Stephen F. Austin State University

A group of chimpanzees living in Louisiana have given a portion of their lifetimes to making life better for human beings. A group of students from Stephen F. Austin State University recently devoted some time to making life better for those chimpanzees.

Chimp Haven is an independent, nonprofit organization headquartered in Keithville, La., with a mission to provide lifetime care for chimpanzees no longer useful for medical research. Because of the expertise of the staff and the state-of-the-art facility, Chimp Haven was selected as the National Chimpanzee Sanctuary System by the National Institutes of Health and will serve as a model sanctuary for other locations throughout the southeast.

Most of the chimpanzees have come from National Institutes of Health facilities. It is much more cost efficient – and kinder to the chimpanzees – to house retired primates in a sanctuary, instead of a research facility.

“It costs $30 a day to keep a chimpanzee in the lab, and we can do it for almost half of that,” Fultz said. “Since many facilities are funded by taxpayers, that represents a huge savings, and that helps all of us.”

SFA students in the anthropology course “Monkeys, Apes and Humans,” taught by assistant professor of anthropology Dr. Karol Chandler-Ezell, visited the facility to conduct observational behavioral studies. Chandler-Ezell explained that anthropologists study cultural groups that are similar, as well as groups that are very different.

“It's called cross-cultural comparison, or cross-species comparison, with our primate relatives,” she said. “By comparing and contrasting seemingly very different groups, we learn to see both more clearly. We understand how much we have in common with those we thought were very different, and at the same time we realize how odd and alien we ourselves are in comparison.”

Tulip, 14, follows the group of students and when the group stops, she stays as close as possible, begging with her eyes for someone to pick up a stick and scratch her tummy or back through the thick mesh wiring. She is a spoiled princess and the only one in the group allowed by the other chimpanzees to have whatever food she wants, even if it has already been “claimed” by someone else. Tulip is very active, and when a student assigned to observe Tulip asks Fultz to confirm that she is watching the right chimpanzee, Tulip helpfully, enthusiastically and correctly nods, “Yes.” The average life expectancy for a chimpanzee in captivity is 60 years, so Tulip may live at Chimp Haven for several more decades.

A total of 65 chimpanzees call Chimp Haven home, and Fultz said that it probably houses two of the largest groups of adult chimpanzees in captivity in the United States: 18 in Habitat One and 19 in Habitat Two. A group that has just arrived is located in a separate area and is being observed to see how they are adapting to their new environment and to each other. The staff monitors the chimpanzees’ progress and places them in larger social groups, similar to how they would live in the wild.

“Group sizes in the wild range from 20 to 100. They can live here at Chimp Haven much like they would in the wild – roaming acres of wooded habitats, relaxing in soft nests with companions or climbing high into the trees,” Fultz said. “Some have lived in small social groups for years, and many have never walked on grass or climbed a tree. They require a slow introduction to this habitat, and if the chimpanzees are uncomfortable in the habitat, we have other housing options that may be more appropriate for them.”

Gay likes electronics – so much that when she found a walkie-talkie that had fallen over the wall into her play yard, she kept it and played with it for three days. She finally relinquished her new toy in exchange for a banana, but before passing the walkie-talkie back to its rightful human owner, she broke it into pieces small enough to pass through the wires in her observation window.

There are separate areas of the habitat, including indoor, sheltered areas with hammocks and hay, as well as an outdoor play area with a climbing apparatus. The chimpanzees move from one area to another through chutes. Both habitats end with an enclosed forest of approximately four acres.

The chimpanzees are contained within their habitat by thick, 20-foot-tall concrete walls and a moat, 60 feet wide and approximately 9 feet deep. The chimpanzees, muscularly built, are not swimmers and are not attracted to the water. If they happen to wade out in the water, wire mesh on the habitat side of the moat will help them climb back out onto dry land.

Many of the chimps are learning to behave more like their counterparts in the wild, Fultz said. The captive-born chimps don’t climb as much as their born-in-the-wild roommates. And although the Louisiana chimpanzees regularly patrol the perimeter of their habitat, some females join in the watch, a job reserved for males in Africa.

“We think this has to do with where they were born,” Fultz explained. “Few of the chimpanzees who patrol were born in captivity. The majority are wild-born.”

The obesity that is common among many of the chimpanzees may or may not be related to their previous captivity, Fultz said.

“We see them losing weight and gaining muscle, some of their blood pressures are going down and other problems are clearing up,” she said.

Grandma is 54 and lives with a smaller group in a facility outside the main habitats. She loves people, and is not comfortable away from the perimeter of her enclosure, so she never utilized the natural terrain that’s available in the numbered habitat areas. When someone walks by, she hurries to the front of her living area to greet them, clapping her hands and nodding enthusiastically. She is housed close to the offices of the facility so she can watch people coming and going throughout the day.

Chimpanzees are valuable for research because their DNA is 98 percent the same as human DNA. Like humans, chimpanzees need space and companionship to thrive. Fultz said the facility is designed for choices, because there are so many different personalities within the groups and many different needs.

“Some chimpanzees do better in smaller groups; some prefer to have a lot of company,” Fultz said. “Some prefer to spend the majority of their days in the forest, but others don’t even like the feel of grass on their feet.”

