Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

Foxie

International Women’s Day

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Today is International Women’s Day, so it seems only appropriate to recognize and celebrate some of the influential women in our field, and in our lives. If you missed Tuesday’s post by Amanda focused on women in primatology, go check it out!

I think it is safe to say that Dr. Jane Goodall is an inspiration to all of us who love and care for chimpanzees. For most of us, our love of the species and individuals is shown in the daily care we provide to them, our friendships built with them, and heard about extensively by our families and friends. But Dr. Goodall has shared her love and passion far beyond the boundaries of her inner circle. She has made a tremendous impact by inspiring both current and future advocates, caregivers, veterinary technicians, and veterinarians of chimpanzees through sharing their stories and the importance of preserving their place on our planet. Beyond that, she is a symbol of success in science for young girls and women everywhere to look up to and aspire to. Her passion for chimpanzees and conservation work has spanned decades, and she continues to travel and advocate for chimpanzees and the importance of conservation to this day (she will be speaking in Seattle later this month!). I was fortunate enough to meet Dr. Goodall briefly when she visited Chimp Haven several years ago. We had the opportunity to listen to stories she shared about meeting chimpanzees living in laboratories and seeing the conditions they had experienced, and then getting to witness the lives they had in sanctuary after many years of work to get them there. It was a wonderful day getting to introduce our chimpanzee friends to Dr. Goodall, if only we could explain to them how cool of a person they were getting to see! All that to say, we admire and celebrate you, Dr. Goodall, and are so thankful for everything you have done and continue to do for chimpanzees and our planet.

Caregiver Ellen talking with Dr. Jane Goodall during a visit to Chimp Haven. My colorful shoes were painted by chimp friends!

Here at CSNW, we have many wonderful women to celebrate today…both chimpanzee and human! If you missed our Be Mine series in February, visit the links for each of our female chimp friends here: Mave, Dora, Rayne, Lucky, Honey B, Jamie, Foxie, Missy, Annie, and Negra, as well as our friend we have lost but whose memory we will always celebrate and remember, Jody.

Male chimps, at least in my experience, are usually easier to get to know and more willing to let you in. Take Terry, Cy, and Burrito for example. These lovely gentleman so readily accept you into their circle, and welcome you. My very first day getting to interact with the chimps, Chad took me to learn about appropriate interactions with Terry and he was so gentle and patient with someone who was (mostly) a stranger to him. He gently groomed the back of my hand, and let me rub him with my knuckle. The ladies, however, are often much more difficult to build friendships with. They have to test you first, making sure you are worthy of their time and friendship. This makes it all the more rewarding when they let you in though. One of the best moments I had recently was with Negra, who J.B. recently (and very accurately and lovingly) described as “a grumpy old lady.” I got to the sanctuary and was turning on lights and making my morning rounds of greeting the chimps. Neggie peeked up from her nest to look at me, and when I told her “Good morning, Neggie!” she quickly got up and made her way over to greet me. She offered me a kiss, and we sat and panted at each other for several seconds as she gave me a kiss on the back of my hand. Next she reached towards me, as if she wanted to groom the back of my hand. In my past experiences with Negra, this usually was not a well-intended gesture, so I was unsure if I should allow her to touch the back of my hand. I showed her my knuckle, politely asking if I could knuckle rub her arm, and she turned to press her arm against the mesh and sat with me for a few moments, letting me gently touch her arm with my knuckle while looking into my eyes. This moment was pure magic for me. Does this mean Negra will always be sweet to me from here on out? No. But it means she let me in, even if just for a few moments, and felt comfortable to allow me to spend that time with her. There’s just something special about those female friendships.

A kiss from Negra

Negra

Happy International Women’s Day to women everywhere! I’m including a shout out to my mom here, because I would not be the person I am today without her example of following her passions and the love, respect, and belief she has had in me at every step of my life. May you all be surrounded with such strong and influential women in your lives, and continue to change the world in ways big and small every single day! Together we can create a brighter future for generations of women to come, both human and chimpanzee.

 

What’d I miss?

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One of the best things about working here with the chimpanzees is that you are always excited to see them in the morning when you get to the Chimp House and if you’re lucky the chimps are equally thrilled to see you. When the mornings are quiet, it is so enriching for us and the chimps to have a quick grooming session or a game of chase to get the day started.

One of the more challenging aspects comes when one of us gets sick. I recently had my first experience with Covid-19, so I was out of work for over a week and I was finally able to return a few days ago. This is challenging for most caregivers because we definitely feel some amount of sadness over not being able to be a part of the chimps daily lives when we’re sick. I know for me personally, I miss them when I’m away for more than a few days and I find myself wondering what they’re doing a lot during my day.

