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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Love how these pages from the Center for Great Apes Annual Report resembles my high school yearbook

An open, large, color booklet features scores of headshots of chimpanzees and orangutans, each with their names and birth dates

Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

CORRECTION: On page 52 in issue #1 of Ape Sh*t, the photo below is listed with other pics as examples of injuries from capuchin monkeys. This, however, was from a spider monkey. I regret the error.

Photo of a human arms with what appear to be teeth marks and swollen, reddened skin.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

We talked about, among other things, our earlier ~2001 listserv Monkeywire, a collaboration with Onion pal @joegarden.bsky.social and WMFU's Becky Ebenkamp (who writes Ape Shit's TV column). Archives still hosted at lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/mo...

Screen shot from the old Monkeywire website, courtesy of archive.org. Next to a black and white image of a young chimp, text reads:

"Monkeywire is the premier source of monkey and ape news for ALL primates. We cull articles from traditional news services and distribute them to subscribers... Our privacy policy is simple: Monkeywire does not share subscriber data. Your secret is safe with us."

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Thanks to the crew at the very entertaining @gorillaradio.show for having me on. It was a lot of fun! The link here is to the video version but you can get it wherever you get podcasts www.patreon.com/gorillaradio...

A multi-screen screenshot from the online recording with Gorilla Radio Show features (from top and L to R: Greg, Chandran, Austin, and a static photo of Carrie "Ape Shit".)

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

I find images of apes in clothing grotesque, but there is just something about this one... (Reprinted in a 1942 primatology textbook by the funny but deeply racist Earnest Hooten, _Man's Poor Relations_)

A black-and-white photo of two young chimps dressed in human clothing hugging each other and looking directly into the camera. A smaller, younger ape looks a bit scared but clings to her elder in comfort. The larger fellow wears a steady expression, holding the baby as if she's a younger sibling. The photo clearly is staged to resemble a human family photo.

The caption for the photo: "Interdependence of young chimpanzees." The photo credit is John Haeseler.

I'm guessing it's originally from a children's book Haeseler and his wife published in 1937, Shorty, about a chimp raised to perform as an actor in Hollywood.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

FASCINATING if stomach-churning 2025 interview with researchers who helped expose online monkey torture rings. I’d been wondering if this subculture was connected to MAGA or other hate groups, but turns out it’s not so much MAGA-aligned as meth-aligned podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/g...

Photo by Joel Gunter taken from the 2023 BBC report on online monkey torture rings, which you can read here: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-65951188

Photo is of a white man with a crew cut and beard standing in front of a confederate flag and a "Trump 2020" flag.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Harry Raven, who appears here as a boy, was the son of a Museum of Natural History curator. He told the NYT (6/5/2009) that he and his sister could play with chimp Meshi only when his father was shooting movies.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Hm, wouldn't be my first choice for acronyms ... (from PRIMATES, link.springer.com/article/10.1...)

A text clipping from a recent PRIMATES study with two terms and their acronyms highlighted:

- adopted infants (AIs)
- biological mothers (BMs)

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

After seeing her family slaughtered, Congo, once in captivity in the US, grew fixated on a mirror. Robert Yerkes interpreted her "infinite loneliness" as "mental deficiency," concluding that gorillas are inferior to chimps.

Black and white photo of a young mountain gorilla clinging to a mirror image of herself. Captioned: Congo with a mirror, from Genetic Psychology Monographs, Clark University.

The photo is circa 1927, when Robert Yerkes worked with the young gorilla. He wrote about Congo in _The Great Apes: A Study of Anthropoid Life_ (1929).

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

This coulda been one of those cute inter-species primates stories, but never underestimate a chimp... www.nytimes.com/1942/05/25/a...

Newspaper clip from 1942 New York Times headlined "Chimpanzee Flees Cage Then Frees Kitten..."

A sentence within the body of the story is then highlighted in yellow. It reads: "...he opened the latch of the cage of an Angora cat and her kitten and gently removed the kitten but pushed the mother cat back into the cage and slammed the door."

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

For those days when you want to see the video of a chimp destroying a drone

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

4/ One of Mae Noell’s biggest challenges was convinincing dummies who wanted to fight chimps that the protections were for their own safety. Her solution: awards go to those who play by the rules. Touch the chimp’s muzzle, you don’t get a prize — and you may just get yr fingers bitten off.

Black-and-white photo of a purple ribbon that the Noell's gave out to participants who played by a list of rules. The ribbon reads:

"I am a member in good standing of the exclusive order of APE FIGHTERS by authority of Noell's Art Gorilla Show."

