Monkeys In The News

Santa Ana Zoo Welcomes A Baby Monkey

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 16:53:00 +0000

The Santa Ana Zoo in Prentice Park has a new addition – a baby monkey born Jan. 31.

The silvery langur - Trachypithecus cristatus – is still unnamed.

Its parents are Oliver and Daria, and all can be seen in the primate area at the zoo.

Silvery langurs, which eat leaves, are typically found in the dense tropical forests of Indonesia and Malaysia, where they are considered near-threatened due to land clearance, often for palm oil plantations.

The baby monkeys are bright orange at birth with pale skin. Within three to five months the coat becomes grayish, and they eventually weigh up to 15 pounds.

Full story here.
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Monkeys Thought To Be Extinct ‘Rediscovered’ In Indonesia

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 14:56:00 +0000

Scientists working in the dense jungles of Indonesia have "rediscovered" a large, gray monkey so rare it was believed by many to be extinct.

They were all the more baffled to find the Miller's Grizzled Langur - its black face framed by a fluffy, Dracula-esque white collar - in an area well outside its previously recorded home range.

The team set up camera traps in the Wehea Forest on the eastern tip of Borneo island in June, hoping to captures images of clouded leopards, orangutans and other wildlife known to congregate at several mineral salt licks.

The pictures that came back caught them all by surprise: groups of monkeys none had ever seen.

Full story here.
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Rare Monkey Caught On Camera In The Wild For The First Time

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 18:08:00 +0000

Myanmar snub-nosed monkeys, previously only known from one dead specimen, have been photographed living in the wild for the first time, conservationists say.

The animal was photographed by a camera trap operated by a joint team from Fauna & Flora International, Biodiversity and Nature Conservation Association, and People Resources and Conservation Foundation.

Full story here.
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Grandpa The 'Psychic' Monkey To Predict GOP Winner In New Hampshire Primary

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 18:32:00 +0000

Grandpa, the wise, old spider monkey who calls the Staten Island Zoo home, views life through Yoda-like eyes — and his fans say that eerily accurate is the future he sees.

His keepers have been testing his supposedly psychic powers by having him pick the winners of tennis matches and pigskin tilts. But the Daily News is giving Grandpa his toughest challenge yet — choosing which candidate in the crowded GOP field will claim victory in the New Hampshire primary.

On Monday, the day before the showdown in the Granite State, The News will have Grandpa pick a banana from a bunch. Each banana will have written on it the name of a GOP candidate — and pity all who are not the chosen banana.

In the past, Grandpa has shown himself to be an ace at beating odds in sporting matches that break down to a simple flip of a coin, like his triumph in picking the Green Bay Packers to win the Super Bowl last year.

But The News’ test will confront the zoo’s “elder statesman” with a race that has proven to be chaotic and a cast of characters whose fates have changed wildly. Even though former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney is running well ahead of the pack in New Hampshire, where he owns a summer home, the zoo’s head curator says it is impossible for mere mortals to know how Grandpa will pick ’em.

Full story here.
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New Vaccine Protects Monkeys Against Primate Version of HIV

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 18:28:00 +0000

Researchers have developed a vaccine that protects Rhesus monkeys against SIV, the simian version of the human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS in humans. Scientists say the experiment could lead to improved treatments for AIDS, and speed development of an effective HIV vaccine.

Building on the results of a large experimental AIDS-vaccine trial in Thailand reported in 2009, researchers developed a two-stage vaccine made up of proteins from the simian immunodeficiency virus, or SIV, that protects a significant percentage of Rhesus macaques against the disease. SIV is a model for HIV because the human virus cannot infect monkeys.

Colonel Nelson Michael is a molecular virologist with the U.S Military HIV Research Program at the Walter Reed Army Institute, and senior author of the research.

“We have now very good evidence, with new generation vaccines that we are seeing, the kinds of promising results in animals that would propel us to spend significant resources to test these vaccines in humans, which is what we are planning to do,” said Michael.

Full story here.
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FaceTime For Apes: Orangutans Use iPads To Video Chat

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 18:26:00 +0000

Orangutans living in captivity will soon start using iPads for primate play-dates, using Skype or FaceTime to interact with their brethren in other zoos, according to zookeepers. The great apes have been playing with iPads for about six months at the Milwaukee County Zoo, and they’ve been such a hit that other zoos plan to introduce them, too.

