Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary

Missy

What’s for Lunch?

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Today we had a very fall colored lunch! The chimps enjoyed carrots, tomatoes, and some sweet potatoes. There were lots of food grunts and squeaks all through the chimp house.

Jamie stood on higher ground to get a good view of what was served:

Missy also climbed up to get a view (mostly for the tomatoes):

Burrito holding on to some sweet potato:

Negra was really enjoying the sweet potato (Neggie was not as interested in the cut up tomato, she only really likes them whole):

Jamie on her firehose perch:

Volunteer Lizz serving Annie some tomatoes:

Did we mention Missy’s favorite food is tomatoes?:

Jamie loading up on the veggies:

Negra patiently waiting for her carrot while the wind causally blows through her hair:

 

 

 

 

How’s your chimp ID?

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One of the first things new chimp house volunteers start learning is how to identify each of the chimpanzees. When you’re meeting a group of chimps for the first time (or the first ten times), they can often look frustratingly similar to one another. Eventually, of course, they start to look like individuals and you wonder how you could ever have mixed them up. But there’s a definite learning curve.

It helps to be able to spend some time just staring at each chimpanzee, so I just made these videos for our volunteers, in which you can see each of the seven chimpanzees from every angle, just being themselves. I thought some of our blog followers might appreciate them also. And if you’re not interested in working on your chimp ID, the videos make seven good excuses just to look at each of these beautiful chimps for several minutes.

(For extra credit, click on each name below to learn some identifying physical characteristics for each individual).

Annie:

Burrito:

Foxie:

Jamie:

Jody:

Missy:

Negra:

Burrito’s Close-up

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Being the only male can be hard…

But who could resist this handsome fellow!

Here are a few extra photos…

Missy eating apples on the Hill this morning:

Missy foraging for corn at lunch:

Jody’s loot today:

Negra was really excited about corn:

Annie did pretty well during the lunch forage:

Foxie:

And then there is Jamie (she has been enjoying her new firehose swing):

 

 

Missy

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Missy came alarmingly close to never making it out of the research lab. She almost died while recovering from a hysterectomy shortly before moving to the sanctuary. Missy is so full of life these days that it’s easy to forget that if things had played out just a little differently, we never would have had the opportunity to get to know and love her. What a loss it would have been.

Missy is who we all want to be. She is fearless, cool, and adventurous. She’s strong and athletic, with a penchant for daredevilry. She has a silly sense of humor and is fiercely loyal to her friends. Though she does on occasion honor us with her attention, she usually prefers chimp company. And that’s fine with us – we’re just glad she’s in our world.

Annie’s Birthday Bash

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What a day of celebrating beautiful, dear, sweet Annie! We decided to have the party on Young’s Hill, the chimps’ 2-acre outdoor habitat and it was complete with a chimp favorite, watermelon bowls filled with lettuce, blueberries, cherry tomatoes, onions, and cabbage, and a new treat of banana leaves filled with roasted sweet potatoes and onions and leftover watermelon, and beautiful organic sunflowers strewn about!

Aren’t these amazing?! They’re bigger than Kelsi! 🙂 We have the best volunteers who found a recipe for wrapping good stuff in squares of the leaves and another who found them in Seattle for us! Something completely new for the chimps!

Here’s the birthday lady opening her banana leaf packet:

Jody was actually first onto the hill and was very excited to make it back with two watermelon bowls! I caught her mid-blink – sorry Jo! – and food squeaking with delight:

Negra’s approach to the forage was to wait for Jody to bring her haul back to the greenhouse and promptly try to take it!:

Jody kindly let her have one. That said, when Jody came back later with another one she wasn’t so willing to give it up which the Queen wasn’t too happy about, though she did get what Jody couldn’t shovel in fast enough. Oh, Neggie:

Burrito found a bowl for himself and started to make his way back to the greenhouse food squeaking all the way. But he stopped short when he saw Jody and Negra near the raceway and decided to try and play it cool so as not to attract their attention (or probably more specifically, Negra’s). You can see how excited he is by his hair standing on end (pilo-erect):

Of course, he couldn’t wait too long before taking some bites:

Jamie’s tactic was to collect everything she wanted and put it in a good place to return to when she was ready:

Missy:

Annie and Jody out for more:

And Foxie! She was way out on one of the structures by herself when she found a watermelon bowl.

Then…Oh. My. Heart! We could hear Foxie food squeaking with excitement when all of a sudden she just couldn’t contain herself! When chimpanzees are overwhelmed with excitement or fear they will often express a facial gesture known as a “fear grimace.” This is what Foxie is doing here, but she was SUPER excited. Usually others chimps are nearby and they reassure one another, but Foxie just kept looking at us from afar as if to say, “Do you see this??!! Watermelon bowls!!! I just can’t…” We love how excited the chimpanzees get over something as seemingly simple as fresh food. It never seems to get old for them and certainly seeing their joy never gets old for us.

Happy 44th, Annie! May all your days and years ahead be filled with more love, joy and adventure than you ever imagined. We love you so very much!

You Better Keep Up

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This morning everyone was on the move and cattails were still very much a theme! Jody seemed to have lot of ground to make up for because this morning we could barely keep up with her. In the afternoon the chimps had a delicious lunch forage and spent the rest of the day grooming, walking (Jamie), and playing with human and non-human friends. Overall, the chimps had a nice relaxing Sunday spent with good food, people, and friends.

Negra on the Hill this morning grabbing a few things:

 

Like I said Jody was on the go all morning. However, I did find a sleepy Jo in the early morning before everyone had access to the Hill, curled up on a pile of hay soaking up some sun:

Once they had access to the Hill I couldn’t keep up. Here is a sequence of her movements this morning.

Jody was the first one on the Hill:

Everything looked good so she headed back to enjoy some chow:

Jody (climbing up) seemed to be on a mission (Annie-left, Missy-right, Foxie-behind log):

Over the bridge:

To find cattails:

Burrito always enjoys some early morning play sessions, he was running around like crazy playing chase:

Burrito didn’t really feel like going on the Hill today, so he patiently waited in the Green House for everyone to come back:

Annie also was soaking in the warm sun in the Green House:

Annie walked out bipedally to eat her chow on the Hill:

And also to get some time to herself:

 

Dr. Missy

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As you may already know, chimpanzees groom each other for both socialization and hygiene. They keep diligent track of any injury their friends have sustained and are always on hand to squeeze, prod, pick at, or even gently bite an offending wound. This does a pretty good job of keeping things open and clean. At the sanctuary, no one is more dedicated to the job of wound groomer than Missy Chimpanzee (AKA Dr. Missy).

Last week we had to do a quick surgical procedure to stitch Jody’s partially detached eyelid back together. She continues to recover and improve, but as an added precaution to make sure she heals smoothly (and gets to keep her stitches as long as possible), we separated her again from the group yesterday evening. Dr. Missy will need to wait a bit longer before she can do some serious grooming.

The doctor in action: