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A tragedy in Eden
It’s in the news again: a human being was seriously attacked by chimpanzees. That was the main topic I was asked about at my friend’s potluck last night: they wanted an explanation for this shocking behavior. This time the scene of the tragedy was Jane Goodall’s Chimp Eden sanctuary in South Africa. Although…
Igor’s 25th anniversary at IPPL
Twenty-five years ago today, Igor was released from the Laboratory for Experimental Medicine and Surgery in Primates and allowed to retire to IPPL. He had spent 21 years at LEMSIP and, before that, five years at a drug company. Igor was wild-born, probably in the rainforests of Thailand, so we will never be able to…
New chimpanzee habitat for DRC sanctuary
With the help of funding from IPPL and our generous supporters, a new forested enclosure built especially for sanctuary chimpanzees in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo welcomed its first residents last month. Construction on the 2.7 hectare (nearly 7 acre) electric-fenced enclosure at the Centre de Réhabilitation des Primates de Lwiro (CRPL) started in…
Gibbon conference is a first!
1. How can you get a gibbon to take his medicine? 2. What do you do with twin baby gibbons? 3. What’s the connection between palm oil and gibbons? These are just a few of the questions we asked and answered at the conference that IPPL Executive Director Shirley McGreal and I attended last week.…
Guest post by a “half woman, half gibbon” from Oz
My name is Sophie Miller, and I am a zookeeper from Australia—also known as “Oz”! [field name=flickr-slideshow-sophie-miller] I work mainly with a variety of primates, but gibbons have a special place in my heart. I have a bumper sticker that reads “half woman, half gibbon,” and it definitely suits me! My fellow Australian primate keepers…
A field report from South Africa’s baboon sanctuary
Hello from C.A.R.E.! This is day two, and I’m starting to get acclimated. The first day was spent meeting the baboons and catching up with C.A.R.E. founder Rita Miljo, who sends her best to IPPL and its supporters. We are staying at the wonderful Mfubu lodge in a cottage overlooking the Olifants River. No alarm…
Zanesville deaths highlight the tragedy of exotic animal ownership
Last weekend, I found myself in the midst of a “teachable moment” with one of my hair stylists, as we discussed the horrible shooting deaths that occurred in Zanesville, Ohio, just one week ago. All last week, it seemed like the whole nation was talking about the tragic killing by local law enforcement of nearly…
U.S. 2010 primate imports decrease slightly over 2009 figures
According to data IPPL has received from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), the U.S. imported 21,315 monkeys and apes last year. That is 783 fewer than in 2009. This sounds like good news, but the data do not indicate some important information, such as: how many monkeys were dead on arrival, where the imported…
Cheers to our “Day of Caring” volunteers!
Today was Trident United Way’s annual Day of Caring. It was also our seventh year participating in this wonderful community-wide volunteer blitz. (And this time we even made the news!) Each year around the time of the 9/11 attacks, our tri-county area has marked the anniversary with a massive, coordinated volunteer drive. This year,…
IPPL remembers the “Pitch in for Pitchou” campaign for an orphaned gorilla in Cameroon
In 1998, IPPL raised over $35,000 from our supporters to help a unique baby gorilla girl named Pitchou, whose mother had been shot for bushmeat. Pitchou had languished for three days in a small crate in a tourist area hotel before being bought by the hotel’s owners, who could no longer bear to see her…
Escape from a cancer lab: Arun Rangsi’s story
Maybe you’ve seen those heartbreaking photos of tiny monkey babies being raised in a lab, clinging desperately to a wire “mother.” Such cruel old experiments confirmed that all primates—human and nonhuman alike—need love and affection to grow up normally. Sadly, that was how our own Arun Rangsi spent his early life. Born in a cancer…
