Out on the Hill
November 10, 2012 by J.B. -
A few weeks ago, we captured some footage of Burrito foraging on Young’s Hill with the GoPro camera. The GoPro is great because it shows us the world from the chimps’ perspective, without the bars or fencing in the way. But the best part is the sound that it captures – make sure to turn up your volume so you can hear Burrito’s low moans and food squeaks. This is the sound of a happy man.
You might notice that Burrito seems a bit more relaxed outside than he did earlier this year. He’s a little less pilo erect (hair standing on end) and he seeks reassurance less often. But you’ll still see him doing both – he’s come a long way, but he’s still pretty cautious when he’s on the hill. You’ll see in this video is that he avoids taking the apple that is sitting right in front of the camera. Whole fruits are Jamie’s favorite thing, so he was probably wise to avoid it with her standing close by.
At the end of the video is a short clip from earlier this week that I filmed with my phone. Jamie and Burrito decided to follow us as we walked around the enclosure. This gives you a good idea of what the view looks like from the top of the hill. If you look carefully, you can see the chimp building at the bottom of the hill. Imagine how scary it must be for Burrito to travel so far from the place he feels most comfortable. He seems to feel better if he can tag along with someone else, even if it’s the girl that bosses him around.
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Love the food grunts!
Thanks for the “listen-in”. Jamie seemed like she had her hands full of apples.
Thank you so much for sharing such great clip of Burrito and the Boss Lady,, he looks so FREE and
and so able to just BE a chimp.. I’m thrilled, he is finding courage, and strength, to be himself. After all that was taken from Burrito its been so hard for him to recover,,but he seems to be coming a long way from his past,, the food sqeeks are delightful,,..
Wow, that is quite some space seen from the top of the hill. Any plans to plant more trees or bushes to minimize the vast, open feeling? I can see how it must seem dangerous to be out there in the open all by ones self, although it does give the staff the opportunity to keep an eye out on everyone.
Yes, we’ll keep planting things out there and we’ll also build more structures up near the top. But it takes a long time to fill up two acres. We wanted to focus most of our efforts near the bottom of the hill, which is where we figured the chimps would spend most of the time at first, since it is closer to home.