Shaibu: Man behind successful Chimpanzee habituation experience

Shaibu Utenga in his office. Photo by: Mussa Mandia

By Happiness Kiemi
Every morning before the sun shine, Shaibu Utenga and his Team take motorbikes hundreds of kilometres deep into the dense tropical rainforest of Rubondo Island National Park (RINP). Then, they leave their bikes behind and start hiking to the place where they left African great apes the day before  - or waiting for their morning screams, pant hoots and calling. Then they follow them all day long up to sunset.

Shaibu, a conservationist with  the Tanzania National Parks, has worked worked in several national parks inhabited by chimpanzee, such as Gombe and Mahale National Parks. He is renowned for his contribution, albeit for a very short time, towards successful RINP Chimpanzee habituation through neutral visits.

RINP is inhabited by western sub-species of chimpanzees, which over a period of four years were brought back to Africa between 1966 up to 1969. These Chimps were once taken to Western Europe as pets from western African countries. In early 1960s, the animals became a nuisance and it was decided to return them to their countries of origin. During that time, however, their countries of origin were in political turmoil. Prof. Bernhard Grzimek of Frankfurt Zoological Society proposed introducing these great apes into RINP. The quiet and vastness of the national park offers a conducive habitat to a variety of wild animals. This, ensures enough food for Chimps to remain wild and increase in number.

Several Chimps habituation attempts failed. In the year 2000, TANAPA in collaboration with Frankfurt Zoological Society started Chimp habituation in Rubondo, but the project was not successful.

Shaibu’s transfer to RINP in 2014 marked the turning point of Rubondo’s chimp habituation project. Soon after his arrival, he realized his passion to take care of chimps and an interest of coming into contact with the apes to make them become tourism products, just like in Gombe National Park. “I was eager to see the western sub-species of chimpanzees, since I once worked in the national parks inhabited by chimps of eastern sub-species, but not the other sub-species. My curiosity was achieved when Tanapa gave me an opportunity to develop my professional dimension in Kibale, Uganda, on habituation techniques and chimps behaviour,” said Shaibu.

Shaibu Utenga (at the rear)  and his colleague following on chimpanzees. Photo by: Mussa Mandia

Firstly, Mr. Shaibu formulated a team for chimp survey to impact it with knowledge on how to habituate the apes, an exercise that was done for three months in a vast area of 456.8 km2.
It was observed that Chimps prefer roosting more in the northern side of the National Park. The Team were given special uniform and required to follow the Chimps every day before sunrise until sunset and this has remained the Team’s routine work since 2014.

The main habituation technic used is Neutral visit (without using baits), different from other techniques, which have been used in other National Parks like Gombe and Mahale, where Chimps were given fruits to accelerate them lose their fear of humans. Later on, it became clear that Chimp habituation technique using baits might create a health-risk to the apes, hence stopped in 2000.

Neutral visits to Chimps bring no harm unless visitors/team are infected with diseases, particularly flu. “Formulation of Chimp habituation guidelines restricting people contracted with infectious disease to participate in the habituation exercise acts as a control measure” Said Shaibu.

According to Shaibu, it was difficult for chimps to come close to the habituation team in the early days of the habituation exercise. The chimps were very shy and easily frightened whenever they heard a voice or ground trampling. During this situation, the animals either moved away very quickly or waited to see the intruder and froze to escape being spotted. After several months of neutral visit, the habituation team was able to see the chimps at a close range, approximately 50 metres away. Currently, after four years of chimp habituation, the primates can be watched at an average distance of 20 metres and they can stay for more than an hour.

Chimpanzee of Rubondo Island National Park. Photo by: Mussa Mandia

What made Shaibu very successful in this task, unlike several other attempts that made in vain? “Tolerance and endurance were important tools in the field. Since RINP has a vast, thickly-forested area providing chimps with a large home range and making spotting them very difficult, it was not an easy task. When I came here in 2014, I heard a lot of stories that some experts tried to habituate these chimps unsuccessfully; these stories became challenging and discouraging to me,” said Shaibu. “My team and I feel extremely happy and applaud ourselves for the successful work,” he added.

Rubondo Chimps are not yet named. A naming ceremony will be held in May 2018, but this will depend on the chimp behaviour. Since September 2016, habituation activity has been involving tourists as part of the team. Before they participate in the Chimp Habituation Experiences (CHEXS), tourists have an opportunity to get more information about the national park and the Chimp behaviour. The recommended time of doing the CHEXS exercise is at least two days.
CHEXS package of two days and one night costs $165 and $150 for a non-resident and Tanzanian expatriate, respectively.