Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest
Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary
Join grad student interns Carly and Grace as they take a break from cleaning and preparing meals to walk and run around Young’s Hill with Jamie.
I was very excited to get to use our new gimbal (a fancy handle that steadies your videos – especially when running) that a wonderful supporter purchased from our Amazon wish list. We’re looking forward to using it to film some Facebook Live videos soon!
Whenever we drive the Gator (our farm utility vehicle), Jamie excitedly challenges us to a drag race. Exercise, enrichment, and a nice little rest for the staff!
Last week, I posted a photo of Missy on her Facebook page leaping off of the termite mound. Her friend Debra Durham commented on the photo, “parkour!” I thought to myself, “exactly!”
If you haven’t heard of parkour, well, you can thank me for letting you in on what, just two days ago, ABC news called, “the new sport that has everyone buzzing.” It’s basically people using the “urban landscape” as a playground. The people who are good at it make leaping and jumping and rolling on concrete and rooftops look effortless (unlike how I would look if I tried it). In many ways, it really is similar to the way Missy moves everyday.
Whenever I see Missy on Young’s Hill – running at full speed, leaping off of the termite mound, climbing log posts or the tall bamboo (usually with a huge playface), or grabbing her friend Annie’s ears in playful joy, I am reminded of what Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest has given this group of chimpanzees who lived for decades in small cages within windowless rooms.
For each of the chimpanzees, sanctuary has provided something unique to them. For Missy, perhaps it’s parkour:
Thank you for being a part of making Missy’s life in sanctuary exactly what she chooses it to be.
Earlier this week, as volunteer Keri and I were finishing a walk around the hill with Jamie, we did some quick calculations to figure out just how far Jamie is walking each day. At a minimum, I think she is doing a mile a day just in walks with her caregivers – around an enclosure that rises 100 feet in elevation from end to end, no less. For a free-living chimpanzee, this wouldn’t be much, but for a chimpanzee who spent her life in a laboratory, it’s not bad at all.
The physical transformations that we’ve witnessed over the past five years have been incredible. After decades in tiny cages in a windowless basement, these seven chimps finally saw the sun, breathed fresh air, and got to run, climb, jump, and swing. Almost immediately, their skin darkened, their hair filled in, and their muscles grew stronger.
While most of these changes occurred over the first few months, we are still witnessing changes to this day. I think this is driven in part by their emotional recovery. This morning, as I watched Jamie run playfully after her friend Missy, I couldn’t help thinking about how much physical health and emotional health are intertwined. The stronger they get, the more they play and explore. And the more they play and explore, the stronger they get. I guess they call this a virtuous cycle.
When I look back at photos from the chimps’ arrival in 2008, I hardly recognize them. Their bodies displayed the toll of so many years in the laboratory, but in their faces you could see the even greater damage that was done to their spirits. They looked sick, tired, scared, and beaten down:
Five years in sanctuary can do a lot. Today, Jamie looks better in every imaginable way. And I’m sure she feels the same. Who knows what changes we’ll see in the next five years.