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

3/ The men who stepped up to fight tended to be drunk — some, very much so. So even with their handicaps, the chimps never lost. For every 10 men who entered the ring, roughly 8 had to be carried out. Most fights were over in seconds.

A page from Mae Noell's book shows a b&w photo of a shirtless man losing a fight with a chimp

A sample flyer advertising the Gorilla Show shows a photo of a muzzled chimp wearing gloves and the text:

"WANTED! Athletic Men to Earn $5 per second by holding 85 pound ape's shoulders on the floor (up to 4 seconds). Also wanted boxers to earn $1 per minute."

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

2/ Humans were required to wear helmets (the apes got no such protection, nor needed it) and a special pair of pants — because the chimps would rip their opponents clothes off.

A page from Mae Noell's _History of Noell's Ark Gorilla Show_ has a b&w photo showing the backside of a chimp in the middle of a fight with a man, wearing a helmet and falling to his feet as he gets his pants ripped off. The caption reads: "Some men who refused to put the outer pants on ended up in their 'birthday suits.' "

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

1/ 🧵 In 1940, Bob & Mae Noell started a travelling show selling tickets to see men fight a "gorilla" -- actually, a chimp. The chimps wore muzzles, which wasn’t enough to stop them from shredding opponents; they'd rip noses apart and aim to take out eyes. So their hands had to be bound as well.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

The use of the “it” pronoun to thing-ify animals is one of my bugaboos. So I was happy to see that, upon making this mistake in unpublished notes in 1838, Charles Darwin corrected himself. He had been observing Jenny, the first orangutan exhibited at the London Zoo.

Text quoted from some of Charles Darwin’s unpublished notes, 1838 [See sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1369848615000370 ]

The key portion reads:

“Is very fond of playing with anything soft, covered <CROSSED OUT>itself<CROSSED out> herself up with two pocket handkerchiefs just like girl with shawl spread spread them out — considered them as her property would not give them up to me, but the keeper brought them and gave them. followed me and bit me for having taken it away and tried to pick my pocket.”

A painting make of Jenny, the first live orangutan exhibited in London. She was about 3 years ago upon arrival.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

Who knew he was a *monkey* salesman? Jim Jones trafficked monkeys from Brazil into the US to raise money for his death cult en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Jones

A young Jim Jones, over 20 years before leading a mass murder-suicide, with a young wooly monkey.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

Saw this teased online, thought, "Tommy Lee: yawn," before realizing that Limbani (shown here dancing) is still in quarantine and probably bored out of his skull. from the good folks at savethechimps.org

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

Makes you long for the days when there were clear, simple headlines.

A text-only newspaper clipping from 1902 reads:

[big print] GOOD STORIES
[smaller print] - African Baboon Who Fills Role of Signalman
- Mayor Wore Chambermaid's Stockings at Coronation

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

I find the media’s framing of this as evidence that primates “keep pets” irksome & misleading. The study analyzed internet photos, inc. captive & free-ranging animals alike. Any view of inter-species relationships needs to start with recognizing our (human) desire to see and shape this stuff.

An ad for a Victorian menagerie (reprinted in Harriet Ritvo's class _The Animal Estate_) publicized the relationship between a male lion and female "tigress."

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Was playing around with a t-shirt design to target the elusive ape-loving vegetarian/vegan market. (If anyone has a recommendation beyond teepublic, pls let me know.) www.teepublic.com/user/ape-sh-...

T-shirt design says "Plant eater" in handwritten white lettering above a silverback gorilla eating grass. Designed for dark-colored shirts.

T-shirt design says "Plant eater" in handwritten black lettering above a silverback gorilla eating grass. Designed for light-colored shirts.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

To research zine issue #2, I did a search for podcasts about the history of animal domestication. Maybe I should take this as a sign?

The top result of a ListenNotes.com search for the history of animal domestication is called "Boring History for Sleep" from a podcast for "anyone who enjoys ancient history for sleep"

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

Important news from the Richmond (Indiana) Palladium, 1921 #primates

A newspaper clipping from a theater column reads:

"A heavy wig worn by Dorothy Phillips in … the famous Aller Holubar First National attraction now at the Murette theater, probably saved that dainty artist's life when Joe Mar-tin, a trained chimpanzee, hurled a heavy coconut from the top of a tall palm tree and struck the actress on the head with sufficient force to knock her down. What made Miss Phillips angry was the fact that Joe. treated the matter as a huge joke, laughing until his trainer shook him out of the tree."