The “Apps for Apes” program started after a zookeeper commented online about getting some iPads for her gorilla charges. Someone donated a used iPad, and it turned out the gorillas didn’t care for it. But the orangutans loved it, as the LA Times says.

The apes don’t typically get to hold the pricey tablets, because they’re strong enough to break them in half, zookeepers said. Instead, a keeper will hold the iPads up to a primate cage and let the apes interact with them. The orangutans have been playing with apps like Doodle Buddy by sticking their fingers through their cages’ mesh. One orangutan, 31-year-old MJ, is apparently a huge fan of David Attenborough nature programs, the BBC reports.

A group called Orangutan Outreach, which is involved in the Apps for Apes effort, is waiting for the iPad 3 to come out so the original iPad will become obsolete and cheaper for zoos to obtain. The Houston Zoo has one iPad but hasn’t introduced it to the orangutans yet, while Zoo Atlanta, the Toronto Zoo and the Phoenix Zoo are waiting to get iPads. When they do, zookeepers across the institutions plan to set up play-dates when the apes can chat via Skype or FaceTime.

Full story here.
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Whiff of "Love Hormone" Helps Monkeys Show a Little Kindness

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 18:23:00 +0000

Oxytocin, the "love hormone" that builds mother-baby bonds and may help us feel more connected toward one another, can also make surly monkeys treat each other a little more kindly.

Administering the hormone nasally through a kid-sized nebulizer, like a gas mask, a Duke University research team has shown that it can make rhesus macaques pay more attention to each other and make choices that give another monkey a squirt of fruit juice, even when they don't get one themselves.

Two macaques were seated next to each other and trained to select symbols from a screen that represented giving a rewarding squirt of juice to one's self, giving juice to the neighbor, or not handing out any juice at all. In repeated trials, they were faced with a choice between just two of these options at a time: reward to self vs. no reward; reward to self vs. reward to other; and reward to other vs. no reward.

"The inhaled oxytocin enhanced 'prosocial' choices by the monkeys, perhaps by making them pay more attention to the other individual," said neuroscientist Michael Platt, who headed the study and is director of the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences. "If that's true, it's really cool, because it suggests that oxytocin breaks down normal social barriers."

Earlier work by Platt's group had shown that macaques would rather give a reward to another monkey when the alternative is no reward for anyone, a concept they call "vicarious reinforcement." Their data in the latest study show an apparent improvement in vicarious reinforcement about a half-hour after exposure to oxytocin. Interestingly, for the first half-hour, the monkey was more likely to reward itself.

Full story here.
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Banana Sam Back At SF Zoo

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 18:21:00 +0000

Banana-Sam was resting comfortably behind the scenes at the San Francisco Zoo on Sunday, with staffers keeping close tabs on the squirrel monkey after his weekend kidnapping ordeal.

The 17-year-old primate spent New Year's Day recuperating out of the public eye after a nearly 40-hour adventure that began with his abduction late Thursday or early Friday.

The 2-pound creature was shaking, hungry and cold when police returned him to the zoo Saturday evening, but he was relatively clean and with no obvious trauma, said Danny Latham, a zoo spokesman.

"We have no idea the conditions in which he was kept," he said.

Latham said it was unclear when Banana-Sam would return to his exhibit with his 17 squirrel monkey friends.

Full story here.
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Kanzi The Chimpanzee Can Start A Fire, Cook His Own Food

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 18:16:00 +0000

A chimpanzee living in Iowa knows how to use tools and can even start fires and cook, animal researchers say.

Kanzi, a male bonobo chimp, lives at the Great Ape Trust in Des Moines, Iowa, where scientists taught him to use matches.

Now Kanzi enjoys roasting marshmallows over an open fire and pan-frying hamburgers, the New York Daily News reported Friday.

"Kanzi makes fire because he wants to. He used to watch the film 'Quest for Fire' when he was very young, which was about early man struggling to control fire," trust scientist Sue Savage-Rumbaugh said.

Full story here.
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'Chimera' Monkeys Created In Lab by Combining Several Embryos Into One

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 20:17:00 +0000

Roku and Hex from OHSU News on Vimeo.

The world's first monkeys to be created from the embryos of several individuals have been born at a US research centre.

Scientists at the Oregon National Primate Research Centre produced the animals, known as chimeras, by sticking together between three and six rhesus monkey embryos in the early stages of their development.

