Got A Light, Mr. Monkey?

Zoo Wants Chimp to Quit Smoking
Friday, August 26, 2005
XI'AN, China — The handlers of a smoking chimpanzee in a zoo in northwest China are trying to get her to kick the habit.
The 26-year-old female chimpanzee (search) has been smoking for 15 years. Her mate died recently, which caused her to smoke even more.
Now, the chimp's keepers are worried about her health as a result of her intense smoking. So, they're trying to give her milk instead of cigarettes.
She started smoking years ago by picking up butts from tourists.
[At least two other smoking zoo chimps have been reported in the past year — Feili, a 13-year-old female in Zhengzhou in central China, and Charlie, a male in Bloemfontein, South Africa.]

Do you roll your own, Mr. Monkey?




"I'm too cool for this zoo!"

Let It Ride, Mr. Monkey!

TEST MONKEYS ARE GAMBLING ADDICTS
SCIENTISTS who trained monkeys to gamble found the animals became addicted.
The rhesus macaque monkeys were trained to gamble to win glasses of fruit juice in a university study of risk-taking behaviour.
Researchers found the primates would take risks to get rewards. Team leader Dr Michael Platt, of Duke University, North Carolina, said: "These monkeys really liked to gamble

"Hey baby, I've got something in my hand for you, too!"

The Trunk Monkey Is Back!

Hey, hey, it's the Trunk Monkey
Sunday, August 28, 2005
By Howard LudwigStaff writer
If you thought the Budweiser Frogs were clever, wait until you see the Trunk Monkey.
Trunk Monkey is a marketing campaign being sold to auto dealers nationwide. It's the creation of R-West, an Oregon-based advertising and public relations firm.
R-West sells its Trunk Monkey marketing package for $11,000. The contract includes five television commercials, which can be customized for any dealership.
The commercials are based on the idea that a chimpanzee lives in the trunk of your car. Drivers push a button, which opens the trunk and frees the chimp to handle odd situations.
In one commercial, the ape rescues the driver by attacking a road-raging madman with a tire iron. The chimp subdues teens who had been throwing eggs at cars in another ad.
Trunk Monkey goes on to bribe a ticket-writing cop, retrieve a stolen vehicle and even deliver a baby in the three subsequent ads. All of the commercials can be seen online at www.trunkmonkeyad.com.
"The best deal, best offer thing does not sell cars, so we just wanted to be top of mind with customers," R-West president Sean Blixseth said.
R-West made its first Trunk Monkey ad two years ago. The campaign was picked up by a dealership in Oregon. The day after the first television commercial aired, the dealer's Web site was swamped.
Hit-counts surpassed that of popular sites such as Amazon.com and Disney, Blixseth said.
Trunk Monkey's popularity has increased steadily ever since, said Blixseth, who receives about six calls daily from interested auto dealers.
R-West is developing two more Trunk Monkey commercials it hopes to have ready for the Super Bowl. The idea is to sell the ads to dealerships to be used locally around the time of the big game.
Arnell Auto Group in Burns Harbor, Ind., purchased the ads in October. The company has exclusive rights to the commercials throughout the Southland and northwest Indiana.
"We wanted to change our image a little bit," said Jane Delligatti, marketing director for Arnell.
Arnell's Trunk Monkey campaign has included three different cable television ads, radio spots, billboards, print ads and direct mail. All have been wildly successful, according to Delligatti.
Monkey marketing has been focused within Indiana's Lake, Porter and LaPorte counties, but the dealership is considering promoting itself to customers farther west, she said.
Delligatti said the nearest dealerships also using the Trunk Monkey campaign in Indiana are in Lebanon and Elkhart. A dealership on Chicago's North Side may also be using the ads.
But, it is not all wine and roses for the Trunk Monkey camp. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, have come out against the ads, voicing concern about methods used to train great apes.
Plaza Auto Mall in New York was given PETA's Compassionate Advertiser Award after agreeing to pull the commercials.
Lousy tree-huggers ruin everything.

