One-armed ape a living reminder to zoo visitors
A gibbon named Kien is adjusting to life one limb short at Lincoln Park Zoo — and providing a curiosity (and zoo officials hope a lesson) for visitors.
Kien lost his right arm April 9 after he got it stuck in a screen reaching for a ChapStick a visitor had tossed near his exhibit. A report by the American Zoo and Aquarium Association released last week described how the gibbon, an ape found in Southeast Asia, had managed to “weave” his arm out and then back in through another opening before getting it stuck.
“In an apparent panic,” investigators reported, the ape tried to free its arm by pulling — a force so hard it dislocated the animal’s elbow and severely damaged its tendons. An orthopedic surgeon reattached the tendons, but three days later the arm lost its circulation, and Lincoln Park vets decided to amputate.
[see Chicago Sun-Times]
