Original subtitles

(ANIMAL CALLS)

'Today on Monkey Life...

orang-utan DNA results day.

But will it reveal who's the daddy?'

We're sort of hopeful that the result

is going to be that it's Gordon's Jin.

'The team grown concerned

when Golden cheeked gibbons Peanut and Pung-Yo

try out their newly renovated forest enclosure...'

She's certainly not right.

She looks like she's lost a lot of muscle mass.

'..and a prickly problem for the ring-tailed lemurs.'

'Monkey World in Dorset, buried deep in the English countryside,

is the largest sanctuary of its kind on the planet.

The team, led by Dr Alison Cronin, rescue and rehabilitate

abused and unwanted primates from all over the world.'

You just never know how it's going to work.

'The park provides a home for more than 260 primates,

from 24 different species.'

'A genetics laboratory in North Wales

is undertaking a special task today.

The lab specialises in human DNA testing

for personal, legal and forensic needs,

and they've just received four samples

from a source they've never tested before.

Three of them are from the park,

and are DNA swabs from orang-utans Awan, Tuan and Gordon.

The fourth, from Wingham Wildlife Park, in Kent,

is DNA from male orang-utan Jin, a former Monkey World resident.'

We do about 200 of these samples a day -

all of them human. (CHUCKLES)

These are our first orang-utan ones that we've had.

Um, so yeah, we were confident

that we'd be able to get some markers for them.

I think it was about 97% of DNA that they share in common with us,

so we're hopeful that we will be able to get a conclusive result.

'The team at Northgene laboratory have been researching

the possibility of extracting orang-utan DNA,

and have discovered a number of markers

appearing in both humans and orang-utans.

These will enable them to build a profile of each animal.

The aim of the test is to ensure 12-year-old orang-utan Awan,

and young adult male Jin - who now lives at Wingham - aren't related.

The pair grew up together after Hsiao-Quai adopted Awan

when her mum rejected her.

The plan is for Awan to move to be with Jin -

but only if they don't have the same father!

The move is on hold until the team can confirm the orang-utan's paternity.

Awan is definitely Tuan's daughter,

but Jin's father needs to be confirmed,

because Hsiao-Quai lived with both Tuan and Gordon

around the time of Jin's conception.

As no-one wants an adult brother and sister living together,

DNA is the only way to be certain they're unrelated.'

They wanted to be sure that there was no common parent,

so we were certain that we could potentially do it

after our initial research.

'DNA is a molecule containing a genetic code

unique to every individual.

The information coded in DNA is hereditary,

meaning it passes from parent to child.

Once the swabs have been analysed,

the results are viewed and compared on a computer.

If any of the animals share the same peaks,

the likelihood is they're related...

and, with Jin and Gordon,

it looks as if it's a positive result.'

It's incredibly exciting that we've been able

to get a conclusive result for both orang-utans.

Um, I think I best go give Alison a call.

ALISON: 'Good, how are you?'

'Charlotte and Hannah make a video call to Alison to break the news.'

We're sort of hopeful that the result is going to be

that it's Gordon's Jin...

um, as opposed to the other way around.

We'll have to wait and hear from you guys!

So, I can confirm that, from the analysis we performed,

that it is very strongly supportive

that out of the two potential fathers for Jin

that Gordon is in fact the most likely to be Jin's father,

and Tuan is most likely to be Awan's father.

Alright. So Awan's free to go meet Jin, then!

That's fantastic. OK.

We'll look forward to getting your reports

and I'll let Markus at Wingham know as well.

'The result is what Alison expected and hoped for.'

"It's just good to know that if Awan and Jin are to have any offspring -

and we'll see, you know, maybe they will, maybe they won't -

but if they DO, they're unrelated individuals

and actually probably far more unrelated

than a lot of other orang-utans

within the European population that's been established for so long.

So, you know, Tuan, Gordon...

are very important individuals genetically

and we just need to make sure we're doing the right thing with them.

'Also waiting for the results is Markus Wilder...

the Curator of Wingham Wildlife Park.'

Jin is actually most closely related to Gordon and not Tuan. So...

