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Sally is a 44-year-old Sumatran orangutan at the Denver Zoo. She developed a benign fibroid tumor of the uterus that was interfering with her other organs. Veterinarian Diana Boon arranged to collect orangutan blood from around the country and enlisted volunteer surgeons to remove the growth. The doctors tried to prepare but found a dearth of information on orangutan anatomy.
But when Sally lost the ability to go to the bathroom, Boon understood she had only days to live if the obstruction wasn’t removed. So on a Friday afternoon she fired off e-mails to the team, telling them the surgery had to be done by Sunday. And they wouldn’t have blood.
“It had to be a bloodless surgery,” Boon said. “It was either this would work, or this wouldn’t work and it would be fatal for Sally.”
And then, the group got a break. Covidien, a Boulder company that makes a device called LigaSure that helps limit blood-loss during surgery, donated the use of a machine for Sally’s sake.
Another snag loomed. The procedure demanded quite a bit of rummaging around in Sally’s abdomen. If a wayward blade nicked her distended bowel, she would die; Sally would not understand how to use a colostomy bag.
There were other hairy moments during the six hours of surgery, but Sally came through it. Read the entire story (and see a video) at The Denver Post. Link -via Fark
Kanzi,
the bonobo that surprised researchers with its linguistic skills (he had
learned lexigrams naturally, simply by watching its mother), added a new
skillset that will be handy when the apes rise up to take over the world:
he can start a fire to cook meals!
Dr Savage-Rumbaugh, of the Great Ape Trust, in Des Moines, Iowa, adds: ‘Kanzi makes fire because he wants to. He used to watch the film Quest For Fire when he was very young which was about early man struggling to control fire. He watched it spellbound over and over hundreds of times.’
He was also fascinated by the camp fires his keepers made to cook food. And he was encouraged to interact with humans and copy them. At the age of five, he was making small piles of bone dry sticks.
David Derbyshire of The Daily Mail has the story (with lots more neat images): Link (Image: still from video by Great Ape Trust)
Do apes love to gamble just like humans do? You bet! New study by Max Planck scientists reveal that apes can calculate odds before taking risky gambles:
Experts observed apes as they gambled using upturned cups concealing pieces of chopped banana.
Given the choice of a safe bet of a small piece of banana or a larger chunk of fruit hidden beneath one of a selection of shuffled cups, the apes chose to gamble more than 50 per cent of the time.
The team, led by Daniel Haun of the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics found that they were also able to identify when the odds were stacked against them and when it was wiser to go with the safe bet.As more cups were added and the odds became worse, the apes become more cautious.
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A Russian circus chimpanzee named Lusha picked stocks that tripled in value over a year’s time. Lusha was presented with cubes representing 30 different stock options and selected eight to invest money in by picking the cubes. Her chosen portfolio outperformed 94% of Russian investment funds!
‘She bought successfully and her portfolio grew almost three times. She did better than almost the whole of the rest of the market,’ said editor of Russian Finance magazine Oleg Anisimov.
He questioned why so-called financial whizz-kids are still receiving hefty perks for their expertise .
‘Everyone is shocked. What are they getting their bonuses for? Maybe it’s worth sending them all to the circus.’
Link -via Blame it on the Voices
Taxonomy: Keeping the family in order
Got a loved one who loves to monkey around? Do you have an ardent Creationist friend who you’d love to poke a little fun at? Here’s a new T-shirt from the Neatorama Shop that will fit him or her nicely.
The Taxonomy: Keeping the Family in Order T-shirt is designed by the super-talented (and available for hire) Chris Murphy of ChrisM70 Graphic Design. Words by our very own national treasure, Neatoramanaut Kalel.
For more geeky science T-shirts, check out the Neatorama Shop: Link
