Sanctuary

Graze Anatomy

September 12, 2022 by Anthony

Before I dive into today’s blog, I have an exciting update to share: The HOOT! 2022 online auction started today!

You can visit the online-only page to decide which amazing items to bid on. Tickets are still available for the live event which will be held on Friday, Sept. 16 at The Foundry by Herban Feast in Seattle! You can learn more about the event by clicking here and buy tickets here.

We caregivers also enjoy viewing (and occasionally bidding on) items that commemorate our favorite sanctuary residents. Although there are some great chimpanzee-themed items, I must admit that I am quite partial to the plush Cuddle Clone of the Jersey cow, Meredith.

As many of you already know, the pastures that surround the sanctuary’s Chimp House provide a home to four rescued cattle: Betsy, Honey, Meredith and Nutmeg. This little herd helps the sanctuary by consuming vegetation that could potentially fuel wildfires. In turn, we give them food, water, shelter, enrichment, veterinary care, and everything else they need to thrive. Caring for these creatures is often quite different from the work we do with chimpanzees, so I’m taking a moment to share some interesting trivia about the sanctuary’s lovable, living lawnmowers.

Domestic cattle (Bos taurus) are often called bovines because they belong to the subfamily Bovinae. This group also includes bison, buffalo, yaks, and other species of wild cattle. Sheep, goats and antelope are their closest living relatives and belong in the same family: Bovidae.

The ancestor of all living cattle is the extinct aurochs (B. primigenius). Aurochs once ranged across Eurasia and North Africa and were commonly depicted in prehistoric art (e.g. the Lascaux cave painting shown below). People across the Roman Empire commonly used them in bullfights, but they likely went extinct due to deforestation, over-hunting, and competition with domestic cattle. The last known aurochs cow lived in Poland and died in 1627.

Jersey cattle are specifically adapted to life on Jersey, one of the United Kingdom’s Channel Islands. The island’s human inhabitants carefully bred these cattle to yield milk with a high percentage of butterfat, and even prohibited the importation of foreign cattle in order to maintain this quality.
Jerseys are not the most popular dairy breed in North America. That title belongs to the black-and-white Holstein-Friesian, which are larger and produce more milk per cow.

Newborn cattle are called calves (e.g. newborn Nutmeg with mother Betsy, shown in the Farm Sanctuary photograph above). Immature females are called heifers and are only considered cows after birthing their first calf. Calves gestate for nine months and typically remain dependent on their mother’s milk for ten months before naturally weaning.

Ranchers often castrate male calves so they don’t develop into adult bulls, which are difficult to house and manage. Young castrated males are called steers until they eventually mature into fully-grown oxen. Historically, humans utilized oxen as draught animals for pulling plows and carts. Even though they are a relatively small cattle breed (females are usually around 800 pounds), Jersey bulls and oxen can grow up to 1,800 pounds.

The glands on cattle noses make distinct patterns that are as unique as human fingerprints.

Cattle horns and hooves are bony structures encased in sheaths of keratin, the same protein that makes up human nails and hair. Hooves generally grow ⅕ -¼ of an inch each month. The hooves of domestic cattle must be trimmed periodically to prevent a variety of health issues (below).

The common safety practice of horn removal is called polling. The remaining knob is called a poll and any subsequent horn growths are called scurs.

Cattle and other ruminants have a complex, multi-chambered stomach that specializes in breaking down fibrous plant matter. They do not have four stomachs. The chambers are called the rumen, reticulum, omasum and abomasum (diagram below) . The rumen alone can hold up to 25 gallons of plant material. Each chamber contains a unique microbiome that is critical for proper digestion and overall health.

Cattle regurgitate chunks of semi-digested food called cud. They chew these again before re-ingesting them. This process is called “rumination” or “chewing the cud.” They chew in a conspicuous circular motion, grinding the forage against a leathery dental pad that they develop in place of upper incisors

Bovines are quite intelligent and have excellent long-term memories. Experiments show that cattle can discern between individual humans and learn to avoid humans who treat them roughly and trust humans who treat them kindly.

Cattle herds are complex societies that regularly split up and reunite (fission-fusion behavior). When not managed by humans, cattle form matriarchal hierarchies where bulls only associate for competition and breeding.

Domestic cattle can run up to 17 miles per hour (for short distances).

Cattle develop friendships with familiar individuals and reinforce their social bonds through grooming. Their preferred method of grooming is to lick each other with their raspy prehensile tongues (which also help them to grab food).

