Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

Construction

New Things Outside!

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As Sabrina mentioned yesterday, we’ve had a crew of folks out yesterday and part of today making some wonderful enhancements to the outdoor habitats on both sides – Young’s Hill for the original group and The Bray for the group of nine from Wildlife Waystation.

The motivated crew was led by none other than the founder of Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest, Keith LaChappelle! Huge thanks go to Keith and everyone who accompanied him for all the work they got done!

Enhancements included planting trees along newly-installed irrigation lines, finishing and adding cool fire hose “roofs” to the new climbing platforms, and creating more resting areas. They had the opportunity to see the chimpanzees enjoy the new additions when we set out a forage for both groups.

Another thanks goes to Chad for taking all of the photos below, saving the day for the blog.

Foxie:

Burrito:

Jamie and Burrito exploring one of the now finished and fire hose – adorned climbing structures:

Annie next to some of the newly planted trees:

Jamie:

This photo doesn’t show off the new enhancements, but it does show off Missy’s athletic dismount from the treat rock. Not bad for nearly 49!

I love this shot of Lucky that Chad got:

Mave is continuing her bravery and adventured out for the forage too:

Terry looking handsome with new trees behind him:

Gordo with a red pepper under the new roof of a structure:

You can never go wrong by finishing with a Gordo close-up:

New Year’s Eve? New Climbing Structure!

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Thank you to that long list of supporters in the video above who donated towards new climbing structures in the Comfort & Joy online auction. What a fabulous day for some new adventure! I hope you all are looking forward to new things with the turn of the calendar tomorrow.

We have had a lot of new things delivered to the sanctuary recently! A huge shout-out to everyone who has purchased items through our Amazon wish list this month. Even with the wonders of modern technology and the efficient delivery of packages, we often don’t know who sent us wish list items. So, if you don’t receive a personal thank  you, it might be because your name wasn’t included as the gift giver. This time of year, we have quite a backlog of thanking to do too, so perhaps a thank you is on the way. In either case, please know how grateful you are for thinking of the chimpanzees and providing them and the sanctuary with much needed and much loved items.

Big thanks also to everyone who has made a donation of cash or securities this month. It’s heartwarming to receive your year-end support and read your messages about how much the sanctuary means to you. We appreciate every dollar donated and will put it to good use in 2024. THANK YOU!

Lucky’s Birthday and Reaching New Heights

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Today we celebrated the 32nd birthday of the one and only Lucky! Due to the seemingly unending rain here in Central Washington, we held the parties fully indoors, which meant that Lucky was out of view of the paparazzi for most of the corn, cherry tomato, and gum forage (yes, gum is one of Lucky’s favorite things). But after the lunch forage, everyone in her group was given a mango and I managed to snap a few photos of Lucky savoring her special treat in the Oakwood greenhouse.

Many thanks to Paulette for sponsoring this day in honor of the birthday girl!

There are very few chimps as sweet as Lucky and her brother, Cy. Lucky generally prefers to be out of the spotlight, with the notable exception of when we are serving her favorite foods, at which point she leaps to the caging to tickles our wrists with her toes while panting excitedly. With her more reserved personality, I wasn’t sure how quickly she would take to a more adventurous life on the Bray. Needless to say, she surprised us all! These days she is often the first one out and among the most likely to be seen at the top of the tallest climbing structures. We often find her out there just soaking up the sun and taking in the view.

The view from the Bray, by the way, is incredible (a few power lines and the occasional parked train in the valley notwithstanding). From almost anywhere on the hill, the chimps can see their caregivers coming and going, they can watch the sun reflect off the Yakima River, they can keep an eye on the cattle, or the can spy on their chimp neighbors next door. But from the very top of the hill, the view across the Cascade Mountains is almost limitless. In order to take advantage of that commanding view, however, the chimps need a few more places to perch.

Building the Bray took quite a while and we didn’t want Lucky and her friends to have to wait any longer than necessary to enjoy it, so we chose to hold off on building some of the climbing structures we had planned. With winter approaching, it’s a good time for us to get back out there and finish what we started.

This past week, we welcomed a new part time Facilities and Grounds Technician, Jake, and we immediately put him to work setting posts that we had purchased last year for these new structures (a quick note of thanks here to Kelsi’s husband, Adam, who filled the same role until his firefighting job began to require more of his time). Now we need your help to finish them! If you visit our Comfort & Joy online auction, you’ll see an option to donate towards the construction of new play structures on the Bray and Young’s Hill, which will help fund the purchase of the framing lumber, decking, and fasteners we need to complete these new towers. If we can get the in-ground work done this month, construction of the decks, roofs, ladders, and swings can continue throughout the fall and winter. And in the spring, we’ll be able to wrap things up with additional irrigation and more trees and shrubs.

And before you know it, Lucky and the rest of her family will be starting each day with a hike to the top of the Bray, just like Jamie’s group does on Young’s Hill, to which we will also be adding new climbing structures in order to take advantage of all the additional space we added last summer.

As a little bonus, here are some photos of Lucky’s group enjoying Ryan’s Lookout, one of their favorite places to hang out.

Terry:

Rayne:

Rayne, again, retrieving a pomegranate from one of the crow’s nests connected to Ryan’s Lookout:

Rayne atop Ryan’s Lookout, with Gordo, Lucky, and Terry in the foreground:

Back in the chute!

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Today Cy’s group got access back to the outdoor chute. After a few months of construction, the chute has received some new and improved space and connections. This chute will eventually be the portal that leads to The Bray outdoor enclosure (currently being built). For now though, it’s a popular hangout where the 2 groups of chimpanzees can check in on each other. Even after the initial excitement dies down, this visual connection is quite enriching!

more tree-climbing adventures!

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What a day! The video above says it all, but below are a few still photos.

Chad, on his day off, happened to see Missy’s climb as he was accompanying a former chimp house volunteer on a walk around the hill. He and J.B. took some videos with their phones as I walked up with the camera and telephoto lens, which was not working right away, but I did get one good photo of Missy amidst the branches, foraging on pine needles:

and some photos on her way down:

Redecorating

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As Chad mentioned the other day, we’re in the final stretch of building the new open-top outdoor enclosures. There’s still a lot of work to be done, but the time had finally come to start tearing down the original fences so that we could install the last stretch of four fences that will separate the new Young’s Hill from the Bray. The only problem was that a few climbing structures were in path of the new fences, including one of the chimps’ favorites: Carlene’s Tower.

Luckily our friends at Sage Mechanical were on hand to help us do a little redecorating. They plucked the tower out of the ground and drove it to a new location.

And now Carlene’s Tower has found a new home among the evergreens at the very top of the hill, where it us sure to become one of the most popular spots in the renovated habitat.

While the final posts are being set, we’ll be busy winding up all 14 miles of wire from the original fence. Eventually, the insulators will be removed from the old posts and the posts will be used to build more climbing structures.

With over double the acreage, we’ll have a lot of building to do. But our immediate goal is just to get the new fences up and running so the Seven can get back outside and Cy’s group can get a chance to explore before winter. That process alone will take at least a month. As was the case with the original Young’s Hill, the new enclosures will be works in progress, with new play structures, trees, and swings added each year.