Fultz said one chimpanzee in particular refused to touch the ground.

“Nicky would swing from window to window to avoid touching the grass,” she explained. “We had to coax him with treats to get him to place one foot on the grass, and when he finally did put a foot down, he jerked it right back up again. I’ve seen babies – human babies – do that because they don’t like the feel of prickly grass on their bare feet. Nicky is getting more comfortable with the grass now, but still stays along the edge of his play yard.”

Mason is a punk. He goes up to the females and, for no apparent reason, pokes their ribs with his fingers. The girls scream in response, which invokes screaming from the males in the group. Then, when everyone is good and riled up, Mason goes and sits off to the side, watching the mayhem and looking innocent.

The SFA students practiced several methods of data collection: nearest neighbor, to determine who’s hanging out with whom; ad libs, to write down as many observations as possible within a specific data collection period; and a timed census, where they noted the location and activity of each chimp at 10-minute intervals. They also completed a focal animal ad libs, where each student followed a single chimp and wrote down everything that chimp did.

One of the biggest problems for the students was identifying the particular chimpanzee they were responsible for monitoring and maintaining visual contact with the primates as they moved between their play areas and living habitats during their active play period. Although the facility is a “retirement” facility, much of the behavior Fultz sees more closely resembles that of a daycare center as the chimpanzees vie for attention from their caregivers and from each other.

Grandpa is a pawn in the battle between Jeff and Kasey to be the alpha male of the group. The battle is more bark than bite. Jeff races to sit by Grandpa’s side and puts his arm around Grandpa's shoulders. Kasey screams his discontent.

When Chimp Haven receives a new chimpanzee, information is requested that will help in grouping: whether it was nursery reared or mother-reared; what group sizes it had lived in; and personality. When a chimpanzee is in the right group, Fultz said, it is evident by its behavior.

“When Merv first came to Chimp Haven, he would come to us for reassurance when something was bothering him or making him nervous. Now he goes to the other chimps for that,” she said.

Fultz said additional research will facilitate the creation of additional facilities.

“In order to create those facilities, we need assistance determining the optimal habitat and group sizes for the chimpanzees, as well as additional funding to help us reach our goals,” she said.

Established in 1995, Chimp Haven accepted its first group of chimps in April 2005. More than 100 chimps are waiting to come to Chimp Haven, and the facility has the potential to house 200.

While chimps living in the wild are endangered due to loss of habitat and the bushmeat trade, more than 1,300 chimpanzees currently reside in American laboratories. The chimps in captivity are still listed as a threatened species.

“Birth control methods are used to control the population, and the zoos are full,” Fultz said. “We need facilities to properly care for the chimpanzees that are no longer needed for research, as well as chimpanzees who are no longer wanted as pets or who have been retired from the entertainment industry.”

Puddin’ likes troll dolls – maybe because he sees the resemblance in the doll’s hair and his own – and rarely goes anywhere without one. The cabbage he munches on is often wadded up in the same hand as the doll, but Puddin’ seems to know which is food and which is friend and manages to eat without ever moving the doll. Although, since the doll is missing a big portion of its chimpanzee-like hair, it’s possible that, at some point, Puddin’ got confused.

Chandler-Ezell said the course gave SFA students the unique opportunity to come to know and understand the apes, and also taught them why and how anthropologists study primates. She hopes to continue and expand the program, eventually training the students to collect data that can be used to help in the Chimp Haven staff's ongoing research.

“By working cooperatively with Chimp Haven, SFA will gain a unique experience for their students while we provide more awareness of the chimps and our responsibilities to them. I hope we can work out a relationship that provides Chimp Haven with interns and student workers from our bright student body, as well as the ability to offer educational credit to interns.”

Anthropology is really about the insatiable curiosity humans have about ourselves, others, and how we came to be as we are, according to Chandler-Ezell.

“You often find that focusing the lens of science on the seemingly bizarre and alien behavior of others actually brings your own culture into closer focus,” she said. “Many of those behaviors become very logical when you understand them.”

Chandler-Ezell said that the students’ reactions to the experience were even better than she had hoped.

“I knew they would be interested and excited, but I didn't imagine how truly changed and touched they were by the chimps,” she said. “The excitement level just kept growing through the semester, and they became more interested as the semester progressed. By the end of the term, we had trouble finishing class on time, because the students wanted to stay and discuss more. And that's something because we were already meeting four hours a day. I was so pleased by how they really absorbed so much information and fed their curiosity.”

Kevin Packard, a senior sociology major from Nacogdoches, said the course and the experience at Chimp Haven helped the group achieve a higher level of empathy toward animals in general, and an understanding that we might not be that different after all.

“There is a certain sublime quality about being up-close to these animals that really can't be captured on video or even in a zoo,” Packard said. “The fact that apes have learned sign language and even have improvised their own, albeit limited, abstract methods of symbolic communication based on what they've learned from us is an incredible insight. You might say that primates help bridge the gap between humans and the rest of the animal kingdom in very significant and profound ways.”

Even after weeks of preparation, students were still surprised by the Chimp Haven experience, Chandler-Ezell said.

“I know it was much more than they expected,” she said. “They have all said it completely changed their perceptions and that they will remember the experience for the rest of their lives.”