The Great Gorilla Debate

Gorilla divides town
WEIPPE, Idaho (AP) — It's a big issue in this small town: Should Weippe bring back the gorilla?
Members of the City Council recently split on whether to repaint the gorilla caricature that for decades had been on the side of the 76-foot-tall water tank in the town. It was the council's first divided vote since the 1980s.
The gorilla was the mascot of the old Weippe High School before it was combined with neighboring Timberline High School in 1970. It was painted over three years ago.
Maxine Johnstun, 83, has led the charge to repaint the gorilla. Johnstun wears a gorilla T-shirt to council meetings and has helped collect $1,300 in donations to pay for a new paint job.
But some residents argue the town should paint the mascot of Timberline High — the mighty Spartans — on the water tank.
"This is Spartan country now," said Bob Hartig, a coach at the high school.
Debate over the gorilla has overshadowed other issues. At a recent council meeting, virtually everyone attending stood up and left when council members deadlocked over the gorilla. Council members on both sides say it's gotten a little ugly.
"Personally, I feel like I've been intimidated," says council member Ronnie Larson, who cast his vote in favor of the gorilla.
The gorilla is back on the agenda for the council's Sept. 12 meeting.

"No, THIS is how you tie a necktie!"

Well Dressed Monkeys

And You Thought Mr. Monkey Was Ambidextrous!

Left-handed chimps poke holes in theory
New findings cast doubt on link between language and handedness in primates.
By Frank D. Roylance Baltimore Sun Posted August 16 2005

When chimpanzees in the famed Gombe National Park in Tanzania pick up sticks and poke them into termite mounds in pursuit of a tasty snack, most use their left hands. In fact, when researchers worked out the numbers, they found that, at least when they're fishing for termites, the Gombe are left-handed by a better than 2-to-1 margin.
By combing through previous chimp studies, researchers also found evidence that about twice as many chimps use their right hands to hammer nuts open with rocks and to sop up water with crumpled leaves. That would merely be an interesting footnote, except that the findings cast doubt on a long-held assumption about how humans evolved. It also raises questions about the notion that, as a group, only primates with language -- namely us -- can display right- or left-handedness. Humans are overwhelmingly right-handed, by a ratio of at least 8-to-1. And, because human language and right-handedness are controlled by the left side of the brain, experts have long argued that the two traits evolved together. Scientists long thought that handedness in other primates was the result of random, individual influence, with no significant pattern within large groups.
"The argument is that other animals don't have language and so shouldn't show any handedness. And that was predominantly what the data showed for many years," said William D. Hopkins, co-author of the report in Monday's Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.
The discovery that chimps show clear evidence of handedness "raises questions about that evolutionary assumption," said Hopkins, a Yerkes researcher and psychologist at Berry College in Georgia. It also suggests this left-right specialization in the brain probably evolved before the common ancestors of chimps and humans split apart 5 million years ago. Despite some evidence of right-left preferences among chickens, pigeons, frogs and fish, studies never seemed to settle the issue of handedness in man's closest relatives. Researchers who looked at captive chimps and gorillas concluded that they were mostly right-handed. But critics argued that those animals, raised among humans, might have learned their handedness from their mostly right-handed human caretakers. In the wild, studies of great apes were rare, Hopkins said.

Monkeys + Cake = Attack!

Man Attacked by Chimps at Sanctuary Returns Home

Victim's wife thanks public and medical staff, says her husband has 'come a long way.'
By Natasha Lee Times Staff Writer Posted August 17 2005

Nearly six months after being mauled by two chimpanzees, a West Covina man returned home Tuesday after undergoing multiple reconstructive surgeries and spending weeks in a coma. St. James Davis, 62, was welcomed home by his tearful wife, LaDonna, and greeted with a round of applause from friends and neighbors.