Three animals were born at the laboratory, a singleton and twins, and were said to be healthy, with no apparent birth defects following the controversial technique.

The chimeras have tissues and organs made up of cells that come from each of the contributing embryos. The mixtures of cells carried up to six distinct genomes.

"The cells never fuse, but they stay together and work together to form tissues and organs," said Shoukhrat Mitalipov, who led the research. "The possibilities for science are enormous."

Scientists named the singleton Chimero, and the twins Roku and Hex, meaning six in Japanese and Greek. Hex was born after merging six individual embryos, according to a report in the journal Cell. "To our knowledge, these infants are the world's first primate chimeras," the authors write.

Full story here.
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Cheetah, Chimp From Tarzan Films, Dies

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 16:54:00 +0000

Condolences poured in to a Florida primate sanctuary Wednesday after the death of Cheetah, a chimpanzee who starred in the Tarzan movies during the 1930s.

"I grew up watching Tarzan and Cheetah from a boy," a man identifying himself as Thomas from England wrote on the Suncoast Primate Sanctuary's website. "God bless you Cheetah. Now you and Tarzan are together again."

The chimpanzee died Saturday after suffering kidney failure the week before, the sanctuary foundation said on the site. He was roughly 80 years old, Debbie Cobb, the sanctuary's outreach director, told CNN affiliate WFLA.

Cobb recalled Cheetah as an outgoing chimp who loved finger painting and watching football and who was soothed by Christian music, the station said.

Cheetah appeared in the Tarzan moves from 1932 through 1934, Cobb told WFLA. According to the website Tarzanmovieguide.com, "Tarzan the Ape Man" was released in 1932 and "Tarzan and his Mate" in 1934.

Full story here.
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US Will Not Finance New Research On Chimps

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 17:41:00 +0000

The National Institutes of Health on Thursday suspended all new grants for biomedical and behavioral research on chimpanzees and accepted the first uniform criteria for assessing the necessity of such research. Those guidelines require that the research be necessary for human health, and that there be no other way to accomplish it.

In making the announcement, Dr. Francis S. Collins, the director of the N.I.H., said that chimps, as the closest human relatives, deserve “special consideration and respect” and that the agency was accepting the recommendations released earlier in the day by an expert committee of the Institute of Medicine, which concluded that most research on chimpanzees was unnecessary.

The report and the quick response by the N.I.H. do not put an end to research on chimps, but they were claimed as victories by animal welfare groups that have long been fighting for a ban on such research, arguing that chimps should not be subjected to experimental use. They said that the move was a step toward eventually ending chimp research, already a tiny segment of federal research.

Full story here.
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Got Those Post-Monkey Day Blues? We Have A Solution...

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 16:47:00 +0000

Everyone is recovering from the blur that was Monkey Day, wiping the fuzz from their eyes, only to realize that it will be a whole year until the next chance to celebrate again. So, what do you do until then?

How about lifting your spirits and gaining some karma by doing something charitable and donating to some primate sanctuaries in need? Here is an alphabetical list of sanctuaries that are always looking for willing donors, please help them however you can:

(Please leave a comment if you know of one that I left off the list!)
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Happy Monkey Day 2011!

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 05:39:00 +0000

Has it really been a year already? Well, I guess you've been patiently waiting a whole year for it, so here are your top 10 Monkey and Primate 2011 News highlights to help you celebrate Monkey Day!

10) Monkey Related Deaths

I'm not really sure what these poor people did to piss off these monkeys, but I'm definitely going to leave an extra banana or two under the monkey tree this Monkey Day just in case any angry simians are lurking around:

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Man Falls To Death From Rooftop After Monkey Attack

Monkey Pushes Stone, 1 Dies On Spot, 2 Injured

Woman Falls To her Death After Monkey Pounces On Her
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9) 'Alien' Monkey Causes Panic In Chinese Village

I want to believe.

8) Drunk Zoo Visitor Attacked By Monkeys After Climbing Into Pen

I did this once in the Llama pen, I woke up with a new wool sweater.

7) Experiment Creates Advertisements To Sell Food To Monkeys

For some reason I'm imagining a monkey forced to stare what at a flashing screen while Beethoven's Ninth Symphony plays in the background. Welly, welly, welly, well...

