Ape researcher suspended amid welfare concerns

Susan Savage-Rumbaugh, famed primate researcher and executive director of the Great Ape Trust (GAT) in Des Moines, Iowa, has been suspended in the wake of allegations that she is a danger to the trust's seven bonobos ? including Kanzi, a bonobo genius that has developed his own "words" and mastered the art of making stone tools.

On 9 September, 12 former GAT employees ? including 10 former ape caretakers, a former PhD researcher and the former head of public safety ? sent a letter to both the GAT board of directors and the local newspaper The Des Moines Register. In it they stated their belief that "Savage-Rumbaugh is not in a state fit to safely oversee the laboratory and bonobo care".

In a more lengthy statement dated 14 September, the 12 also allege that Savage-Rumbaugh locked apes outdoors without access to water, and exposed apes to visitors who did not have the necessary vaccinations. GAT's board of directors is now investigating the claims, which Savage-Rumbaugh denies.

"I don't feel the need to dignify the allegations with a characterisation," she told New Scientist. She says that 10 of the signatories had left the Trust before she became director of the lab in January, and the two that she has managed were laid off recently. She says the allegations are simply the work of disgruntled employees.

In response to the claims, the US Department of Agriculture, which regulates animal welfare, inspected GAT on 12 September. "They gave us a clean bill of health and I have to believe the board will do the same," says Savage-Rumbaugh.

Ongoing investigation

USDA spokesman David Sacks confirms that the report, which is not yet publicly available, found no major problems with the facility. But board director Kenneth Schweller, a retired professor from Buena Vista University in Storm Lake, Iowa, says that while the board was happy to receive a positive report, the issues raised go beyond the USDA's mandate and that the internal investigation will continue for an unspecified amount of time.

Itai Roffman, a graduate student at Haifa University in Israel who worked at GAT, says the situation arose because of a culture clash. The caretakers, he believes, expected GAT to be managed like a zoo rather than a research facility. "They had a view that Sue's work was not conventional primate research," he says.

Roffman admits that some of the techniques used by the researchers ? such as sleeping alongside the apes to gain their trust ? may seem unusual. Savage-Rumbaugh and her family members have virtually lived alongside the apes for 40 years and raised them "bi-culturally" with both ape and human "parents". But that investment has paid off in scientific discoveries, says Roffman, including his recent study that described Kanzi's ability to make his own stone tools.

So what's next for the bonobos? The letter's signatories told New Scientist that they hope the apes can stay at GAT away from Savage-Rumbaugh, or else go to good homes at zoos or sanctuaries.

Ape researchers hope that the ape family won't be separated. "This is absolutely a worldwide unique place," says Derek Wildman of Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan, who is studying the bonobos' genomes to determine how language learning might affect epigenetic characteristics. "It's a real shame; it ruins any study of their genetics because you're introducing so many variables." Additionally, says Roffman, the apes would suffer if they were separated from one another or from Savage-Rumbaugh's family.

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