While we can’t know if the chimps think of us or wonder where we are, we do get some indications that we’ve been missed when we come back and are greeted with very exuberant pant hoots and invitations to groom and/or play.

A memorable instance of this occurred when J.B. took a vacation last year. After a week-long absence, he came by to visit the chimp house when he returned, only to be spotted immediately by Jamie from Young’s Hill. Jamie, in her excitement let out an enthusiastic vocalization, that I imagine must have been just for J.B., and the whole group came out very excitedly to see him and take him on a walk around the Hill.

 

And now..
A quiet moment with Neggie and her carrot:

 

Also, Honey B is home with her group after her recent separation for an injury near her eye! More on her homecoming in an upcoming blog!

 

Be Mine, Foxie

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“Foxieee!!…” is an unapologetic and relatively common fan-girl level squeal you might hear ringing through the chimp house on any given day I greet her. Given that we’re both grown women, it’s ridiculous, but the joy in seeing this effervescent sprite of a person will not be contained. Nor should it be. Foxie’s typical response to this is for her hair to stand on end (pilo, in chimp lingo), run toward me, toss me her doll du jour, and sprint or pirouette off for a game of chase. If I’m extra fortunate, she might pause long enough to push her lips through the caging and greet me with a breathy pant and a kiss to the back of my hand. Oh, and I’m pilo, too, but unfortunately my hair doesn’t stand on end. 😉

I have had the profound privilege and joy of knowing Foxie and her beloved group members for around 13 and a half years or so now. For those of you who may be newer to our blog, they were the original group of seven chimpanzees who arrived to the sanctuary on June 13, 2008. It’s equally hard to believe so much time has passed as to imagine any time without them. When I look back on photos from earlier years I see a lot less gray hair on both of us, a little less hitch in our giddy-ups, but speaking for myself, always a heart the shape of her.

We’re asked all the time who among the chimpanzees is our “favorite”. Foxie is not my favorite. She is my family.

I cherish, no less, each of the unique relationships I have with the chimpanzees, a gracious gift of their choosing from them to us. And just as with humans, for whatever ineffable reasons, sometimes you just connect with one another in different ways.

Foxie was born on August, 8, 1976, to her mother, Winny, and her father, Brian, at the then Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research (now Texas Biomedical Research Institute) in San Antonio, Texas. Winny gave birth to 11 children and she died while living at the Alamogordo Primate Facility in New Mexico in 2013. Our records don’t indicate where Brian wound up, but it was unlikely in sanctuary. As is common for all chimpanzees used in biomedical research, Foxie has numerous full and half-siblings. Most are only listed as numbers. Her one younger sibling who we do have information on is her half-sister, Sophie, who was also born to Winny and thankfully resides at Save the Chimps in Florida.

What I find particularly delightful and interesting about Sophie, who would not have known Foxie, is that she also loves her dolls, especially stuffed monkeys. (Of important note if you are going to be Foxie’s friend: she DETESTS stuffed primate dolls and they are guaranteed to meet a swift and violent end involving immediate de-stuffing and beheading, so don’t even THINK about sending her one! 🙂 Foxie is a troll>Dora>Strawberry Shortcake & friends purist.).

Sophie and her monkeys. (Photos courtesy of Save the Chimps):

And my personal favorite, carrying her giant witch:

Foxie herself went on to be used in biomedical research for thirty years before arriving to her sanctuary home. Used as a “breeder” (lab terms) and in hepatitis vaccine research, Foxie gave birth to two sons, David and Steve, a rare set of twins, and two daughters, Angie and Kelsey. And like most chimpanzee mothers in labs, her children were stolen from her within days of birth to continue the cycle of research. Devastatingly, David and Steve died while still in the labs. And thankfully, Kelsey eventually made it to Chimp Haven in Louisiana (Caregiver Sabrina was so fortunate to work with her!). It’s our understanding that Kelsey has since passed away, but we’re profoundly grateful she had a chance to experience a wonderful life in sanctuary. And Foxie’s only remaining daughter, Angie, is living happily at Save the Chimps.

Kelsey (photo courtesy of staff caregiver, Sabrina):

Angie (the 1st). Photo courtesy of Save the Chimps:

When J.B., Diana, and Sarah (our former Director) met Foxie’s group, they had been living in a windowless basement of the Buckshire Corporation in Pennsylvania (which leases animals to labs for research) for over two years. Their cages were the size of bathroom stalls and they were lined up next to one another.