"He's come a long way," said LaDonna, 64, at a news conference outside the couple's home with their attorney, Gloria Allred. "In reality, when this first happened, I thought this would take longer than six months."
Davis and his wife were attacked March 3 while visiting the couple's pet chimp, Moe, at the Animal Haven Ranch in Kern County. The couple had gone to the private sanctuary to celebrate the chimp's 39th birthday. While they were standing outside Moe's cage with a birthday cake, two other male chimps escaped from their cages and attacked them. The animals chewed off most of St. James Davis' face and fingers from both hands, and tore off his foot. He lost his right eye. LaDonna Davis' left thumb was bitten off.
On Tuesday, as St. James Davis was wheeled on a stretcher into his home, he waved — his right eye bandaged and just a thin veil of skin for a nose — and thanked the crowd of supporters. He is scheduled to have two surgeries next week, and will continue to undergo rehabilitation treatments and counseling, Allred said.
"I think we all feel good he's alive," his wife said.
She thanked the public for the outpouring of support and praised the staff at Loma Linda University Medical Center for "giving back St. James to me." Allred described St. James Davis as a fighter who had survived despite many medical obstacles." I and many others admire him for his fighting spirit," she said. "We are thankful for this day and look forward to the future."

The attack has not changed the couple's devotion to Moe, said LaDonna Davis, adding that her husband harbors no ill feelings toward the chimps that attacked him. After biting off part of a woman's finger, Moe was taken from the Davis home in 1999 and placed at the Wildlife Waystation in the Angeles National Forest. He was moved to the Animal Haven Ranch in 2004.
"It's like people; it's like human nature — you have the best of us and the worst of us, and that's the same in animals," LaDonna Davis said. Neighbors and friends said St. James Davis was lucky to be alive. "It's great that he survived," said family friend Steve Peterson, 44, his eyes welling with tears. "I've been waiting to talk to him."
Allred would not say whether the Davises planned legal action against the animal sanctuary. The owner has asked state authorities to find a new home for Moe. But neighbors such as Darryl Davis believe that Moe's home is with the couple.
"The safest place for Moe is right in his backyard," said Davis, 43, who is taking part in a petition drive to help return the chimp to the couple's care. More than 100,000 signatures have been gathered, he said

Surf's Up, Mr. Monkey!

An orang-utan plays on water skis at an event marking 100 days to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Pusan, southeast of Seoul, August 10, 2005. The APEC meeting will be held in Pusan in November.

Monkeys Stick Together!

Monkeys rescue injured mate
From correspondents in Hong KongAugust 05, 2005
From: AAP

A MONKEY knocked down by a motorcyclist in Hong Kong was bravely rescued by fellow simians, press reports said Thursday.A group of monkeys ran out and retrieved the injured creature moments after it was run down by the 45-year female rider, the South China Morning Post and Chinese newspapers reported.
The monkeys pulled their companion, apparently still alive, into undergrowth at the side of the country road.
The rescue bid appeared to be in vain, however, as a dead monkey was later found nearby, the reports said.
The motorcyclist, who was thrown from her bike in the collision, needed medical treatment for injuries to her right wrist and elbow.
About 20 monkeys are killed every year in traffic accidents in the southern Chinese territory, the report said, citing agriculture chiefs. However, it is not uncommon for them to take injured or dead companions away from danger due to the tight-knit nature of their living groups, it added.
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Hong Kong's estimated 1200 wild monkeys come into increasing contact with human populations as urban sprawl encroahces on their rural habitats.

Stay Out of the Bad Neighborhoods, Mr. Monkey!

