Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

Cle Elum Seven

Spiderchimp

by

The ceiling of the greenhouse is made up of long metal bars that allow the chimpanzees to brachiate (swing arm over arm), much like wild chimps swing through the trees. The chimps use these bars pretty often to move from place to place in the greenhouse. For Foxie, though, they’re more than functional – they’re fun. Foxie uses the greenhouse ceiling as her own personal playground. She climbs around upside down on all fours, and then dangles by her feet (sometimes while laughing). Today she took Dora along for the ride.

web_Foxie_climb_on_ceiling_Dora_doll_in_mouth_GH_ek_IMG_8194

web_Foxie_climb_on_ceiling_Dora_doll_in_mouth_GH_ek_IMG_8196

web_Foxie_climb_on_ceiling_Dora_doll_in_mouth_GH_ek_IMG_8193

web_Foxie_climb_on_ceiling_Dora_doll_in_mouth_GH_ek_IMG_8197

web_Foxie_hang_upside_down_on_ceiling_Dora_doll_in_mouth_foot_GH_ek_IMG_8200

web_Foxie_hang_upside_down_on_ceiling_Dora_doll_in_mouth_GH_ek_IMG_8198

web_Foxie_hang_upside_down_on_ceiling_Dora_doll_in_foot_GH_ek_IMG_8203

In Search of The Perfect Snow to Eat

by

It didn’t take long for the chimpanzees to make their way outside today once the sun came out. Jamie, Jody, Annie, Missy, Foxie and Burrito all made their way onto Young’s Hill. While Jamie continued on to do her first perimeter walk around the hill, the other chimpanzees were more focused on eating the pieces of crusty snow they found. Missy seemed to be on a mission to find the perfect piece.

Missy took her time making her way across the logs, eating chunks of crusty snow along the way.
web_Missy_sit_balance_log_eat_snow_ice_YH_kh_IMG_8100

Then she moved on to Negra’s cabin in search of more pieces. Of course, as many of you know by now, Missy has a knack for climbing. She climbed up one of the posts and made her way up to the roof of the cabin.

web_Missy_climb_cabin_post_YH_kh_IMG_8117

web_Missy_climb_cabin_reach_YH_kh_IMG_8118

web_Missy_climb_cabin_post_search_snow_ice_YH_kh_IMG_8119

web_Missy_climb_cabin_grab_snow_ice_eat_YH_kh_IMG_8120

Lo and behold, there it was, another big piece.

web_Missy_climb_cabin_stand_sign_eat_snow_ice_YH_kh_IMG_8122

She took her time enjoying the morsel, taking in the scenery and scoping out where to find the next piece.

web_Missy_sit_sign_cabin_back_to_camera_eat_snow_ice_YH_kh_IMG_8124

When she finished, she climbed onto the roof of the cabin and then proceeded to check for more crusty snow chunks on the other side.
web_Missy_climb_cabin_plexiglass_forage_snow_ice_YH_kh_IMG_8125

web_Missy_stand_cabin_plexiglass_roof_look_for_ice_snow_YH_kh_IMG_8126

After that, she continued up to the top of the cabin.
web_Missy_climb_cabin_post_YH_kh_IMG_8129

web_Missy_climb_top_cabin_look_for_ice_YH_kh_IMG_8131

web_Missy_climb_cabin_to_top_look_for_ice_YH_kh_IMG_8134

web_Missy_climb_top_cabin_find_ice_snow_jackpot_YH_kh_IMG_8138

Ahhhh, the perfect piece.
web_Missy_find_ice_snow_sit_top_cabin_YH_kh_IMG_8139

web_Missy_eat_snow_ice_chunck_look_toward_camera_sit_top_cabin_YH_kh_IMG_8142

Peace and Quiet

by

Negra’s days are made up of quiet moments. She’s usually the last one out of bed in the morning, and the first to go back to bed after breakfast. She spends most of her day lying in a big, soft nest in front of her favorite window on the playroom catwalk, where she can watch the neighboring farm and the train running through the valley. When there’s a conflict in the group, Negra does her best to stay out of it, and she’s usually the one to end it with her “That’s enough!” pant hoot.

To Negra, sanctuary means peace and quiet.

web_Negra_look_out_window_PR_ek_IMG_2470

web_Negra_look_out_window_chin_on_arm_PR_ek_IMG_2479

web_Negra_PR_ek_IMG_2477

web_Negra_look_at_camera_PR_ek_IMG_2483

Jamie’s mood

by

Just like all emotional beings, Jamie’s mood fluctuates. We don’t always know if we’re going to be greeted in the morning by Happy Jamie or Somewhat Cranky Jamie. Lately she’s had far more of the former than the latter, which is a huge plus for all the primates at CSNW.

If Jamie wakes up on the wrong side of the nest, her crankiness can translate into intolerance for things like dropping food (which we do a lot—especially me, who wins the Clumsiest Caregiver award every year), or playing troll toss too loudly with Foxie, or standing closer to the fencing than Jamie would like. And sometimes, it’s for what seems like no reason at all.

