Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

Cle Elum 7

Projects and Preferences

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Jamie has a mind that never sleeps. We do our best to keep her occupied and enriched, but sometimes she has to take matters into her own hands. It’s not unusual to find Jamie working on a project of her own making – anything from stuffing socks into a hollow tube, to pouring liquid back and forth from one container to another, to tying knots in scarves. (She even participated in routine fecal sample collection once.)

Interestingly, Jamie often prefers that these activities are done in privacy. As soon as she notices a caregiver watching – or even worse, trying to film or take photos – she stops what she’s doing. This morning I caught her using the wooden blocks in the photo below to hammer the red plastic stick into the floor of the playroom. Even though I knew I was pushing my luck, I grabbed the camera in hopes that I might get a video for the blog, but not surprisingly, the game was over as soon as she spotted me.

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Speaking of keeping the chimps enriched, we posted the photo below to our Facebook page this morning and asked everyone to guess whose feet are socked up so stylishly. The answer is Missy! Missy and Jody both love to wear socks (and in fact these particular socks were sent to Jody by her Pal Sandy Nelson), but typically it’s only one at a time. Missy loves to pull on a sock (or two) when she’s feeling a little playful. (If you’re wondering why we’re okay posting photos of Missy wearing socks while we advocate against the use of chimpanzee “performers” wearing clothes in movies and on TV, please visit this page.)

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Being Chimpanzees

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One of our primary goals here at the sanctuary is to allow and encourage the chimpanzees to act like chimpanzees, in as many ways as possible. A big part of being a chimp is being around other chimps – something that many lab chimps are denied. As much as we caregivers love playing, grooming, and just hanging out with our chimp friends (and we’re always there for them if they want our company), we always prefer to see them enjoying the company of other chimps.

Some chimps, like Missy, tend to prefer chimp company over human company, while others, like Burrito, usually seek out humans to play with. So it’s especially rewarding to see a guy like Burrito just be a chimp with other chimps.

Jody’s eyes

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Over six and a half years ago, J.B., Diana, Sarah, and Keith all visited the chimpanzees while they were still in the Buckshire lab. J.B. wrote this entry about Jody and how the first thing he noticed about her were her striking eyes. After living at CSNW now for over six years, I think they are even more vibrant now than they ever have been before.

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Chimpanzees: Always Curious

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It’s important to have priorities in life, and the chimpanzees at Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest are good at deciding what is top priority (usually food) and what is a close ranking second, as you’ll see in the video below.

Here’s what the back of the lower mount for the GoPro camera looks like. I caught this photo last week of Annie standing next to it. The steel mount, custom made by J.B., has a hinge and opens up to slip the camera in and then has a padlock to secure it.

Annie looking at GoPro mount

Annie’s 40th

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We celebrated Annie’s 40th birthday today! Her exact birthday is unknown since she was captured in the wild, but her records indicate that she was born sometime in 1974, and today is the day we picked to celebrate it. Annie certainly doesn’t act 40 at all! She’s still very young at heart—she shows her playful side daily when wrestling with Missy or running around Young’s Hill.

We wanted to celebrate her special day with some of her favorites—green grass, beets, green onions, piñatas, buckets of water, shovels, and chow! Thanks to some supplies Lisa Stuverud brought us we had a fun colorful party with new enrichment, too. We set up a breakfast forage first, and then volunteer Becca served Annie’s favorite veggies at lunch.

Here’s the party setup:
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I love this photo — you can see the juice from the tangerine spraying to the side! Good shot by Elizabeth.
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Annie with a mouthful of chow (she loves to wadge chow!)
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Annie loves green grass, so we picked some for her and included bunches of it in their breakfast forage:
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Some of her favorite veggies are green onions and beets:
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The other chimps enjoyed the party too! Burrito the charmer practically posed during the forage for this photo:
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Everyone loved the fruit! Here’s Jamie:
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Jody:
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Foxie:
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Missy loved the green grass:
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And Jody ended up getting the piñatas (there was a Dora the Explorer piñata too, but that was torn up before we could snap a photo!)
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Foxie got a new troll and some knuckle rubs from Diana, which made her laugh:
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And Negra spent a lot of time in hard-to-see spots during the day, but I did get this picture of her beautiful relaxed face:
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Happy 40th Birthday, Annie!