Gorillas and things

Kriba and baby Kipenzi at Taronga Zoo

On the way from South Africa last month, I had a brief visit to Sydney's Taronga Zoo for the sole purpose of visiting their two groups of Western lowland gorillas. Anyone who knows me well will be aware that I am a gorilla nut, they are my absolute favourite animals, but I don't often get the chance to spend time watching them in the flesh. Whilst I didn't enjoy the zoo itself all that much, and found the gorilla enclosures (and the loud, disrespectful and highly populous horde of visitors!) to be not the greatest, I did enjoy spending quiet moments with Kibali and Kimya, as their enclosure wasn't as mobbed as the main one, and they had access to an area away from the rude public. Admittedly, seeing the beautiful Kriba with her utterly gorgeous new infant, Kipenzi was very special. It's wonderful to see apes being raised lovingly by there mothers, so many apes are not so lucky in this regard. I had just spent two weeks at a sanctuary caring for many ape orphans, so seeing an infant lucky enough to be raised this way made me very happy.

On another gorilla-related note, I've just started researching for a university report, which is to be on an endangered species of my choice... can you guess which species I chose? I'm hoping that I will be able to visit Melbourne Zoo and Werribee Open Range Zoo to visit and photograph the gorillas for this project. I will also be contacting people involved with gorilla conservation (the species I chose was the Western gorilla). Should be fun, and hopefully an opportunity to learn a bit more about a species that I am so passionate about.


This is Kimya, the young female who is living with the new male, Kibali. She is probably the most beautiful gorilla I've seen. Kimya often holds her hands to her ears, which I hear is a trait unique to gorillas originally from Apenheul (Kimya's mum, Kriba came to Taronga from Apenheul).

So, that was the 'gorillas', here come the 'things'; basically what I'm going to be getting up to. The big ape news in South Australia at the moment is that lovely Zombi at Monarto Zoo has become a mum for the first time. I can't wait to visit the chimp group, and see Zombi with her precious new infant. While my feelings about apes in zoos are very mixed, I know that Zombi's little one will have a fantastic future at Monarto, the chimps have an excellent enclosure, with lots to do. Having a new baby around must be great for the newly formed group as well.
Here's a photo of Zombi from when I last saw her, way back in April (it's been FAR too long since I've been to see the chimpanzees!)



On to the doggy stuff- Bella recently had her first (and last!) sleepover with her Borzoi friend Arya. Unfortunately, it was all just too exciting and they were up at three in the morning wanting to play. After almost two hours of trying to convince them to go back to sleep, we ended up giving in and letting them play outside for a few minutes, waking up whoever had managed to, so far, sleep through the noise. Finally the two naughty hounds went back to sleep at about 5AM. On the plus side, we were quite productive that weekend, and Bella will soon have two new pyjama coats.
 We recently started obedience classes at a different club (this one has a fence), I'm hoping that we'll get to the point where Bel can give agility a try because I think she'd love it. We're entering two conformation shows in September, and another two in October, hopefully will get a few more points, or otherwise just have a lot of fun. :)

Chimp Eden, South Africa

Mary, who holds many a male heart <3
When Mary gets up and moves away, she is almost always followed by her loyal male admirers, usually Charles or Marco.

I took a while to get around to it, but here I am, finally writing about my trip to South Africa. Spending time at a chimpanzee sanctuary- and being able to do something helpful!- was an amazing experience. Chimp Eden was a really beautiful place, aside from the chimpanzees, there was a variety of wildlife roaming free on the reserve. The local vervet monkeys were great to watch, though I was less fond of them when they stole a large amount of my unattended dessert (they ignored all the healthy food!).

I've got a small amount of video footage from the sanctuary, but so far I haven't been able to get it off the camera as we've lost that camera's lead. We've ordered a new one from the UK, and hopefully it won't be too long before I can upload the videos onto Youtube.



 Jessica, the dominant female in Group 1. She is quite a character, though Martha is not her biggest fan. The youngsters sometimes begged for food from her, but they had no luck. Jessica is certainly not one to part with her food.


