The new dormitory will soon be finished!

Here are some pictures of the new chimpanzee dormitory. They are working on the interior and it will be finished soon. This will help a lot with the space for the chimps in the sanctuary. And then we need money to start the fence...
Hilde

News from Lwiro

The new dormitory
The struggle of getting enough funds for the new chimpanzee dormitory is fianlly over. Only to be taken over by the struggle to raise the funds for the fence around the forrest....

But back to the dormitory, it was started last march, but due to lacking of funds the work has been stopped for many months now the outside is finished but the inside is not. Now funds have come through 9900 dollars from Survive Australia, after an auction they held this autumn, and 4600 dollars from Friends of Lwiro in Norway ( former AWARE Norway), most of that from sales of Julius paintings in Kristiansand Zoo. This is enough to finally finish the dormitory and the building has started today. But the best thing is that COOPERA has agreed to try to cover the running cost of the sanctuary for 2009! This is great because otherwise the money from Australia and Norway would have had to cover the running cost, and the dormitory wouldn't be finished.

The dormitory January-09

Great support from local children

Yesterday morning there was a very nice visit to the sanctuary. The children of " the environmental center of education and interpretation" of CHAHOBOKA / KATANA donated a big sack of carrots that they had grown themselves for the CRPL primates. It's so great to see.

Everyone loves football

After the football turnament this christmas, a video was made and sent on Spanish tv about the athletic club CRSN Lwiro. This has raised 3000 euros to build a new football pitch and changing room for the teams!

The chimpanzees

It has been very cold this month in Lwiro, and almost all the chimpanzees in the sanctuary have got colds, especially the little ones and Baheny has injured one of his canine teeth. It got ripped of when it got stuck in a rope. Luckily he is doing well, and will recover ok from the injury.

Baheny

June 1st to July 11th 2008

It has been a long time since the last update, but a lot has happened here at Lwiro. Seven new monkeys of various species have arrived, through confiscations. This brings Lwiro sanctuary to 80 residents in total!

After Kanshi finished her one month quarantine she was moved to the sanctuary. She has now settled in well to the Goma group, and is getting on with all of the individuals.

Kalume is doing wonderfully also, and spends his days in a cage next to the Goma group or going for a walk around the sanctuary. His mobility has improved incredibly in the last few weeks, and he has even been climbing trees with the babies!

The four babies which arrived a few months ago are all doing well. They are getting bigger by the day! We have had to move them to the quarantine cage at the house, as they were getting too big and boisterous for the small cages at the sanctuary (besides the fact that they are all now occupied by monkeys). Construction on a small dormitory attached to the quarantine cage has finished this will serve as the babies night den. Another cage is in construction in the yard also, this will serve as a new quarantine cage.

Maiko, one of the babies arriving a few months ago, had a bullet fragment lodged above her right eye from when her group was shot at by poachers. This bullet fragment came out of its own accord a few days ago.

Construction also continues on the new dormitory, next to the small forest. The foundations have been laid and the walls are almost finished.




There have been several more small earthquakes originating from the DRC-Rwandan border area; however, they didn’t seem to impact the animals as much as the previous earthquakes.

I am a new volunteer at Lwiro, my name is Andrea. I will be writing the blog updates when I get time! When I came to Lwiro I had some goods and services donated to me for the sanctuary. I would like to acknowledge these companies and individuals for being so generous.

Firstly, thank-you to Darren and David of DARCHE who made and donated over 30 new hammocks for the chimpanzees night dens. These hammocks will go into the new dormitory and ensure that everyone can have a bed to themselves!



A huge thank-you to Peptech Animal Health, in particular Tim Trigg and Katie Yeates, who donated contraceptive implants for the chimpanzees. These were needed greatly.

Thank-you to LYNX (a keeper driven conservation group) who donated funds to allow us to purchase medications and protein powders which were desperately needed. To Zoos Victoria, for donating worming medications, thank-you. And thanks very much to Dr Kate Bodley who worked very hard to organize all of the medications.

Thank you to RCR International, who donated 8 hot water bottles for use with very young babies when they come to the sanctuary.

Last but not least, I would like to thank Jetta Express enormously for donating the air freight to get the above items and more to Uganda, so we could get them to the sanctuary in Congo.

A few updates

Julius has now finished his quarantine and spend his time with the other babies in the sanctuary or in the forrest. He loves playing with the others.

Kalume finally seems to be getting better, he enjoys his walks around the sanctuary and all the atention, he has become like a little baby! He also plays with the babies, but do find them a bit anoying.

Kalonge, the baby baboon, has moved in with our baboon group and it seems to be going well. Then it's just Kashusha, the adult male, to go...

The foundation of the new chimpanzee dormitory is finsihed, and we've got some money to continue, at least the outside wall.

Construction begins

Finally we've starte constructing the foundation of the new dormitory for the chimpanzees. It's next to a little forest which we plan to put a fence around so that the chimps can play in the forest all day. The money for the foundation came from AWARE- Norway 7800 USD, mostly from Kristiansand Zoo and some from Seadrill, and private donations. The foudation is 20m*10m, and has 6 rooms for the chimpanzees, and a corridor for keepers. We don't have the money to continue after the foundation is finished yet, but have hopes they will arrive soon...