Elgin Monkey Hunt Continues
Repeated Reports Of Monkey Sightings Prompt Night Search
POSTED: 11:49 am CDT August 4, 2005
UPDATED: 3:22 pm CDT August 4, 2005
CHICAGO -- Police in Elgin continue their hunt for an elusive monkey reported to be roaming in wooded areas in the far west suburbs.
A 4-foot-tall monkey or chimpanzee has been sighted more than once in recent days, NBC5's Lisa Tutman reported Thursday.
Tatiana Williams, 15, was still a bit unnerved Thursday morning by what she saw at around 11 p.m. Sunday near her home.
"It was a monkey," she told Tutman. "(It was) brown, or like tan. It was a monkey sitting on the slide."
Williams said the monkey did not appear to see her and just sat quiet and stil on the playground equipment. The teenager, on the other hand, moved quickly, running from the scene to tell her mother what she had seen.
"I thought she was playing, because me and a couple of my friends were sitting out here, and she was like, 'Mom, I just seen a monkey,'" Jennifer Williams said. "She said it was a monkey and I was like, 'Are you sure?'"
Police say that they've received several similar reports since Sunday, including one Thursday morning three miles from the playground where Williams spotted the primate.
There have been at least six police searches through wooded areas in Elgin since Sunday, Tutman said.
"Last night, our animal control officers and a couple of other officers were actually out in nightvision gear walking through the woods to see if they could find this animal, mostly because the information we had received indicated that the animal was mostly seen late night, late hours," said Lt. Cecil Smith, with the Elgin Police Department.
"So, they were out in the woods late last night until 2 o'clock this morning," he added.
Tutman pressed Smith.
"Have you given any thought to the possibility that this may just be a really short, hairy guy?" she asked.
"Well," he replied, "anything's possible, but we're going on the premise that it's a chimpanzee or a monkey."
Police say they will likely resume their searche as they get more information and sightings, the Williams family said that, while there is humor in the monkey tale, there are some real concerns, too.
"I'll be scared for my kids to be out late at night because, you know, you never know what that monkey may be carrying," Jennifer Williams said.
Police believe the monkey may be an escaped pet.

Power To The Monkey People!

An armed policeman walks past a group of protesters dressed as monkeys, outside the gates of No.10 Downing Street in London, August 2, 2005. A troop of campaigners in monkey costumes teamed up with a British member of parliament to submit a petition to Prime Minister Tony Blair urging a total ban on primate testing.

I Need A Hero...I'm Holding Out For a Monkey Till the End of the Night!

US heroes set to retire at Chimp Haven HQ
By Philip Sherwell Washington
August 1, 2005

Rita and Teresa served the United States Government with distinction for four decades. They played their part in its nascent space program and then later made an important contribution to medical research.
Now, as they reach their dotage, America is doing its bit for them. The inseparable duo were the first residents of a thoroughly modern retirement home built deep in the woods of north-western Louisiana.
What makes the facility unique is that the taxpayer-funded project is not a nursing home for humans but a "retirement sanctuary" for chimpanzees who have spent their lives toiling away for Uncle Sam. It is called Chimp Haven.
Rita and Teresa have since been joined by nearly 30 more veterans of US scientific institutions. In all, about 200 retired chimps will be living in this peaceful setting after the centre is completed next year, including some descendants of America's first chimpanzee in space, named Ham, whose flight in 1961 paved the way for the nation's first astronaut, Alan Shepard.
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Ham was found to be slightly fatigued and dehydrated but otherwise in good shape after he splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean.
"The chimps deserve a good retirement after spending their lives working for man in government research facilities," said Chimp Haven president Dr Linda Brent. "It's not only the right thing to do, it's also much less costly than housing them in labs."
Rita and Teresa were earlier part of a breeding program for NASA after being captured in Africa in the 1960s.
Their new sleeping quarters have been purpose-built. There is running water, mirrors, windows and a choice of bedding arrangements — hammocks of fire-hose tubing or hay and blankets. There is winter heating and a play yard at the back.
The chimps also watch television. Their favourite viewing includes hospital dramas — presumably because they are used to humans in white lab coats — action movies and team sports, such as American football.
Of about 1500 lab chimps in the US, nearly half are no longer used for research.

All Monkey-Nappers Will Be Brought To Justice!