I spent the majority of my time recording the behaviour of Group 1 (Charles and Jessica's group), which was lovely as I was able to get to know the chimps' fascinating personalities.



Mowgli, an extremely cute little man.
 For the first week I was there Mowgli displayed at me when I came to the enclosure, and often threw sticks and bark. It was never quite as impressive as the displays of the likes of Charles and Marco, and he has yet to acquire Marco's good aim thankfully. After that time, he must have gotten used to me, or at least figured that I'd been sufficiently awed by his powerful display, as he stopped performing charging displays at me.
 Mowgli became one of my favourites, he always seemed so cheerful, often turned pirouettes and somersaults. I really enjoyed watching Mowgli, and golly, he has a handsome little face!



Tamu playing with Charles, the big boss.
Tamu is the youngest in the group, but makes up for his small size with a big personality, he hangs around a lot with the big guys. It was lovely to see a big dominant male like Charles playing with a juvenile like Tamu. He certainly knew the right spots to tickle to make Tamu laugh REALLY loudly! Charles has a very traumatic background, he was rescued from the same circus as Jessica and both were in appalling condition.

Another photo of Charles, he is the boss after all.




This is Suzie, one beautiful girl. Her favourite fashion accessory is a small stick in her ear, as modeled in this picture.
Suzie is one of my absolute favourite chimpanzees. When she sits watching you it feels almost like she's looking right into your soul, there's something very human-like about her gaze, even more so than the other chimps. She often sits with her legs folded and her hands in a lap, somewhat reminiscent of how a human child might sit. It seems Suzie has become good friends with another favourite of mine, Charlene. When the group had their late afternoon snooze, so much of the time the two girls lay next to one another, and I often saw them seeking out one another's company. One time, when the chimps were going indoors for the evening and getting all excited, Charlene started screaming as some of the other chimps pushed her out of the way. It was Suzie that went up to her and gave her a big reassuring hug.




Azie and friends having an afternoon nap. Azie is a very clever girl when it comes to the use of tools. She always seemed to spend so much more time then any of the others using rocks to crack open nuts, and using sticks to fish for goodies out of the pseudo termite mound. Azie is also one pretty girl!




My favourite chimpanzee, Charlene. She doesn't quite have Azie's knack for tool-use.
One time, Charlene spent several minutes watching Suzie cracking open a nut with a rock, staring intently at her as she worked away. When Suzie moved off, Charlene picked up the rock, studied it carefully as if thinking 'I know this thing is involved in some way...', and then proceeded to put the rock to one side and bash the nut with her fist instead!
Charlene isn't as quick on her feet as the other chimps, which is thought to be the result of a thiamine deficiency when she was younger. She can certainly give a good account of herself though, and beats her chest and tummy when annoyed.
 Some of my best memories of Chimp Eden were watching the chimpanzees playing together, it was really special to see them enjoying themselves so much considering what difficult backgrounds they all have. One such highlight was watching a very long and energetic play session between to of the bushmeat orphans, Mowgli and Charlene. I've recorded a bit of it on video, and will hopefully be uploading it to Youtube soon.


I took this photo after Mowgli and Charlene were playing together, and he put her arm around her. :)


This trip was an incredible experience for me, it has only solidified my passion for the great apes. I left with different ideas of what my eventual goals are. On my way home I visited Taronga Zoo in Sydney, which was a huge contrast to the peaceful sanctuary at which I'd spent the past weeks. I now have higher personal standards in my ideals of how captive apes should be kept. My career goal is still to work as a great ape caregiver at a zoo or sanctuary, but I now have different ideas of what sorts of zoos I'd like to work at. Spending time with chimpanzees living in spacious accommodation, with opportunities to socialize, plenty for them to do and opportunities to get out of each other's way and out of sight of their human observers, gave me a clear view of what I think all captive apes should be given.

I'll sign off with one more photo of dear Charlene, such a gorgeous hairy girl. I feel so lucky to be able to spend time with her and all the other wonderful chimpanzees.