Foxie arrived here in 2008 as all her group members did, ghosts of themselves:

Foxie, nearly sixteen years living in sanctuary later, because of you:

I’ll never know how Foxie, or any of the chimpanzees, found the inner strength to survive a day in the labs, let alone over thirty years. But I hope she somehow always knew the magic she holds, the wondrous person she is. I think she did. She is one of the most intuitive and loving friends a chimp or a human could hope for. She is brave, cautiously adventurous, joyful beyond imagine, and she has a closet full of sassy pants and she’s not afraid to wear them while spitting in your face or round kicking steel doors to rile the neighbors.

As previously mentioned, probably one of the most well known and endearing facts about Foxie is her unwavering love (and to be honest, sometimes, love/hate) for her dolls. An intrigue first sparked shortly after her arrival, on July 13, 2008 (according to one of the very first blog posts!) by the chance meeting of Trixie the Troll, who staff happened across at Goodwill and thought the chimpanzees might be interested in. Foxie was interested. And she scooped Trixie right up:

All these years later, Foxie has hundreds of dolls (thanks again to you) and it’s rare to find her without one. She still enjoys her trolls, but some years ago she discovered Dora the Explorer dolls (she was over the moon for France Dora!) and now she’s primarily committed to Strawberry Shortcake and her friends. Of course it’s emotionally appealing to make the common assumption she’s replacing her lost children with the dolls. Does Foxie often exhibit mothering behavior toward her dolls? Yes. And does she also bite, beat and stomp the bejebus out of them? Yes. We can never know what’s inside her head, she’s her own person after all, but they clearly provide her with comfort, joy, and sometimes a means of expressing some very strong emotions. And that’s all we need to know.

One of Foxie’s favorite games is to pass her dolls back and forth through the caging with us as we chase her with them. These games are often raucous games complete with backflips (her, not me), hanging upside down and kicking about (still her) and wildly laughing hearts (both of us). But some of my most cherished times are when we’re just sitting together quietly, her hugging her doll close to her before handing them to me, then I in turn hug and “kiss” them before handing them back. Even now I think what an absolute act of courage for her to part with something she so dearly loves, feeling safe in the trust we will return what is rightfully hers to her as soon as she asks.

While I’m hugging the doll, Foxie will often nod her head and smile, softly hooing, or sometimes serenely gaze into the distance, lost in a passing thought. And so it goes for some time. Every outstretched hand, doll, and gaze, I hope, a sacred weaving, the tapestry of her strong spirit healing and reinforced with each thread of love and honoring from my heart to hers. Eventually she’ll tuck the doll into her, hold my gaze as she gently touches the back of my hand with her fingertips and then move on to her other important chimp business.

Foxie just being Foxie makes our hearts sing, but her courageous and curious spirit is something to witness. She’s one of the few chimpanzees who declines building a nest, preferring, nay, insisting, on sleeping on the bare ground. She doesn’t like blankets, or most things, touching her (and don’t try to tie any such thing around her dolls, either!). She’s not comfortable on structures that move and tests new ones out step by step, bite by bite. All of this makes perfect sense given her history. But what I love is that she doesn’t allow her fear or discomfort to deter her. She can be fearless! She just does things in her own way and time. Which is exactly what sanctuary is all about.

In 2016, long-time supporters made the Twister, an amazing structure on Young’s Hill, possible for the chimps. It’s an amazing tower of firehose with a crow’s nest at the very top. Occasionally we’d see Foxie attempt to climb up with her friends, but she always got part way and headed back down, vexed by all the moving parts.

Well, fast forward to a summer day two years later. I was walking around the perimeter with the chimpanzees when I noticed Foxie heading toward the Twister, and Jody, her dear friend, right behind her with a look of pure determination. What was going to happen?! I could see it as if in slow motion…as if Jody was telling Foxie, “That’s it, Foxie, today’s the day you’re going to the top!” Foxie climbed a few feet up one of the beams of the structure and hesitated. Jody came up right alongside her and ushered her, to my complete thrill and amazement, all the way to the top! I couldn’t believe it! I whooped and hollered and threw my hands in the air, announcing it on the radio, so proud of her! She glanced over at me and pounded her fists on the platform. I still remember the look of satisfaction and awe on her face as she took in the view. I’m forever grateful to Jody for that day. That’s just who she was to her family. To us all.

We hold immense gratitude for all of you who have made Foxie’s life here in sanctuary possible. Countless moments of adventure, choice, hope, healing, and love, all in her own choosing and time. YOU changed her life. And our special thanks go out to Foxie’s Pals: Vicki, Monica, Chris & Lee Ann, Donna, Sharlene, Donna, Jon & Sandra, Linda, Penelope, Jordan, Sara, Connie, Virginia, William, Nancy, Kimberly, JJ, and Jayne.

I believe the world became a more magical place the day Foxie was born. And though it would be some thirty years later before I would know it, so did my heart. If you find yourself in need of  some Foxie level enchantment in your life, please consider becoming Foxie’s Pal, too. From our hearts, thank you for being here.

Wood Wool Forage and More!

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Providing enrichment opportunities for the chimps and watching them enjoy the experience is truly a rewarding part of our job. Today we put out peanut butter frisbees, which is a favorite among Negra’s group. Surprisingly, Jamie shared this food puzzle with everyone including Foxie! After cleaning the playroom we noticed we had a lot of leftover wood wool. We decided to put the wood wool out in the green house and put out seeds in the wood wool for the chimps to search for. Watching them problem solve and find different tactics to engage with their enrichment always motivates us to keep creating more ways to enrich them throughout the day. Overall, making enrichment for chimpanzees is not only fun, but also deeply enriching for both chimpanzees and their caregivers.

Don’t forget to test your knowledge of chimpanzees and other primates!

Burrito tossing the wood wool around:

Negra stepped out onto Young’s Hill today 🙂

Jamie:

Goofy little Foxie:

Foxie grooming Negra in the green house:

Mirror Mania

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Chimpanzee intelligence is well-known and a specific aspect of their intelligence that I find particularly fascinating is their awareness of self as separate from others, or ‘theory of mind’. A classic experiment used to test for theory of mind in animals is the mirror test whereby a mark is placed on the face or some other body part of an animals and then they are presented with a mirror. If the animal notices the mark and reaches towards their own face instead of the one in the mirror, this indicates that they are aware that the image in the mirror is themself and not another animal. This works on a number of species we all recognize to be intelligent like elephants, dolphins, and the great apes while, interestingly, other nonhuman primates like monkeys, will fail this test. Human children typically begin to pass the mirror test around the age of two.

I’ve always enjoyed watching chimpanzees look at themselves in the mirror. Some are more interested than others in their own reflections, usually picking at marks or scabs on their face and head, opening their mouths to inspect their teeth and tongue, and sometimes making faces at themselves. Are they amused? Are they curious? What’s happening in those minds?!

To celebrate this endearing behavior, I’ve decided to put together a compilation of photos and videos of the chimps at CSNW looking at their own beautiful faces. Enjoy!

A Path Out

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We finally have a decent break from the snow and subfreezing temperatures. Though there are some more winter storms in the forecast, at least most days are going to be fairly mild in regard to temperature. In fact, for the first time in a long time, the sun has broken through the clouds to grace us with it’s warm presence. With the sun out, it was too good of an opportunity not to try to give Annie’s group Young’s Hill. After some light shoveling, a path to Young’s Hill was forged.

I must apologize, however. As I watched the pileup at the door that leads to Young’s Hill was opening, I realized I had forgotten the camera and my phone. I guess it boils down to I was too plum excited to see the color contrast of chimp and snow.

Foxie

Annie

Even with access to get their own snow, sometimes having the snow brought to you is the best. At least that seemed to be Jamie’s preference, with the addition of icicles and black cherry Stur water enhancers.

Missy also had joined Jamie in snow and icicles.

Some bonus photos of Willy B playing with Lucky a couple of days ago!

Library Day

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It’s no secret that Jamie Chimpanzee loves books, and after being on the nice list and getting lots of gifts at Christmas, she had amassed quite the book collection. Today we decided to give her lots of her books to look through all at once and called it Library Day. It was a blast! Sabrina and I had fun decorating for the occasion – setting up all of her books on their own shelves, and then providing cabbage, radicchio, and juice as refreshments for the event. It turned into a library party when the stars aligned and their enrichment for the day was peanut butter puzzles, so they got a lot of things they enjoy all at once!

Above: Jamie looking through her books.

Above: Jamie drinking juice from a tea cup.

Everyone except for Negra took turns drinking from the large juice pool by the library setup. Negra made her way upstairs quickly to the peanut butter puzzles and blankets and soon was cozy in her newly built nest.

Here is a photo of Negra that I took recently, being her wonderful, regal self.

I hope you all enjoy the video from today, and have had a wonderful holiday season. The celebrations continue at the sanctuary with Burrito’s birthday which is quickly approaching! If you would like to send gifts to help him celebrate, please check out our wish list here.