Chimpanzee kid named Jerome has recently turned 3 months old. It was named in honour of its parents – Romeo (Roma) and Juliet (Jetta). Jerome is the first baby of this couple of anthropoid apes living in Feldman Ecopark. Not only were the parents waiting for its birth impatiently, but also the whole team of the Regional Landscape Park. Chimpanzees are the endangered animals and every newborn gets a special attention of the international animal protection organizations.
“At first Juliet was a perfect mother, who fed the baby, caressed it and didn’t leave it even for a second. But after a while, the mother grew cool towards the baby – perhaps, Romeo began to demonstrate displeasure and be jealous. Several weeks ago, the mother stopped feeding the baby and take care of it, and we had to take it away,” Feldman Ecopark’s deputy director of zootechnics Valeriia Ivashchenko told. “Now, we are feeding Jerome with formula. We gradually add kid’s formulas, kefir, fruit puree into the kid’s diet.”
According to the workers of Feldman Ecopark, who stay near the chimpanzee kid round the clock and actually replaced its mother, Jerome is healthy, cheerful and sociable.
“The kid is strongly attached to its keepers and is always glad to see new people always smiling to them as a human child. It lives in the individual room with a cozy bed and favourite toys. Veterinarians visit it on a regular basis to monitor its health,” Jerome’s caregiver, the keeper in Feldman Ecopark Olena Drozdetska told.
Jerome will never return to the enclosure of his parents, who have recently made a big stir in Feldman Ecopark, but after that, live in perfect harmony without scandals. It will live separately, the specialists of Feldman Ecopark emphasized. When it grows up, they will find a couple for it.
It should be reminded that the collection of primate in Feldman Ecopark is the biggest in Ukraine and includes 200 animals of 30 species. There are eight chimpanzees among them, and the most famous of them is Chita, a symbol of Ecopark.