The USDA estimates the current global population of domestic cattle to be over one billion head (individuals), up 13.2 million from the previous year. These populations contribute significantly to anthropogenic climate change. The methane released from cattle ranches accounts for around 14% of global emissions.

Red meat consumption peaked in 1976 and has fallen dramatically since, but the average American still consumes around 57.2 pounds of beef each year. Ranching remains a key industry in the communities near the sanctuary (below). Recently, the availability of plant-based meat substitutes, the rising costs of beef production, and the recent drought in the American West may all be contributing to this decline.

Now you’re all prepared to absolutely slay a Jeopardy category on the subject of bovines. You’re welcome.

Don’t forget to check out the HOOT! page to get your bovine collectibles and contribute to their sanctuary home!

Redecorating

September 9, 2022 by J.B.

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.

Bringing the outside in

September 8, 2022 by Anna

As Chad mentioned on Tuesday, Jamie’s Group is off Young’s Hill for the moment so we can complete the new outdoor expansion. Since the original 7 are so used to foraging for their own browse this time of year, it seems particularly important to make sure they still get to sample the edible plants growing naturally on the property. This afternoon Chad visited the pond to harvest some fresh cattails for their enjoyment. I love watching the subtle cattail fluff slowly drift around the greenhouse.

“Chimps Are Off The Hill”

September 6, 2022 by Chad de Bree

A couple of years ago, Caregiver Anthony wrote a blog about some of the lingo we use around the sanctuary. As staff prepare for the day to end, one of the things we do is a head count of each chimpanzee to ensure they are off of Young’s Hill and aren’t out in the cold at night. When we are able to close off Young’s Hill (at Jamie’s discretion that is), we announce over the radio “the chimps are off the hill.” It is one of the more common announcements made over the radio that can be heard around the sanctuary.

As J.B. mentioned a couple of months ago, the construction around the Young’s Hill expansion and The Bray is picking up. Well, we have reached the point of that blog where Jamie’s group will not have access to Young’s Hill for a little bit. As caregivers, we are obviously conflicted by this. On one hand, they will not have access to Young’s Hill. On the other hand, their outside habitat is expanding and Cy’s group will get the opportunity to venture into The Bray. Plus there’s the addition of new climbing structures and flora for them to interact with. There are cost and benefits to everything, and I personally think the benefits are astronomical in comparison to the cost of some time off Young’s Hill.

So please excuse the hiatus of seeing photos of the chimpanzees on Young’s Hill. They will still have access to their greenhouse, which still provides them with fresh air and sunshine during this time.

And enjoy these recent photos!

Missy and Annie on their morning patrol before coming in to make way for construction.

Terry enjoying one of his favorite food puzzles: Boomer Balls!

Honey B falling into slumber while watching the humans clean.

Cy catching up on his reading during National Read a Book Day!

Honey B enjoying lunch in the Oakwood Greenhouse!

“Are the chimps trained?”

September 5, 2022 by Anthony

When I tell people that I work at a chimpanzee sanctuary, they usually respond with one of the following frequently-asked questions: Do you get to touch the chimps? Do they go outside? Can people visit the sanctuary?

Today’s blog post responds to another common question with a complex answer: Are the chimps trained?

If this question refers to the awful practice of coercing captive primates to perform tasks for our entertainment, then the answer is a plain and emphatic “no.” (“We don’t do that here.”)

When defined more broadly though, behavioral training can be an important practice for improving and maintaining excellent animal welfare. For example, chimpanzees can be taught to voluntarily cooperate in their own veterinary care, greatly reducing the stress and risk associated with medical procedures. Training can also be a powerful tool for improving human-chimpanzee relationships, desensitizing chimps to unfamiliar environmental changes, and providing the chimps with additional cognitive, social and sensory enrichment.

CSNW, like many institutions that care for chimpanzees, has adapted a behavioral training program to improve the lives of the residents. Our past training initiatives have helped us administer medical care and monitor chimpanzee wellness over the years. We are now revamping this framework to utilize a larger staff, accommodate an additional group of chimps, and target loftier goals. Last year, we invited Margaret Whittaker of Creative Animal Behavior Solutions to review training methodology and help us optimize our plans for the future. One key takeaway has been that progress requires a shared understanding of the underlying theory and familiarity with common techniques. We caregivers should understand what training is, value training as an important component of care, and know how to train efficiently and responsibly.