6) Monkey 'Witch' Burnt To Death By Community

Joke time! What do you say to an angry witch? Ribbit.

5) Monkeys Urinate On Themselves To Attract A Mate

Coming soon to a perfume counter near you.

4) Gorilla Gains Internet Fame After Walking Upright

I was going to make a Robin Williams falling into a gorilla exhibit joke, but it just seems a little too obvious. Let's just move on.

3) "Elvis" Monkey Among 200 New Species Discovered In Vietnam

Hunk-a-hunk of burning monkey. Wait, wasn't that a few stories back?

2) Lab Chimps See Daylight For First Time

After 30 years of captivity, these chimps see sunlight and grass for the first time. It's pretty amazing to watch their reaction. The heartbreaking and heartwarming story of the year.

1) Research Finds Poop-Throwing By Chimps Is A Sign Of Intelligence

That's right, throwing feces is a sign of brain development. Now, everybody get out there and celebrate Monkey Day!

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Wild Monkeys To Measure Fukushima Radiation

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 15:05:00 +0000

Scientists in Japan are struggling to assess the consequences of the Fukushima nuclear plant disaster amid continuing concerns over high levels of radiation. Now help is at hand in the form of the area’s wild monkey population.

Radiation levels in the woods near the Fukushima nuclear power plant in the aftermath of the nuclear disaster is now going to be measured with the help of the primates.

Researchers from Fukushima University have designed special collars for the monkeys which will feed information to scientists.

Each of the collars contains a small radiation survey meter and a GPS transmitter and can be unclipped by remote control, Japan’s Kyodo news agency reported on Saturday.

This will enable the research team, led by robotics professor Takayuki Takahashi, to recover them and collect data one to two months after releasing the monkeys back into the wild.

Currently, radiation is measured using helicopters – a method which has proved incapable of obtaining the most accurate estimates.

The project has also been designed to check radiation exposure in wild animals. The monkeys will allow the scientists to compare radiation levels on the ground and in the air, as they spend much of their time sitting high up in trees.

The two-month project is to kick off in spring 2012.

Full story here.
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Kentucky Police Purchase Monkey In Undercover Drug Sting

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 14:58:00 +0000

"Monkey business in Rowan county," says Chief Deputy, Joe Cline, of the Rowan county sheriff's office.

Sheriffs deputies in Rowan county have been cracking down on drug trafficking, making under cover buys. It was at Jerry Mynhier's house, where they found more than what they were looking for, "We received a lot of complaints about this guy. While we were in there doing our buys, we were able to find out that he had a monkey,That he wanted to sell," adds Mynhier.

After talking with Mynhier in jail, he says the monkey was his pet, "It was named, when I got it, Snickers."

He says he bought Snickers from a friend and that he became part of the family, "I have a little house next door that it was kept it in. It lived in a cage and I also let it run loose in there.

Sheriff's deputies say that Snickers appeared neglected, but Mynhier says he took care of her,"I fed it bananas, peanuts, and grapes."

Sheriffs deputies working undercover paid $500 for the spider monkey.

"It required some extra contacts and calls and a lot was done prior to the transactions. We wanted to make sure that we didn't have monkey on our hands, not knowing how to take care of one, or where to take it," says Cline.

Sheriffs deputies say that Mynhier faces several felony charges for possessing oxycodone and likely a misdemeanor charge for possessing a primate.

"Selling the drugs is what I'm confused about, but having a monkey that was stupidity," says Mynhier.

Full story here.
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Freezing Lemur Found On London's Tooting Common

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 14:54:00 +0000

A ring-tailed lemur, native to the east African island of Madagascar, was found collapsed in sub-zero conditions on a south-west London common.

The primate, who has been named King Julien after the character in the animated film Madagascar, was found on Tooting Common on Tuesday night.

The animal has been treated for shock and hypothermia at an animal hospital and is making a good recovery.

It is not known how it came to be on the common.

The lemur was also suffering from severe dehydration when it was taken to the Blue Cross animal hospital in Victoria, central London.

It was put on a drip and put in the hospital's isolation unit for close monitoring.

Full story here.
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"Elvis" Monkey Among 200 New Species Discovered In Vietnam

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 14:51:00 +0000

A monkey with an Elvis haircut and a psychedelic gecko and are among 208 new species described last year by scientists in the Mekong River region of Southeast Asia.