'Yep.' ..that is what we had suspected

from the very beginning and it means that the recommendation

for Awan to come to you to be with Jin is all good."

'Good.' Yeah.

'Very nice.' Now, we're really pleased

because that will be a much easier journey for her and...

'Yep, definitely.'

..and those two are probably...

so far unrelated, from their parents being wild caught,

and so on, that that's a good thing.

'That's perfect.'

'Awan can now move to Wingham Wildlife Park

and be reunited with her old friend, and now possible mate, Jin.

Alison has mixed emotions.'

It's never easy to let individuals go that -

especially individuals that have been born here.

You know, we bring on these young orang-utans...

..and you become involved in their lives,

and we're their guardians so it's...

always difficult to let them go.

But it's an important thing to do and we can't keep all of them

and we just make sure that we provide them

with the best opportunities we can.

So, it's...

It's the way life rolls around here, trying to do the best thing

for all of our captive orang-utans and others that need our support.

(BIRDSONG)

'Down at Malagasy, Primate Care staff member Ali

is preparing a colourful, but prickly, treat

for the park's small troop of ring-tailed lemurs.'

Come on!

'He's been harvesting fresh gorse, which is currently in flower

and grows in abundance around the park...

and putting the prickly stems into baskets.'

That IS spiky.

There we go, that's one ball.

Hello, everybody.

'He's suspending them along a rope to make it that bit trickier,

and encourage the mainly ground-dwelling lemurs

to use their arboreal skills.'

They're all coming over now. Good stuff."

'He's barely finished distributing the brightly coloured,

scent-filled baskets before the lemurs come running.'

Hmm, that smell good?

This is flowering gorse, so you can see it's very colourful.

It's also very spiky so there's a lot of...

A lot of interesting dynamics going on here with this one.

We've also put a little bit of scatter in there,

just something to, you know, pique their interests.

This, at the moment, is obviously very colourful,

it's very yellow and it smells fantastic, too,

so hopefully this'll trigger a few of their...few of their behaviours.

'The troop of eight is currently split into two sub-groups.

Troublesome young twins Kurt and Friedrich

have been picking on the older boys, Himal, Indiana and Cirrius.

As a result, they now take it in turns to use the outdoor area,

while the others remain in the caged enclosure.

Today, Kurt and Friedrich have been joined by Al...

Renton...

and the dominant - ONLY female - Fennel.

As an additional treat, Ali is giving the small group

a scatter of banana, dried fruit, and nuts.

But, if they want it,

they're going to have to find a way through the prickly gorse balls.'

So we'll give them stuff like this, any form of enrichment, really,

to stimulate as many natural behaviours as we can.

That's the point of enrichment, what we aim to do in captivity.

We can't make it 100% natural, obviously,

so we need to, you know, add little bits and bobs

that will trigger something that makes them behave in a natural way.

'The approach is certainly working with the twins.

They're young and confident and determined to discover

what's concealed by the prickly gorse,

using their long, pointed muzzles

and excellent sense of smell as they search.

The oldest in the troop is Renton, who's 25.

These days, he takes the easy option,

letting the younger males do the hard work...

..while he picks up any scraps that fall to the ground.

Renton is still extremely close to his sister Fennel,

who's two years younger.

She's still very agile and active, quickly tracking down the treats.

Al is the other young male outside today.

Very little is known about his background,

but his broken tail suggests he suffered severe trauma

during his time in the pet trade.

He's adapted incredibly well, but struggles to compete

with the more dominant males when it comes to food.

Al is at the bottom.

He normally gets displaced off food,

he normally gets displaced off enrichment like this

and...you know, he's had a... he's had a pretty rough start.

He's got a broken tail, so it's at a complete right angle.

And you'd think that would stop him but his balance is fantastic.

He's really good at balancing on the rope up in the trees.

It doesn't seem to slow him down at all,

and because he's got that good balance,

it means he can reach the stuff that a lot of the other guys

wouldn't particularly bother with, and that gives him a chance

to interact with the enrichment as well as the others.

'Ring-tailed lemurs are well adapted

to tackling prickly and hard-to-reach food sources.

Their padded hands and feet allow them to reach into spiky areas,

and their thick fur also acts as a protective barrier.

