To celebrate the holiday season Monkey Outta Nowhere adopted an Emperor Tamarin from the nearby Como Zoo. The zoo has seven tamarins in the primate exhibit and we opted to support the smallest of the monkeys for its Seuss-like qualities. It’s always been one of our favorites.
And why support a monkey at all? Como Zoo is a top-notch urban zoo that’s a great low-cost attraction for families (donations are suggested, but not required). That’s a cause worth supporting.
We hope you and your family–and the tamarin’s–have a happy holiday.
Drunk monkeys, it seems, are a lot like drunk people. They drink more when they’re alone, they like to drink after a hard day’s work and they’ll often drink until they fall asleep. You can’t make this stuff up. Apparently you need a team of researchers at the National Institutes of Health Animal Center in Maryland working to find primate parrallels to human alcoholism in order to treat symptoms of relapse. Or they just wanted to see monkeys get smashed.
Paintings by a chimpanzee named Congo sold for more than $25,000 at auction earlier this month, while works by Andy Warhol and Renoir attracted so little attention they had to be withdrawn. The artworks were created by Congo in the late 1950s at the London Zoo. Pablo Picasso owned one of Congo’s works and Salvidor Dali liked the chimp so much he proclaimed, “The hand of the chimpanzee is quasihuman; the hand of Jackson Pollock is totally animal!” (link via Jeremy)
A Mesa, Ariz. police veteran has proposed training a capuchin monkey for high-risk police operations. The SWAT team monkey could unlock doors and search buildings on command, keeping SWAT personnel out of harm’s way. A federal grant would pay for a pilot program to train the monkey, though the idea is still in the proposal stage and hasn’t been cleared by the Mesa police department’s executive ranks.
The Wildlife Conservation Society is auctioning off the chance to name a new species of monkey. The new monkey was discoverd in Madidi National Park in Bolivia in 2000. The auction will begin Feb. 24 at charityfolks.com.
Update: Those naming rights went for $650,000 to an anonymous buyer who outbid Ellen DeGeneres. The new name has not yet been decided on.
Scientists have discovered a new species of monkey in the Himalayas. The stocky, short-tailed, brown-haired creatures have been named Macaca munzala. While the monkeys were new to scientists, locals were familiar with the animals and called them “mun zala” or deep forest monkeys.
Just when you thought real hobbies were dead and gone, along comes an exhibit of monkey portraiture.
It’s actually pretty amazing work, done by photographer Jill Greenberg (don’t recognize the name? poke around her site and you’ll recognize images from magazine covers and ads), and will be on display at the Paul Kopeikin Gallery in Los Angeles from October 23 to December 11, 2004. (link via kottke.org)
When 300-pound gorilla Koko had a toothache, she asked for a dentist. Koko is famous for mastering more than 1,000 American Sign Language signs. She made the sign for pain and pointed to her mouth. Dentists and veterinarians were dispatched to extract a tooth.
A monkey in an Israeli zoo has started walking exclusively on its hindlegs after nearly being killed by a stomach virus. Monkeys usually alternate between walking on all fours and walking upright, but this monkey is walking upright all the time, like a human. So far the only explanation zoo officials have is brain damage, though the monkey has otherwise returned to normal.
When the zoo says don’t pound on the glass, they mean it. And now they’re giving chimps a way to fight back. Chicago’s Lincoln Park Zoo opened a new habitat for apes that lets chimpanzees touch a panel and shoot harmless blasts of air at unsuspecting visitors.
The new feature should help people and primates interact in a safe way. Though Chicago’s not the first place to let monkeys fight back. The Los Angeles Zoo lets apes pull on ropes to ring bells or spray water at visitors. Now who’s being watched?
A work-at-home dad wrestles with faith, social justice & story.