Talkin' Monkey Project

I will start off by saying that this was one of the parts of the course that I was most dreading, the required service learning hours. After actually performing the majority of my hours at the Talkin’ Monkey Project my perspective has changed drastically, I actually enjoyed the work I had done and I felt that the work I had done truly had a positive impact on both the creatures that lived at the rescue center and the people who were running it.  Even though this organization has very little to do with my future career plans as a Civil Engineer, I have always loved animals and have been fascinated with monkeys as they are the closest animals to humans genetically. This caused me to jump at the opportunity to volunteer at a place where I would get to interact and be up close to some primates.

 

This organization encompasses most everything this class is about, sustainability, stewardship, and conservationism. All of the food for the monkeys is provided by donations from local grocery stores, they donate the food that is past the “sell by date” so they can no longer sell it to people, but it is still perfectly edible. So this prevents the food from just being thrown out unlike at most grocery stores where an estimated $15 billion is thrown out in the U.S. each year and provides a very good and plentiful food source for the animals. Whatever food they cannot use for the monkeys they give to their neighbors who have animals on their property as well. They also recycle everything they have including organic waste as the have a compost pile, which they use for fertilizer for the various plants they have on the property. 

Kelpie

During my time volunteering I cleaned cages, brought food to the monkeys and even got to get up close and personal with one of the spider monkeys “Kelpie”. All of us who were volunteering that day got to go inside of her cage and interact with her. She was a very friendly and docile creature who you could tell had a very strong bond with Dr.Misotti. The day I spent at the Talkin’ Monkey Project was a very memorable and enjoyable day; So much so that I plan on doing the majority of the remainder of my service learning hours there.     

Gizmo

Kelpie