Release

The release site in the park has emerged as the most suitable location for the release, a pre-release enclosure with a containment cage (for veterinary purposes) has been built. A local camp for staff will be built across the river prior to the move of the chimpanzees at the site.

2006 Construction

One of the first activities that were completed in 2006, was to reopen the access road to the chosen release site. Every year, after the rainy season, grass grows and trees fall on the road. The clearing of the 30 kilometers that separate the CCC to the release site is a hard job. Once it was done, the fence that had been built in 2005 needed repairs. Posts had fallen and bush fire had burned some isolators…
In the mean time, a welder came on site to finish the cage. It took him more time than was scheduled but both the fence and the cages are now fully operational. The human camp that will be across the river will be built during the 2007 dry season.

Collars

At the end of 2006, all the releasable chimpanzees were fitted with dummy collars that are the exact replica of the collars that they'll be wearing once they are release. In the future, these GPS collars fitted on every released chimpanzee will allow the researchers and staff to follow their routes through the Park over the Internet without the need to physically follow them every day from nest to nest. The GPS collars will not however, be the only means of monitoring. Staff and students will regularly follow them to record their new diet, their cycle, and their adaptation. Such GPS collars, which have been used with bears and wolves, have a battery life of three years and can connect to a satellite to upload stored information at varying time intervals, ranging from every ten minutes to only twice a day. The user can select the most appropriate upload period depending on the need. Between satellite connections, the collar stores the GPS location of the individuals, taking a reading from every two to ten minutes. This system will allow the trackers to collect accurate and regular data on the movements of the chimps throughout the monitoring period. It has never been used for great apes but the CCC management staff is working closely with the company making the collars, VECTRONIC Aerospace GmbH in Germany. Since all the chimpanzees had to be anesthetized, blood was drawn and a TB test performed. The viral and bacterial tests all came back negative. The chimpanzees, especially the females, were not, initially, particularly comfortable with the collars and tried really hard to remove them. Some succeeded and we had to refit them using a stronger security system, a band of rubber that breaks under pressure. They are now perfectly happy with their collars and younger chimps that don’t have them are starting to wear vines or anything they can find to put around their neck! It’s definitely the new fashion in Somoria!