Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest
Hope. Love. Home. Sanctuary
It’s been very quiet here today. Freezing rain has left everything coated in a thick layer of ice, making it nearly impossible to travel to or from the sanctuary.
Jamie didn’t seem too upset by the fact that her two-acre habitat had frozen over. In fact, she seemed to relish the opportunity to stay inside, make a cozy nest with blankets, giant stuffed animals, and her favorite boots, and leisurely flip through a new book about primates.
We give out over 70 fleece blankets each day so that the chimps can sleep in clean, comfortable nests. Night nests are usually built up off the ground on the catwalks in the playroom or on benches in the smaller front rooms. Sometimes the chimps sleep near each other, other times they seek privacy.
Annie often gathers blankets from the playroom and front rooms to build her nest on a front room bench. Its takes a lot of work to get the nest just right.
Humans aren’t the only ones that like to curl up with a good book on a rainy morning.
The chimps spent the early part of the day on Young’s Hill, but before long the rain had them retreating back inside to the cozy greenhouse and playroom. Jamie returned to find a new book, one of many sent in recently by a generous supporter, and she immediately gathered all of her favorite things so that she could flip through her book from the comfort of a good nest.
The only problem – the nest was too comfortable.
Her eyelids grew heavier and heavier until she couldn’t fight it anymore, and she drifted off to sleep.
Her new book would have to wait.
I woke up thinking that I should feature Jody on the blog today. She’s a bit more elusive than some of the other chimpanzees, so we don’t get as many photos and videos of her.
She does have her routines, though.
Today, we spread a forage on the hill at lunch, and Jody, true to form, collected the food she wanted, came back inside, and emptied it on the deck while she sat on the lower part of the platform in the greenhouse.
Then, she spent some time relaxing – we often see her in this position:
She did a little self-grooming:
Graciously allowed me to take some close-up photos of her beautiful face:
Volunteer Lynn and I were talking about Jody’s very round eyes that often appear to be hopeful or excited about something:
She soon retired to the cooler playroom for a post-meal siesta:
If you’re having a bad day, this should make you feel better:
Amazingly, this is only the second best video of chimps holding hands that you will see this week. If you haven’t yet, check out this story about Terry and Jeannie from our friends at Save the Chimps.
I love taking photos and video of the chimpanzees running around, being active, and getting into mischief. Active chimpanzees are generally happy chimpanzees, and when I watch them explore and run I think of all of the years they lived in small cages.
There’s also something incredible, though, about watching the chimps truly relax.
Today the sun is streaming into the playroom and seems to be making Jamie and Negra very sleepy.
Jamie, in typical Jamie fashion, is curled up in her nest with boots and toys:
Of course, being Jamie, this nap is not going to last very long:
Negra is in her spot on the catwalk of the playroom in front of the window – feet up in the air:
Doesn’t this just make you want to join them in relaxing in the sun?
Chimpanzees spend a lot of time in their nests. In the wild, they tend to bed down at dusk and remain there for about 12 hours until the sun rises again. On average, they sleep for 9 to 10 hours, waking now and again throughout the night and even calling to group members in other trees but rarely leaving their nests.
Here at the sanctuary, most of the chimps follow a similar 12-hour nesting pattern, even though the length of each day here in Central Washington changes drastically with the seasons. On a typical day, the chimps eat dinner at 4:30 and get their evening food puzzles at 5:00. When they are done eating, they begin to make their nests indoors, and almost everyone is in bed by the time we’re wrapping up our workday at 5:30. This is true even in the summer when it stays light outside until 10:00!
Once the chimps are inside for the night, we close off Young’s Hill for security reasons. But if any of the chimps choose to stay outside, two staff members stay at the chimp house until the chimps choose to come back in.
Jamie, as you may have heard, is not like the other chimps. She needs very little sleep, and she has no interest in lying awake in her nest for hours counting sheep. So, being the clever chimp that she is, she figured out that all she has to do is stay outside after dinner or even sit in the doorway to Young’s Hill and, just like that, she has two companions for the rest of the evening.
When she keeps her caregivers here late, she usually does three of four purposeful walks around Young’s Hill, much like her daytime patrols. But eventually, even she grows tired of the walks and it becomes obvious that she’s just killing time to keep her human friends around a bit longer.
On our last walk last night at 8pm, she made a point of climbing every structure on the hill.
She crossed every fire hose bridge.
Finally, she sat quietly at the highest point on the hill and took in the view.
When she decided that she’d had enough, she climbed down and returned to the chimp house.
Even Jamie needs to sleep eventually. Which is good, because her caregivers do too.
