Behind the Curtain at Great Ape Trust

Absorbing the news out of the Great Ape Trust is like sitting vigil during the agonizingly slow death of someone you love. You want the pain to end.

On the heels of international acclaim for groundbreaking language studies with Kanzi, Panbanisha and the other bonobos – rare, endangered chimpanzee-like apes found in the wild – the accusations against Dr. Sue Savage-Rumbaugh by 12 former caretakers-turned-whistleblowers are jarring. Among them:

• She is in such an altered state of reality that she hears puppies speaking English and believes people are hiding in the bushes waiting to slash her vehicle tires.
• She offered in televised interviews that she sleeps and bathes with the apes.
• A young adolescent male, Nyota, nearly escaped on her watch.
• She took Teco, a 2-year-old baby bonobo who represents the future of ape language research, to be blessed at the Buddha Relics Tour at a Des Moines public auditorium earlier this month, potentially exposing him to tuberculosis and respiratory diseases for which apes have a susceptibility.

The allegations could have unintended consequences, such as deepening a funding crisis that threatens to shutter what is now known as Great Ape Trust Bonobo Hope Sanctuary and perhaps split up this magnificent family of our closest-living relatives, bonobos who have been together for more than three decades.

Savage-Rumbaugh, who has been placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of an outside investigation, “categorically denies” the allegations that she “intentionally harmed any one of the bonobos." She says they were made by disgruntled former workers who are "jealous that we are succeeding in fund-raising." 

“It is not their business anymore,” she said, reading from a statement prepared by her attorney.

Without Context, the Bonobo World Does Look Weird

Back when I made my living writing about the Great Ape Trust bonobos and the people who study them, this is exactly the kind of story we hoped to avoid as we invited the world to look into the eyes of a great ape. What we wanted people to see was what Sue Savage-Rumbaugh saw 30 years ago:

A playful, mischievous 2½-year-old at the time, Kanzi spontaneously began using abstract symbols, known as lexigrams, to ask for food. He hadn’t been taught to use them; as human children do, Kanzi simply acquired language by being exposed to it.

Elegant in its simplicity, this astonishing discovery further lifted a tissue-thin veil separating human and non-human primates and challenged assumptions and paradigms at the foundation of some of our most sacred beliefs.

Dr. Sue’s inquiry itself is rife with controversy among scientists, and with the departure last year of Communications Director Al Setka, my former boss and an absolute news and messaging genius, there’s no one left to manage the brand. What the public sees now is disturbing and shocking and lacking in needed context.

The science of these bonobos takes place in a wondrous parallel universe, one that is not quite human and not quite bonobo.

Without it, Great Ape Trust seems like a weird place where people romp around with bonobos and call it science.

CNN’s Anderson Cooper, for crying out loud, put on a bunny suit when he interviewed Dr. Sue after she was named one of the world’s 100 most influential persons in 2011 by TIME magazine. With no one around to explain, articulately, why that is culturally significant, things like the bunny suit can come off as silly games with no scientific relevance – one of those monkey-see-monkey-do kind of stunts so diminishing to these magnificent beings.

The bunny suit was a test. If Anderson Cooper was cool enough to wear it, he is cool enough – in the apes' eyes – to be with them. How we respond to bonobo play determines how much favor we’ll get in their world.

The science of these bonobos takes place in a wondrous parallel universe, one that is not quite human and not quite bonobo. It is a science that is grounded in the rearing of babies, in the day-to-day living with bonobo families and in the two-way conversations between ape and human that can shake even your own sense of self.

Scientific Funding Elusive

But in the end, the dream of founder Ted Townsend and the group of scientists he assembled wasn’t sustainable, despite something like $30 million in seed money from that good and generous man who only wanted to inspire future generations of scientists.

Lots of cool things happened at Great Ape Trust during its all too brief time in the sun. But there was no big moment on the precipice of great scientific discovery.

It was the failure to publish research supporting the scientific inquiry as valuable and still groundbreaking that precipitated today’s funding crisis. Ted always intended that his contribution would be venture capital, of sorts, to sustain the organization until scientific grants could pay the freight.

It will take someone with patience and passion and, frankly, a ton of money to put the wheels back on the bus. These bonobos could live for another 10, 20 or, in baby Teco’s case, 50-plus years.

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Fortunately for the bonobos, this dust-up over Dr. Sue is getting international attention. The whistle-blowers – the Bonobo 12 – are asking interesting and perhaps ultimately legal questions about who “owns” the apes, about “personhood” and about the unique responsibilities that come with caring for endangered species.

The best we may be able to hope for is that there aren’t unintended consequences from the Bonobo 12’s whistleblowing – such as splitting up this family that has lived together for three decades.

Ken Schweller, the retired Buena Vista University professor who heads what is now called the Great Ape Trust Bonobo Hope Sanctuary board of directors, acknowledged the organization is “in a funding crisis and desperately need(s) to raise money to stay in Des Moines.” Alternative homes for the bonobos include other research centers, zoos or sanctuaries.

It’s ironic enough that this caricature may be the final legacy of Dr. Sue’s extraordinary scientific inquiry, without which Great Ape Trust never would have existed. The ultimate irony, however, may be that Great Ape Trust would not have existed in Des Moines if not for Georgia State University’s sense of urgency in unburdening itself from the liability of allegations that are chillingly similar to those of the Bonobo 12.

It may well be that the last chapter of the history of ape language research was written in Des Moines.

Beth Dalbey, West Des Moines Patch's local editor, served as communications editor for three years at Great Ape Trust.