Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

habitats

Late Winter on the Hill and A Day in the Clinic

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The weather has been beautiful lately and the chimps have been taking full advantage of this false spring before the inevitable second winter strikes back. Enjoy a few scenes from The Bray and Young’s Hill from the past couple of days.

I also want to share with you that yesterday, Honey B took what we hope will be her last trip to the clinic for a while. Here’s more on that from Dr. Erin:

Yesterday, Honey B had her 3rd clinic trip to manage a bite wound on her left hand. She’s had 2 regional limb perfusions to concentrate antibiotics, including deep flushing of the infected wound. Despite twice daily laser treatments, x-rays, and antibiotics, the swelling and drainage have persisted. A team of medical professionals, including Dr. Jeffrey Friedrich, a board certified hand surgeon, and surgery residents Dr. Thais Calderon and Dr. Emma Dwyer, performed a deeper exploratory surgery, which, unfortunately, resulted in the amputation of the affected finger to prevent arthritis and chronic pain. As sad as we are that we couldn’t defeat the bone infection in Honey B’s finger, we are looking forward to her being more comfortable and regaining better use of her hand. We’re grateful for the expertise of Dan Low MD (chimp anesthesiologist extraordinaire) who introduced us to Dr. Friedrich, CRNA Kate Uselman (anesthesia), Dr. Rachelle Chavez, DC, OB/GYN, and sonographer Huong Johnston who performed ultrasound and a complete pelvic exam. Honey B recovered well and was awake and hungry by dinnertime. Even though she was ready to join a brief fray yesterday afternoon, she will need to be isolated for a few days to monitor her healing. A huge thank you goes out to the entire medical team for their care and expertise!

And a huge thank you to Dr. Erin, too!

One team performs the ultrasound while another begins a regional limb perfusion:

The anesthesia team monitors Honey B’s vitals:

The surgical team at work, while CSNW Vet Assistant, Krissy, and visiting veterinary student extern, Eden, observe and help coordinate:

Honey B in recovery:

And Honey B the next day, ready to explore and rejoin her friends (but not until the doc gives the OK):

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.

Construction Update

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Summers are always busy at the sanctuary but this year seems more hectic than ever. We had the first of many volunteer work parties a couple weeks ago to work on the electric fences that will enclose the Bray and the renovated Young’s Hill, the 1.8-acre and 2.4-acre habitats for the new group of nine and the Cle Elum Seven. Many thanks to volunteer Karen Ducey for these first two photos.

The installation of the fence insulators is a daunting job due to the sheer number of them, but over a dozen hard-working volunteers managed to install a couple thousand in just one weekend.

Tomorrow, volunteers will return to keep the progress going.

The project foreman, Benny, will be on hand to make sure the work proceeds apace. It’s best not to get on his bad side.

Central Nursery arrived today to begin installing a massive new irrigation system that will initially support over 100 new trees and shrubs in the habitats including aspen, pine, hazelnut, dogwood, blueberry, and bamboo. The irrigation system will draw water from an old spring-fed irrigation pond by the house that was used to water the orchard back when this was a working homestead. We are installing more irrigation lines than we will need in this first phase so that we can plant even more trees and shrubs in the future.

We’re a little late taking panels off the greenhouses this year because of all the construction going on around them.

On the east side of the building, the folks from Sage Mechanical have been installing new overhead chutes that will make additional connections between the indoor enclosures and the Bray. This way, the chimps can reach their outdoor habitat from the front rooms, playroom, or greenhouse and won’t ever have to wait for us to finish cleaning to get where they want to go.

Here’s the view from the playroom window. To most people, these tunnels would not be the most exciting part of our expansion project but based on how much the chimps love the existing chute and how we’ve seen chimps use overhead tunnels at other sanctuaries, we’re pretty sure they’re going to be a big hit.

On the other side of the building, a smaller section of chute is being installed that will create an outdoor connection between the other playroom and greenhouse. This was conceived as a connection to the closed-top outdoor enclosure planned for the west side of the building but that larger project is on hold due to escalating costs and significant supply chain delays. But now that our new group of nine is living together in relative harmony and will soon have access to The Bray, the closed-top enclosure is far less important than it was when we first began making plans for the two separate Wildlife Waystation groups. We imagine the chimps will love to sit out in this chute and watch the staff, volunteers, and delivery people come up the driveway.

Finally, we are also starting to plan for and build new climbing structures within the future Young’s Hill and Bray enclosures. The first one to get underway was Ryan’s Lookout, which is being built with a generous donation from Karen and Don Young in memory of their son, Ryan. The basic structure is complete and soon it will be surrounded by trees and shrubs as well as fire hose vines for the chimps to swing on and tightrope-walk across. I think this will be a popular spot for the groups to sit and groom and stare out at the river and valley below.

Our hope is to have the renovated Young’s Hill ready by late summer and the Bray ready by fall. Soon we will have to tear down the existing fence, at which point the Seven won’t have access to the hill and the pressure to get everything completed will be intense! While I was of course joking about Benny being a foreman, in all seriousness, Jamie will be watching and patience is not one of her virtues. So that should help keep us motivated. But the disruption will be worth it when she finally gets to lay in the shade of the towering pines at the top of her new habitat.