Move to the sanctuary

Today was the day for moving Kongo and Lume to the sanctuary. We decided that Kongo would move into Kalumes group and Lume in with the babies. Carmen managed to anesthetize Lume by hand and he was put in a cage and moved up to the sanctuary to the babies bedroom so that he could get to know them through the bars for a few hours before he was let in. It was harder with Kongo. He had been anesthetized by Carmen ones before and she was not allowed to come anywhere near him with the needle, and not anyone else either! Pablo, a wildlife vet from Spain, arrived yesterday to relive Carmen, so she could go on holiday for a month. He got an exiting first day, when he had to dart Kongo with his blowpipe. Poor Kongo had never seen one of them before so was easily fooled. And then he was a sleep as well, and could be moved up to the sanctuary. He was put in the empty room next to Kalume groups room and then we waited till he woke up. He was very scared when he did and saw all these strange chimpanzees looking curiously in at him. Luckily we had made a sliding door between this room and Kalumes room so we could introduce them safely. We decided only to let a couple in at firs to get him used to them over night before putting the whole group in tomorrow. Shege and Lubutu was let in and it went well, but Kongo didn’t want much to do with them, still very scared.
Lume was let in with the babies, and it went much better with him, because he knows how to handle chimpanzees. It was a bit much at times because everyone wanted to play with the newcomer at ones, but then he had Kaleshe there to comfort him.