Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest

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termite mound

Chimpanzees and insect eating

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When I started to write this, J.B. was leading a Summer Visit tour:

JB giving presentation

I’d be willing to bet that one of the things he explained is what we put in the termite mound / treat rock on Young’s Hill. Generally, what we say is that the termite mound mimics ant hills or termite mounds that chimpanzees encounter in the wild, and we provide the chimpanzees with tools to access the goodies inside. It’s great enrichment because it involves tool use and problem solving, and it taps into natural chimpanzee behavior.

The difference, we explain, is that chimpanzees in captivity do not appreciate termites and ants! They react to “bugs” the same way most industrialized human cultures do – as a nuisance, but definitely not as a source for food. And that is why, instead of insects, we put things like mashed up bananas and/or peanut butter in the mound for the chimpanzees to fish out.

The chimpanzees, however, have a way of proving what we say to be wrong. I still don’t think that any of the chimpanzees would appreciate it if we put insects in the pvc tubes that screw into the termite mound, but Jamie and Missy have recently discovered a surprising delicacy – wasp larvae.

This is doubly surprising, given that the chimps certainly do not like wasps, and Jamie has been stung before. Apparently, that risk is worth harvesting this new treat. I wonder how they even discovered that the nests contained something they would like!

Here are a few photos I managed to get of Jamie with a nest that she brought in from Young’s Hill:

Jamie with a wasps' nest

 

Jamie with a wasps' nest 4

 

Jamie with a wasps' nest 3

 

Watching her, it wasn’t entirely clear to me how much of the larvae she was eating, because she seemed to be selectively eating some parts and not others, but she was clearly enjoying the experience:

Jamie with a wasps' nest 2

 

I haven’t been able to capture any photos of Missy with wasp nests, so you’ll have to take my word that she is very excited when she has a nest, perhaps even more so than Jamie.

 

Speaking of Missy, it’s her 40th birthday tomorrow!!!

Missy on the hill

Above is a photo of Missy from today as she took a rest before running the perimeter of Young’s Hill.

 

I defy anyone to call Missy old – she has one of the youngest spirits I’ve known in a chimpanzee. Whether she is searching for wasp nests, running like mad, wrestling with her BFF Annie, or demanding garden tomatoes, she demonstrates, daily, a sense of freedom that she’s found in her second chance at life (read this blog post from 2014 about Missy’s quite literal second chance).

We will be having a big celebration for Missy 40th tomorrow, so be sure to check here on the blog for photos of the party and wish her a happy birthday!

Chimpanzee Parkour

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Last week, I posted a photo of Missy on her Facebook page leaping off of the termite mound. Her friend Debra Durham commented on the photo, “parkour!” I thought to myself, “exactly!”

If you haven’t heard of parkour, well, you can thank me for letting you in on what, just two days ago, ABC news called, “the new sport that has everyone buzzing.” It’s basically people using the “urban landscape” as a playground. The people who are good at it make leaping and jumping and rolling on concrete and rooftops look effortless (unlike how I would look if I tried it). In many ways, it really is similar to the way Missy moves everyday.

Whenever I see Missy on Young’s Hill – running at full speed, leaping off of the termite mound, climbing  log posts or the tall bamboo (usually with a huge playface), or grabbing her friend Annie’s ears in playful joy, I am reminded of what Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest has given this group of chimpanzees who lived for decades in small cages within windowless rooms.

For each of the chimpanzees, sanctuary has provided something unique to them. For Missy, perhaps it’s parkour:

Missy sitting on the treat rock

Missy about to leap from treat rock

missy performing parkour

Thank you for being a part of making Missy’s life in sanctuary exactly what she chooses it to be.

Tool Use and the Termite Mound

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web Missy tool use treat rock peanut butter sticks youngs hill IMG_0052

Jane Goodall’s research was ground-breaking in many ways, but one of her most important discoveries was that chimpanzees possess the ability to use tools. At the time, it was thought that tool use was a defining characteristic of the human species. But shortly after she began studying the chimpanzees of Gombe, Dr. Jane saw them using sticks to fish termites out of their nests. When she reported her findings to her mentor, Louis Leakey, he famously wrote, “Now we must redefine tool, redefine Man, or accept chimpanzees as humans.”

Over the last 50 years, primatologists have discovered that the use of tools to “fish” for termites and ants is even more complex than had originally been thought. Chimpanzees have been observed bringing “tool kits,” containing a variety of tools for different purposes, to the nests. For example, some tools are used specifically to perforate the nests of army ants. Breaking nests open by hand tends to result in an aggressive counter-attack by the ants, and may even cause them to relocate the nest. Using the perforating tool results in a less painful experience and allows for the harvesting of the ants to be sustainable. Other tools are used specifically for dipping into the nest, and their size and shape, as well as the technique for ingesting the insects once they are caught, are influenced by the behavior of the insects being harvested. And all of these techniques are influenced by culture, which is to say that they are learned and not determined by genetics and environment alone. They differ from community to community, as each community has its own set of knowledge and traditions.

When we built Young’s Hill, the Young’s provided the funds for us to build an artificial termite mound. The mound is actually hollow and consists of concrete laid over a rebar framework. Stainless steel tubes protrude through the concrete, and we can climb in and attach PVC tubes filled with food treats on the inside. The mound also protects critical irrigation components for the bamboo groves.

Most captive chimpanzees, having been raised outside of the cultures found in free-living communities, do not consider insects to be food. So we stick with what they enjoy – in this case, frozen banana mixed with peanut butter and almond milk.

If you’re impressed with Jamie’s tool-using abilities, vote for her in the Humane Society of the United States’ chimpanzee art contest.