From this story:
At least Jody had a bit of fun before she went to doing the chores: she raided a fridge containing chimp snacks.
As amusing as this story is, I sort of feel sorry for poor Jody. What was her life like before she came to the zoo? Was she a slave to her owners? Or does she actually miss doing her chores because of the praise she got for them?
That would be my guess, without knowing anything more about her previous life.
If you can afford to keep a monkey and feel safe enough to have it walking about the house wielding long thwompy things, I wouldn’t imagine that you would be treating it too bad. Probably Judy picked it up through imitation, not by learning.
Okay the subtitle to that article “Zoo resident succumbs to sedatives” had me thinking the poor primate ODed and died!
PHEW!
I can’t remember where it was exactly, other than on my TV, but there was this refuge for wild orangutans somewhere in orangutan country. The orangs would watch humans scrubbing their clothes clean with a bar of soap at the river’s edge. After awhile, the organs would come down, grab a bar of soap and start scrubbing whatever clothes were available. It was cute. I’m sure they didn’t do a very good job of it, but they figured it was an interesting activity and if humans were doing it, must be fun.
Damn. That edit function doesn’t last long enough.
Organs = orangs.
It’s entirely possible that the housekeeping chimp learned toilet-cleaning and fridge-scrubbing without being forced to do so. Chimpanzees love to imitate humans. The old saying “monkey see, monkey do” has a lot of truth in it, and applies to chimps as well as monkeys.
In the 1960s I dated a young man whose father was the head of a primate research laboratory associated with the University of Oklahoma. The house in which my boyfriend’s father and stepmother lived was also occupied by a playful young chimpanzee who was being raised as if he were a human child. The chimp was free to romp around the house, and he displayed immense curiosity about the activities of humans.
Once while I was staying overnight, I was startled when I emerged from the shower and found that the chimp had draped my bra across his head as if it were earmuffs (he’d seen me wearing earmuffs earlier in the day). As I dried off and re-dressed myself, the chimp watched with fascination. He was particularly impressed when he saw me spraying deodorant under my arms.
Later in the day, they found the chimp spritzing his own armpits with bug spray.
I’m going to get a chimp.
Then I’m going to make a short film in which I am repeatedly handed a lot of money.
Then I’m going to make the chimp watch it over and over until he can copy the behavior perfectly.