One thing that Somewhat Cranky Jamie doesn’t always like is when we try to take photos or videos of her, especially if she’s working on a project. But she’s been very tolerant of such activities recently, and even let me take this very up close photo of her today:

web_jamie_close-up_eyes_gh_dm_IMG_2392

I usually thank her for letting me take her photo, and to show my appreciation, I turn the camera around so she can see what I captured. She likes to look at photos, so we will scroll through what is on the card until she turns away to find something else to do.

Today, Happy Jamie spent the afternoon getting groomed by caregiver-in-training Whitney, and played a brief game of tug-o-war and chase. Even though Jamie is very human-oriented, she doesn’t always roughhouse with her caregivers, so it’s a real treat when she allows us to play games like that with her. She also spent some quiet time grooming caregiver Lizz for awhile, and has already been on three walks, despite the drizzly overcast skies.

We love days like today… a Happy Jamie means a good day for everyone.

web_jamie_gh_dm_IMG_2390

Taking It All In

by

Today we’ve been lucky enough to have some mild temperatures and sunshine in Cle Elum. After lunch I headed out to the greenhouse, expecting to find most of the chimpanzees lounging out there (their favorite sunny day spot). I was pleasantly surprised, however, to find everyone except for Burrito and Negra outside on Young’s Hill, their two-acre outdoor habitat.

When it’s cold outside, the chimps would generally rather be indoors. The more determined among them might go out for very short periods, but as a rule, the chimps choose to spend most of the winter inside. On mild days, it’s not uncommon to find some activity on the hill – the chimps know that the nice temperatures won’t last long.

When I stepped outside this afternoon there was a large group of hawks circling over Young’s Hill.

web_hawks_circle_above_YH_ek_IMG_2356

I started thinking about how before Young’s Hill was built, the chimps had never had an unobstructed view of the sky before. Young’s Hill has expanded the chimps’ world in more ways than one. In addition to giving them more space to explore, it allows them to see more of their surroundings and to participate more in their environment.

Here’s Annie looking out over the valley adjacent to the sanctuary:

web_Annie_sit_on_climbing_structure_trees_in_background_YH_ek_IMG_2364

The chimps also have a clear line of sight to the driveway, so they can always check out who’s coming and going. Today Jody was very interested to watch volunteers Pam and T.J. arrive for their shift:

web_Jody_sit_on_ground_watch_volunteers_arrive_YH_ek_IMG_2350

Missy, on the other hand, had no time to look around. She was fully focused on her acrobatic feats.

web_Missy_tightrope_walk_firehose_YH_ek_IMG_2330

web_Missy_tightrope_walk_firehose_YH_ek_IMG_2331

Close-ups

by

It’s not often that I take non-blurry, close-up pictures of each of the chimps. There are number of reasons for this, one being operator error. Second, third and fourth reasons are that the chimps are often moving, just out of sight of the camera, or would rather not have their picture taken. So, when the close-up photos actually turn out, I cannot stop looking at them.

Sometimes pictures just convey so much more than words ever can about the beauty, serenity or nature of each of the chimpanzees. These are some of my favorite close-ups of each of the chimps from the past few weeks.

Jamie
web_Jamie_stare_at_camera_closeup_FRs_kh_IMG_0736

Burrito
web_Burrito_sit_ledge_arms_crossed_FR2_kh_IMG_0717

Jody
web_Jody_look_out_arms_crossed_sit_bench_FR4_kh_IMG_1971

Negra
web_Negra_look_at_camera_closeup_face_FR4_kh_IMG_2634

Foxie
web_Foxie_look_toward_camera_enrichment_hammer_in_hand_ledge_FRs_kh_IMG_0721

Missy
web_Missy_sit_platform_look_out_GH_IMG_7725

Annie
web_Annie_mouth_open_PR_kh_IMG_7900

Jamie’s precision enrichment project

by

As many of you know, Jamie loves projects. She appreciates a challenge, and seeks out opportunities for doing things “the hard way.” It’s really the opposite of most people’s instincts, because laziness is almost a default—we ask ourselves to find the quickest way to do things which require the least amount of exertion. Conserving energy might be the ultimate cause for this instinct, but in any case, it’s how most animals (humans included) operate. Jamie, however, has other things in mind. She wants to challenge herself.

Lately, when I serve breakfast, I have a little routine with Jamie. I give her a cup which she pins against the fencing, and then I place her servings in the bowl. So as I hand fruit pieces to the mouths or hands of the other chimps, I put Jamie’s in her bowl and she spends time fishing the piece out of the bowl. Once she gets the slice, she sort of leans the bowl my direction so I can refill it. Doing things the hard way tend to just make her happy. It’s awful to imagine the trauma she must have experienced from boredom in her previous life in biomedical research.

We can’t ever make up for what she must have gone through, but we try to give her as many challenges and projects as we can to keep her happy. Sometimes her projects come from surprising places—like today, I caught her playing with this enrichment toy for quite awhile. The small poles could be pushed through the holes in the wood center, and she would do just that and then flip it over and start again. The thing I found interesting was her technique—rather than just using her fingers to push the poles, she used another pole as a tool. You can see in the video just how precise she was with each push.

After taking some video of this activity I showed it to Jamie, who was interested in watching herself for a brief moment before returning to her project (watch until the very end to see that bit).