Essentially, training is the process of behavior modification through learning. We often call training between humans “teaching” and training with non-humans “conditioning,” but they’re basically synonymous. Our preferred type of training, operant conditioning, allows the chimps to voluntarily participate and choose which behaviors to present. The chimpanzees are free to come and go at their own leisure, and we never punish them for choosing not to participate. Indeed, certain individuals often decline our invitation because they have better things to do, and that’s okay. In operant conditioning, they’re the operators.

Although the semantics are complicated, the activity of operant conditioning is actually quite simple. First, the trainer uses both a verbal and gestural cue to communicate that a desired behavior will be rewarded in the subsequent window. (You can see an example of J.B. asking Burrito to present his right foot below.) Then, the trainer uses an audible “bridge” to mark the correct behavior and indicate that a treat is on the way. This edible reward is a form of motivation via positive reinforcement. In training jargon, “positive” refers to the addition of a stimulus and “reinforcement” refers to the increase in a desired behavior.

In short, we give rewards when the chimps choose to do desirable behaviors.

You may be wondering why we choose to modify chimpanzee behavior through training. After all, the chimps are wild creatures and we should respect their freedom to choose their own behavior. Even so, captivity is an unfortunate and complicated circumstance, unfairly chosen for them long ago, and purposeful training has the potential to make this environment more comfortable for them. Of course, we caregivers carry the responsibility to only focus our efforts on behaviors that benefit the chimps and use the least intrusive, minimally aversive methods for each.

Some examples of behaviors we train and rehearse are:

Eating cooperatively and/or at stations (allowing subordinate group members to receive food)

Presenting various body parts for injury treatment and monitoring

Receiving injections for vaccinations and sedation/immobilization

Shifting between enclosures to enable cleaning and to facilitate social integrations

Sitting on a bench scale to monitor weight and body condition

In the future, we will also prioritize desensitizing the chimps to uncomfortable but necessary medical procedures, including heart and lung auscultation, radiographs, EKGs and ultrasounds. These approaches usually require that we isolate, immobilize and anesthetize chimpanzees; winning their voluntarily participation is a safer and less stressful alternative for all involved!

I hope to share more content related to behavioral training (including visual demonstrations of our progress) in the near future!

This Is A Bit Munch

September 4, 2022 by Grace

Hi, everyone! It’s a *beautiful* Sunday here in Cle Elum and it feels like everyone’s enjoying it. Right now I can see Cy on the security monitors relaxing in the Mezzanine with a new magazine, a few mall walkers walkin’, and Jamie’s group relaxing after a lunch forage on Young’s Hill. For today’s forage we had baked sweet potatoes, mini sweet peppers, tomatoes, and cucumbers… And the chimps were so very excited. Baking fruits and veggies might seem like no big deal to us humans, but the chimps (for the most part) love it when they get baked foods. Whether it be the texture change or the natural sweetness that comes from baking a fruit, they get all worked up in the best way.

Speaking of mealtimes, the other day I was sitting with Gordo at dinner and he allowed me to snag a few videos of him eating. If you’re anything like me, it is the bane of your existence when you can hear another human chewing their meals. It’s not logical, I know, but something about it just gives me uncomfortable goosebumps. Having the opportunity to sit and listen to the chimps eat, though, is the best. The humans have talked about it and for some reason most of us feel the same way- listening to the chimps eat with their food grunts, lip smacks, and munchin’ sounds just makes you smile.

You might not believe me and that’s okay, but don’t worry- I’ve compiled a six minute long video of the chimps munchin’ away to try and change your mind. 🙂

P.S: don’t forget that our annual fundraiser is coming up next week! On Friday, September 16th we will be celebrating the chimps at HOOT! 2022! You can read more on the celebration in Diana’s blog post here, but you can still purchase tickets for both in-person and virtual festivities. We will have a live and silent auction, with items so good that some of us caregivers are trying to figure out how to snag them without Diana noticing, and if you sign up for a VIP ticket (for either in-person or virtual) you will be registered to attend an exclusive, virtual tour of the sanctuary! Join us to celebrate the chimps and sanctuary next week! 🙂 See more by clicking here.

P.P.S: As a 501(c)(3) registered nonprofit organization, we rely on your support to provide lifetime quality care and sustainable sanctuary for our residents. There are a variety of ways to support us- like helping us reach our goal of being rated a 2022 Great Top-Rated nonprofit by GreatNonprofits! It’s as easy as going here and clicking “Share Your Story”. The humans, and the residents, of CSNW say thanks in advance!

Now, some photos from today’s forage on Young’s Hill! 🙂

Annie, enjoying some peppers: