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.
Nesting, Nesting, Nesting…
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.
All About Burrito
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.
Sponsor a Day of sanctuary and here’s to 2010!
Sarah came up with a great idea to allow people to sponsor a day of sanctuary. It’s just $100 and you can pick any day! More info and a calendar here. I’ve already signed up in remembrance of my mom’s birthday on Sept. 12th and Tom Chimpanzee‘s celebrated birthday on May 1st.
The Sponsor a Day program was announced in the e-newsletter sent out this morning, but I thought I’d share my excitement about the program and way of honoring others here on the blog too.
In other news, J.B. is working on the greenhouse in this strange sun-and-snow weather right now, and we’re planning for Burrito’s birthday on January 6th. Once everyone is back from their respective short vacations, we’ll sit down and prioritize some fundraising ideas for all of you eager blog supporters. Thanks so much again for raising the funds for the chimp proof window! J.B. has been talking with the steel contractors and trying to figure out a time line for installation, which will probably be weather-dependent. Oh, and I’ve begun to work with Kristi of Vintage Vine and Margie and Nicole to plan the late winter/early spring wine tasting in the upper county – Sippin for the Seven was so much fun last year that we’d love to make it an annual event.
Never a dull moment!
Thank you all for making 2009 full of fun and new experiences for both the chimpanzee and the human people at CSNW. I can’t wait to see what 2010 brings!