Ring-tailed lemurs have a very good sense of smell,

with a wet nose at the end of their long muzzles,

which helps them find flowering plants.

In the wild, flowers make up 5% of a ring-tailed lemur's diet.

Today, however, they seem more interested

in the dried fruit and nuts Ali has put out,

rather than the brightly coloured gorse flowers.

But it's been a fun and active morning for the lemur troop,

and rewarding for the Primate Care staff

to see them mimicking the behaviour of wild lemurs

in their faraway habitat of Madagascar.'

(BIRDSONG)

'At chimp Bart's outdoor enclosure, the Primate Care staff

are preparing to bring the whole troop back together again.

After 18 months of hard work, careful planning

and occasionally frustrating introductions,

they're going to be reunited...

with Argentine chimp Sasha now an integral member.'

We're finally at this point with Bart's group

where after over a year of ups and downs,

trying to get everyone to be nice to Sasha,

trying to get her to understand how to behave in the context of a whole group,

we're finally at this point where everyone's going outside together for the first time,

and - fingers crossed - it's not gonna be pure chaos

and a year's worth of hard work won't fall apart instantly.

I'm very optimistic. We've set it up in a good, positive way.

She's at this point now, we wouldn't be going for it

if we didn't think it was the right time,

so just got to see what happens.

'It's been a learning curve for Sasha and the Primate Care staff.

The penultimate test came just a few weeks ago

when the female was joined outside by tricky second in command, Gamba.

It went smoothly and, since then, Shaun and the team

have been gradually adding more and more individuals to the mix,

culminating with both Bart and Gamba outside with Sasha at the same time.'

Bart is back in my good books now,

so after months of driving me insane,

of just being a perpetual toddler, just flat out holding...

He held up these intros for so long.

Everyone else was fine and a lot of these other old people,

like Busta and Cindy, were trying to tell him, "She's OK."

He just wouldn't accept it, and then finally, he's...

He just seems to be OK with it now to the point where if someone is giving her grief,

he is coming over and dealing with it

and he is doing the dominant male thing.

We've seen it just lately with Gamba and Sasha.

To begin with, he ran in there and he walloped Gamba.

After that, he learned, "I don't actually need to go that far overboard with Gamba.

I can just be here, and because I'm massive

and he's a bit nervous of me, just me being here will make him behave."

So he's learning as he goes along, so there's hope for him yet.

'This morning, to distract the chimps and keep them occupied,

the team have distributed a large amount of fresh browse

along with their normal breakfast.

They're also going to release the group

from different slide locations.'

(CHIMPS CHATTERING)

'As usual, some of the more dominant individuals

put on a bit of a noisy display.'

(RAUCOUS CHATTERING)

'But Sasha is cautious and sensibly stays out of the way.

Many of the females, like Beth, are keen to greet Bart and show respect.

The dominant male demonstrates just how much he's matured,

giving each some attention.

Oranges seem the most popular choice for breakfast...

with Bart collecting a leader's share.'

Right now, this is really good.

They've come out to a load of food, a load of browse.

There's lots of nice scatter as well,

so it's very exciting but no-one's kind of stopping Sasha,

no-one's going overboard, like, just being too dramatic

and trying to defend patches of food.

Everyone's nicely getting involved

and stuffing their faces, which is great!

'For the group in general, everything is back to normal -

all outside together.

But this is the first time Sasha's been outside

with so many chimps at one time.

Luckily, she seems to be taking everything in her stride.'

It's taken her a while to get to this point

but she does understand now different things work with different people.

We're gonna see how it goes. This is the first day.

We will watch non-stop, see how her relationships are developing

in the context of the whole group,

make sure no-one's giving her aggravation,

make sure she's still getting plenty of food at the feed times.

But this will make things so much easier

so hopefully they'll be a lot more settled,

we'll be a lot more settled and our lives will just be easier.

'The team are relieved... and the chimps are relaxed.

There'll always be fracas and disagreement within chimp groups,

but hopefully this group are now settled.'

This has really been the longest intro I've ever been part of,

with so many ups and downs.