The animals were discovered in a region that is threatened by habitat loss, deforestation, climate change and overdevelopment, the WWF said.

The newly described species include a "psychedelic gecko" in southern Vietnam and a nose-less monkey in a remote province of Burma that looks like it wears a pompadour.

"While this species, sporting an Elvis-like hairstyle, is new to science, the local people know it well," the group said in a report.

Full story here.
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Chimps 'Trade' Like Humans - Some Even Indulge In 'The Oldest Profession'

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 14:33:00 +0000

What was the basis for the earliest friendships? If wild chimps are any guide: support in a fight, borrowing a valued tool, and a bite to eat now and then. Quite similar to our friendships today, in fact. Indeed, some chimps are so modern they have relationships that we would classify as friends with benefits.

Primatologists are reassessing the complexity of chimpanzee society in the light of new findings that also suggest answers to a long-standing question: why share things with non-relatives?

For the first time wild chimps in Senegal have been observed taking plant foods and tools from other chimps, who don't react to the intrusion. The chimps donating their stuff don't get paid, but neither do they protest. Instead, the trade appears to help build social cohesion.

What's more, in another west African study, this time in Ivory Coast, a "market" has been described where chimps exchange commodities in the shape of both social behaviours including grooming and sex, and resources such as meat.

Christophe Boesch of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, says we have only recently begun to appreciate the time and energy chimps invest in reciprocal relationships, and he compares chimp relationships to friendship. "These findings have prompted primatologists to use some terms that have in the past been reserved for humans."

Jill Pruetz of Iowa State University in Ames and colleague Stacy Lindshield documented a kind of proto-trade in savannah chimps (Pan troglodytes verus) living in the Fongoli area of south-east Senegal. They witnessed 41 transfers of plant foods and tools. Chimps are known to share meat, but this is the first study to document them sharing other types of goods.

Food or tools were transferred from males to females 27 times. In most cases this was the result of a female simply taking the item and the male doing nothing to stop her. In other chimp populations males may lash out in this situation but at Fongoli males outnumber females and have to be nice to them if they want to have sex later.

Pruetz suspects that item transfer is a social lubricant. "It seems like the ulterior motive is social group harmony on some level," she says.

If a male is transferring goods to another male, then Pruetz predicts that the male will expect support from the recipient of his largesse in any future aggressive encounter with other males. If a male shares with a female he is likely to expect sexual benefits from her. "But other age-sex classes were also involved," says Pruetz, "and I think this reflects the cohesive nature of this chimp community."

Full story here.
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Pakistan "Arrests" Indian Monkey For Crossing Border

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 17:32:00 +0000

A monkey, which had crossed the Indian border, was arrested by wildlife officials in Bahawalpur, Express News reported on Monday.

As soon as the monkey entered the Cholistan area of Bahawalpur, locals tried to capture it but failed as the monkey dodged past them.

The residents of the area then informed the wildlife officials, who after some investigation and struggle, managed to capture the monkey.

The monkey was later placed at the Bahawalpur Zoo and has been named Bobby.

This is not the first case of such cross-border animal arrests.

Last year, Indian police held a pigeon under armed guard after it was caught on an alleged spying mission for Pakistan.

Full story here.
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Research Finds Poop-Throwing By Chimps Is A Sign Of Intelligence

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 18:54:00 +0000

A lot of people who have gone to the zoo have become the targets of feces thrown by apes or monkeys, and left no doubt wondering about the so-called intellectual capacity of a beast that would resort to such foul play. Now however, researchers studying such behavior have come to the conclusion that throwing feces, or any object really, is actually a sign of high ordered behavior. Bill Hopkins of Emory University and his colleagues have been studying the whole process behind throwing and the impact it has on brain development, and have published their results in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B.

Hopkins and his team have focused their research on chimpanzees, mainly due they say, to the fact that chimps are our closet living relative and that they are the only other species besides humans that regularly throw things with a clear target in mind. He and his team have been watching chimps in action for several years and comparing their actions with scans of their brains to see if there were any correlations between those chimps that threw a lot, and those that didn’t or whether they’re accuracy held any deeper meaning. Surprisingly, they found that chimps that both threw more and were more likely to hit their targets showed heightened development in the motor cortex, and more connections between it and the Broca’s area, which they say is an important part of speech in humans. The better chimp throwers, in other words, had more highly developed left brain hemispheres, which is also, non-coincidently, where speech processing occurs in people.