Man Sentenced For Stealing Pet Monkey
King Receives 5-Year Sentence
POSTED: 1:31 pm EDT July 29, 2005
UPDATED: 1:38 pm EDT July 29, 2005
ANNAPOLIS, Md. -- A man who stole a pet capuchin monkey worth was sentenced Thursday to five years in prison.
Kenneth M. King, 25, who pleaded guilty to burglary in the February incident, was also ordered to spend five years on supervised probation.
"You essentially took a member of that family," Anne Arundel County Circuit Judge Michele Dane Jaklitsch said in handing down the sentence.
Brian and Michelle Howard, who own Janey, a white-throated capuchin worth $7,000, said outside the courtroom that their monkey has been frightened since she was returned to them two days after the Feb. 2 break-in.
"She's very clingy," said Brian Howard, who bought the creature as a Christmas gift for his wife. Janey still holds a teddy bear for comfort.
Assistant State's Attorney David P. Ash said King and his girlfriend, Wendy M. Ward, 30, were intrigued by Janey when they went to the Howards' house to by a bird from them. King stole the 3-pound pet because he liked it, and Ward covered for him, Ash said.
After the theft, police received an anonymous tip from someone in Baltimore about a monkey. When they followed up on the tip, they executed a search warrant and recovered Janey, who was identified by her owners.
"You can't hide something like a monkey," said Anne Arundel police spokesman Sgt. Shawn Urbas said at the time
Janey was holding her teddy bear when police found her caged in an upstairs bedroom of King and Ward's home, the Howards said.
"She couldn't handle that cage anymore," Michelle Howard said, so the couple moved Janey in with Nikki, their 8-year-old black wedge-cap capuchin.
The Howards' son, Brian Jr., then 8, was so upset after the break-in that "we couldn't get him to sleep in his own bed for two weeks because he was afraid that these people would come back," Howard said.
In court Thursday, Ward and King apologized to the Howards.
Ward received a one-year suspended sentence and three years of supervised probation. The couple were ordered to pay $2,500 to the Howards for repairs resulting from the break-in.

War of the Monkeys!

San Juan fears monkey invasion
The Orlando Sentinel
TOA BAJA, Puerto Rico - When hordes of monkeys began invading Puerto Rico's agricultural fields, devastating crops and eluding capture, the major concern was trapping them before they reached urban areas, where they would pose a public health hazard and be nearly impossible to round up.
Fear is turning to outrage. Authorities recently acknowledged a clan of these pesky moneys, escapees from defunct medical research laboratories along Puerto Rico's southern coast, has turned up just 20 minutes outside metropolitan San Juan - home to 1.5 million residents and a virtually unlimited number of hiding places.
"It would be very bad if these monkeys got to San Juan," said Jose Chalbert, director of Puerto Rico's Department of Natural Resources, an agency that recently proposed capturing the wild monkeys because they carry diseases.
"I don't even want to think about having to trap monkeys there," Chalbert said, adding that funding for his $3 million effort to trap the monkeys is being held up amid all the fighting going on in the legislature.
Primates are not native to Puerto Rico. But the island has been home to a species of monkey dating back to the 1950s when scientists brought them here for medical experiments. The animals - descendants of the patas and rhesus monkeys that escaped from medical-research labs - are known to be fertile and aggressive. Mature monkeys can weigh up to 50 pounds, and it's estimated the monkey population in southeast Puerto Rico stands at between 1,000 to 2,000 - and it's growing every day.
No one knows how many primates live in and around Toa Baja, a small agricultural community just west of San Juan.
Elias Sanchez, a top assistant to Toa Baja's mayor, said the city is trying to address the problem. But the trapping and control of the population is beyond the scope of any local community.
"The island's government should be helping," he said, adding that the population of monkeys is "very small."
But residents insist "dozens" of them have taken up residence near Toa Baja's municipal dump. Inside the landfill they forage for food and then they explore nearby neighborhoods, frightening homeowners and children.
Emma Vasquez, who lives next to the landfill, said a baby monkey once jumped from a tree onto the roof of her house.
"At first we all thought it was cute," Vasquez, 60 said, recalling the incident. "Then it started tipping over all of my plants in the balcony, and growling at me."
When she called police, authorities from the island's natural resource department showed up wearing white body suits and masks to protect themselves. "That scared me even more," she said.
The monkey eventually was sedated and then removed from her roof.
In another incident, Wilberto Cerrano said he has seen about 15 monkeys as close as 200 yards from his home "swinging in the trees and running around, like they are happy as can be."
Cerrano, who lives in the Villa Clemente neighborhood, near the landfill said he doesn't think the animals will make their way into San Juan. "They don't like people. They keep their distance," Cerrano, 55, said.
Monkeys have been traded in the Caribbean for more than 300 years, mostly for research purposes. Today, several islands in the region have burgeoning populations of these primates and have been trapping them and either selling them for research or putting them down.