We've had moments we thought we were nearly done,

and moments where we're, "This is never gonna happen.

She's gonna have to live with Hananya."

But it's great to finally see everyone's out,

everyone's nice and quiet, all just stuffing their faces.

Everyone knows she's there. No-one's going out of their way to interfere with her.

For now, everything's looking good

and hopefully I'm finally done with these introductions now!

(GENTLE MUSIC)

At the Gibbon Support building and enclosure,

it's a big day for golden-cheeked pair, Peanut and Pung-Yo.'

(SQUEAKY CHATTERING)

'For the last few months,

they've been confined to the indoor area and outside tunnels...

while their tree-filled enclosure

has undergone much-needed maintenance.

The Great British weather delayed the finish date,

but now it's ready,

and the two gibbons are about to try it out for the first time.'

I say, it's perfect time of year for them to go out now

because they've been kept in during the winter months.

So it's not really been an issue.

But now the sun's coming out,

all the new buds are starting to come through,

so there's lots of lovely new browse in here,

lots of lovely edible trees, nice spacious enclosures

so they can move about and brachiate and just be gibbons.

It will be very exciting. I can't wait.

'Alison's arrived to see what the long-established pair

make of their revamped outdoor space.

Time for Primate Care staff member Sarah to open up.

The two golden-cheeked gibbons don't hold back.

Pung-Yo is straight up into the trees,

doing what gibbons do best - brachiating through the branches.

Peanut is often a little slower than her gung-ho mate,

but today she seems unusually cautious, stumbling a little.'

She's moving very slowly.

'The team are concerned with her movement.'

Maybe she's just had some sort of injury.

Maybe she's got arthritis.

So that could be an arthritic thing. Yeah.

Peanut.

She's struggling to walk there, eh.

'It may be a short-term issue,

but it could be something more serious.'

She's approximately 27 years of age but she's been fine...

while we've been doing the refurb outside.

But we've let her out this morning, she came out fine,

but she just seems to have gone a bit...

strange on her...on her legs.

So we're gonna keep a close eye on her...

..and then we'll make a decision whether, for today,

we bring her in and monitor her a bit closely inside

where we have a bit more control.

Be able to get some video footage of her moving

so that the vet can analyse that way,

and then we'll go from there. But, no....

Strange. Appetite's fine.

Arms are fine.

Strange.

She looks even weaker out here than inside, doesn't she?

Yeah, I'm not happy with that.

'High in the trees, using her hands and arms

to brachiate and move around,

Peanut seems happier and more comfortable...'

Pea!

'..but back on the ground, it's obvious she has a problem.

The team are so concerned about the 27-year-old gibbon,

Animal Director Jeremy has come to take a look.'

She's certainly not right.

Okey-dokey.

She looks like she's lost a lot of muscle mass.

'The team decide to call Peanut back indoors.'

"Come on, Pea!"

'The worry is that if her condition worsens,

the team won't be able to reach her quickly if she's outside.

In the indoor enclosure, and outdoor tunnel system,

they'll be right on hand.

The gibbons have regular operant conditioning sessions

so the Primate Care staff can examine them when needed.

This allows Sarah to take a closer look.'

Peanut, come here.

Good girl. Hi! You want back scratches. That's nice.

Can we see your foot? Can we see your foot?

(PEANUT GRUNTS SOFTLY) Can we see your foot?

Peanut.

Give me your hand.

Good girl. (CLICKS TONGUE)

Good girl.

Come here. Can we see your foot?

Good girl. That's better!

That's better!

No reaction to pokies.

Ah.

Oh, was that sore, poppet?

OK. Was it the ankle?

'Something isn't right.

Until they hear back from the vet, Peanut will be kept indoors

so the staff can keep a close eye on her.

It'll be a worrying time for the gibbon team

until they can find out what's going on.'

(LIVELY DRUMBEATS)

(ANIMALS CALL)

'Next time on Monkey Life...

Alison makes plans to rehome partially paralysed chimp Chocolat

following a visit from her elderly owner...'

At 23 years old,

you know, she's still got, potentially, another 30 years,

if she does well, to live, Chocolat.

'..and baby silvered langur, Diep, moves into a new home.'

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