Such findings led the term to suggest that the ability to throw is, or was, a precursor to speech development in human beings.

After making their discovery regarding the parts of the brain that appear to be involved in better throwing in chimps, the team tested the chimps and found that those that could throw better also appeared to be better communicators within their group, giving credence to their idea that speech and throwing are related. Interestingly, they also found that the better throwing chimps didn’t appear to posses any more physical prowess than other chimps, which the researchers suggest means that throwing didn’t develop as a means of hunting, but as a form of communication within groups, i.e. throwing stuff at someone else became a form of self expression, which is clearly evident to anyone who has ever been targeted by a chimp locked up in a zoo.

Full story here.
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Monkeys Eat Like Kings In Annual Lopburi Buffet

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 17:46:00 +0000

A local monkey population in central Thailand has been treated to a lavish feast of fruits and vegetables, as well as dishes prepared by five-star hotels, in a bizarre annual tradition designed to draw in tourists.

The annual 'monkey buffet' festival takes place on the last Sunday in November at the Pra Prang Sam Yot temple in the town of Lopburi, situated 150km north of Bangkok.

The ritual offers thanks to Lopburi's 2,000 monkeys for providing good fortune and prosperity, and tourists.

Locals filled tables with fresh produce, desserts and giant ice blocks, which were then destroyed by the monkeys as locals and foreign tourists looked on with delight.

Full story here.
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Leading U.S. Primate Lab Accused Of Illegal Chimp Breeding

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 17:42:00 +0000

The largest primate research facility in the United States has been accused of breeding chimpanzees in violation of government rules, and possibly the law.

At the heart of the case is whether the New Iberia Research Center systematically broke National Institutes of Health rules while breeding chimpanzees, or simply made a few honest and subsequently corrected mistakes.

However, the NIH branch responsible for investigating the allegations has done so opaquely, with apparent reluctance.

“They’ve signed contracts and grants saying that they won’t use federally owned chimps to breed,” said Kathleen Conlee, animal research program director with the Humane Society, who formally filed the accusations in March with the U.S. Department of Justice and Department of Health and Human Services. “We have evidence that they’re breeding federally owned chimps.”

New Iberia and the Humane Society are old adversaries: In 2009, undercover video taken by Humane Society activists led to a government investigation of disturbing Animal Welfare Act violations at the facility, which houses 350 chimpanzees used in disease research. Some of the chimpanzees are owned privately by companies or universities, and others are government owned.

Full story here.
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112 Monkeys, Baboon To Get New Home After Bankruptcy

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 17:31:00 +0000

A wildlife shelter that went bust will be transferring 113 primates to a nearby sanctuary after a bankruptcy judge on Monday approved the move.

"We don't have definitive historical numbers on rescues, but it is clearly one of the largest single rescues we know of," Adam Roberts, executive vice president of Born Free USA, told msnbc.com.

Born Free expects to receive the 112 macaque monkeys and one baboon in a few months at its primate sanctuary in Dilley, Texas. The animals are currently at the San Antonio-based Wild Animal Orphanage, which last year filed for bankruptcy.

"This is a heartbreaking situation particularly for this large group of primates who would otherwise likely be euthanized without our humane intervention," Roberts said in a statement. "Every day wild animals need to be rescued from 'pet owners,' laboratories, roadside zoos, and other abusive circumstances, but this time it is about a large sanctuary having to shut down completely — and demonstrates just how challenging wildlife rescue work is."

Full story here.
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Endangered Baby Gorilla Born At Chicago Zoo Dies

noreply@blogger.com (C.) — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 17:25:00 +0000

A preliminary exam shows that an endangered baby gorilla born nine days ago at Chicago's Lincoln Park Zoo died of head trauma.

Zoo workers discovered the baby gorilla was dead Friday morning, as she was being carried around by her mother.

The zoo says workers allowed the mother, 16-year-old Bana, to keep the baby for several hours "to make peace with what happened." She was a first-time mother.

The cause of death was determined later in the day during a necropsy, the animal version of an autopsy.

The baby's father was a 22-year-old silverback gorilla named Kwan.

The baby was the first Western lowland gorilla born at the zoo since 2005. She had not been named.

In a statement, the zoo says the baby appeared to be fully developed.

Full story here.
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