By Mary Lynn Campbell

maggiewithcapuchins

Due to the recent changes with the rules and regulations in many of our states across the country, the issue of keeping our monkey’s safe and under control has become very important.

When an accident happens and a monkey gets away or when something worse happens, the media is right on the story immediately. It is evidently big news to many but to us as monkey caregivers, we begin to think about what we would do if this happened to our beloved monkey. The next things that enters into our minds is what is another incident going to do to the already challenging situation that we have been dealing with due to fearful people and the activist who are working to push more regulations and changes for us monkey caregivers.

Are you using the proper safety procedures and equipment for your monkey?  Let’s find out!

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By Donna Bandy

Let me start with; before deciding to get a ring-tailed lemur or any Primate for that matter, please check the laws in your state as well as the county you dwell in to be sure it is legal to have one where you live.

I NEVER leave my primates alone ever.  If I need to go somewhere without them, then my husband watches them and if something requires my husband and I to be there together, then we have a very close experienced friend that is family to us, babysit them for us.  We bring them to her and pick them up when we are done doing what we had to do.  And a baby, never leave them.  I have cancelled important appointments when we first got Rocky, because he was in no way at a point as to me being able to leave him with anyone and hasn’t been fully ready now either, but we have done it twice recently and the first time he did call for me at first and then settled down, but he did do a Panic Poop.

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By Donna Bandy

We got our first ring-tailed lemur Rocky 11 1/2 mos. ago, but before getting him, I learned a lot from a couple friends that have them and did a lot of research on them and amp-ted up my research and notes the closer I got to getting Rocky. Everyone kept telling me to get a male and not a female because the females are the dominate of the troop with lemurs. I already knew I wanted a boy anyways, however if my mind had of been set on a female, then a female is what I would have gotten. From all my many years of working with and training domestic and exotic animals, I already knew not to listen to that reasoning, for me, because I already know how to deal with those types of behaviors with dominant males and females.

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Experienced primate owners like Donna often come up with special recipes where they integrate monkey chow directly into the recipe since they know how important these biscuits are for their monkeys.  This recipe contains a bunch of healthy ingredients that most primates are sure to love. Donna’s monkeys love these veggie squares and we’re pretty excited she allowed us to share this recipe with the rest of the monkey community.  Let’s find out how to make these tasteful Bandy Boys Pumpkin Spice Veggie Delight Biscuits.  Thanks Donna!

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Looking to “Mix” things up in your monkey’s diet?  This is a smoothie mix for your monkeys or you could even make this into popsicles and give this to your monkeys on a hot day or as a treat. You can get the plastic popsicle containers from the dollar store and our monkeys love them because they have a plastic handle they can hold on to and it keeps their hands from getting cold.

Thank you Winona for sharing!

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One of my favorite topics to talk about is primate enrichment.  In the wild primates spent a lot of time hunting for food.  As a matter of fact, that is how they mainly keep themselves busy during the day so why not try to mimic this behavior in our homes?   The design above is my own creation but it is based on the design of several others that I’ve seen over the years.  Some people prefer to use plastic drinking cups but to make this enrichment unit virtual indestructible, I decided to use pipe caps.  I had to make some tweaks along the way but am pretty happy with the end-result.   I’ve been using these primate enrichment cups with my capuchin for several months now and he loves it.  It’s fairly easy to make, so let’s get started!

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Monkey Chow

Are you feeding your monkey a commercial primate diet?  If you don’t, you really should because it contains all the necessary ingredients to keep your primate healthy.   The most popular primate diets are made by Zupreem and Mazuri.   The primate dry food shown above is also often referred to in the primate world as monkey chow.  Many primate owners soak their biscuits in juice to make them more interesting for their primate but if you’re still having a hard time feeding these essential biscuits to your primate(s), maybe it’s time to make some monkey cookies.  Listed below we have several recipes for monkey cookies that are sure to be a hit with your monkey.  Thank you Eva and Donna for sending these in!

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When you do a little research, you’ll notice that raw pumpkin seeds are actually very healthy.  When you dig a little further, you’re also going to notice that zoos often add pumpkins to their primate enclosure simply because it’s a cheap and they’re actually amazing enrichment devices.  Simply cut a hole in the pumpkin and your monkey(s) will keep themselves busy for many hours.

Let’s talk a little bit about the great benefits of pumpkin seeds.

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Bio-Serv has some pretty unique treats for primates and while not every monkey loves every treat, they’ve got plenty of different treats so one of them could be your monkey’s favorite!  The great thing about their treats is that they’re nutritional complete and that nearly all of them have vitamin D3 in them which is very important especially for new world primates.   This blog isn’t so much about their treats but more about their enrichment devices.   We’ve tested out 3 of them with our capuchin so let’s find out together if these enrichment devices are worth their asking price.

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A few months ago I read about an amazing treat dispenser one could easily build themselves so to the store I went to get the necessary materials to build this great enrichment device.   Out of all the enrichment units we have available to our capuchin, this one is without any doubt his favorite.   This monkey treat dispenser is available outside his monkey room and the first thing he’ll do when we release him from his room is run towards it to see what we put in it today.  He loves to pull the handle up to see what appears in the dispenser hole.  We typically put nuts, seeds, or popcorn into this primate enrichment unit which fit perfectly for this device.   It’s a enrichment device that will encourage their natural foraging instincts.  Interested in making our own?  Let’s find out after the break what you’ll need to get started!

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