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Chimp of the Week: Toby’s captor in Indiana died and left instructions for him to be shot. Fortunately, @animallegaldefense.bsky.social got him to the Center for Great Apes sanctuary, where even the quarantine enclosure is relatively luxurious. No more pizza, Mountain Dew, & Fanta, for this guy.

Toby, a thirtysomething chimpanzee, thumbs through a magazine while seated on the ground of his quarantine enclosure. After quarantine, the Center for Great Apes expects to integrate him into a chimp group.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

1/ Ape Sh*t issue #1 is now shipping via mail order. One advantage of print-on-demand is that you can make corrections in future printings. So here’s a deal: Anyone first to find a typo or factual error in issue #1 gets a copy of #2 when it's out.

A sample spread from Ape Shit zine, issue #1 features black-and-white images from old newspaper clips. One shows a chained capuchin monkey clad in a diaper. Another shows a senior couple riding bicycles, the man with a diapered monkey on his shoulders.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 30/07/2026

A new study surveys primates’ cross-species relationships, in the wild and in captivity. The key takeaway: Photos of monkeys with other animals are adorable. doi.org/10.1007/s103...

A petite langur with silvery brown hair and a dark face and ears sits in a tree and pets a giant squirrel. Photo by Senthi Aathavan Senthilverl/Wiki Commons.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

Chimp of the week: Ronnie from Wales Ape & Monkey Sanctuary. Considered remarkably chill, he grew up with a young orangutan and uses sign language to tell visitors to take off their glasses, hats and coats. www.ape-monkey-rescue.org.uk/chimpanzees/...

Photo of an unbelievably adorable adult chimp with beige freckles around his nose and mouth + a greying beard. His mouth is slightly open, and he looks very friendly and happy.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

The first issue of Ape Shit is now available via mail! (coming to stores in September) It investigates the the American saga of the "service monkey," the former practice of using monkeys as thieves, how capuchins fight back against their captors & more. orbooks.com/catalog/ape-shit/

An old b&w newspaper photo shows a chained capuchin monkey feeding a bearded man in a wheelchair. The image is superimposed over a collection of actual newspaper articles, with headlines such as "Monkeys help the disabled" and "Monkeys deliver safety message to over 1500 students."

The caption for this collage reads: "In 1979, Crystal's placement with William Powell, who had quadriplegia, was widely reported by the Washington Post and major U.S. wire services. However, like most monkeys that Helping Hands place as 'helpers,' the relationship was short-lived."

$Screen shot of the table of contents for Ape Shit Issue #1, 2026. It features a b&w photo of a capuchin monkey holding a plunger.\ Note for those with vision impairments, I'll be making an audio version of the very lengthy main article to share later.$ A b&w page from Ape Shit #1 shows a 30-ish dark-haired white woman (Alison Pascoe) holding 4 capuchin monkeys, whom she trained for the Hollywood horror movie _Monkey Shines_. It is also accompanied by some text from a Q&A interview with her. She describes, among other things, one Helping Hands monkey who would squirt her breast milk at her disabled recipient.

A b&w page from Ape Shit #1 shows a 30-ish dark-haired white woman (Alison Pascoe) holding 4 capuchin monkeys, whom she trained for the Hollywood horror movie _Monkey Shines_. It is also accompanied by some text from a Q&A interview with her. She describes, among other things, one Helping Hands monkey who would squirt her breast milk at her disabled recipient.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

Badly written science papers are a dime a dozen but this one is almost comical. Wanted to read this but - damn! - the combo of jargon and passive verbiage in the abstract alone is something else. (From the _American Journal of Primatology_)

A collection of images, one featuring a female macaque monkey mounting a male and another of a female mounting another female. Another pair of pics shows a single macaque using stones. Jargon scattered throughout.

Text from the abstract of this paper: "After challenging the view that cultural processes mainly produce behavioral adaptations, we urge researchers to adopt a pluralistic view on Darwinian evolution by emphasizing the diversity and importance of evolutionary by-products and highlighting the heuristic merit of concepts such as behavioral spandrels and exaptations, particularly in the domain of cultural evolution in primates. We then use the concept of the “structure-function interface” and draw from our own research on macaques to provide two examples of possible behavioral adaptations and their corresponding by-products, both of which are maintained via the proximate mechanisms of cultural processes and pleasurable feedback. These two behavioral by-products are female homosexual mounts and object play, and their putative functional counterparts are female-to-male mounts and tool use, respectively. We provide empirical evidence from the structural analysis of behavior to support our contentions that some non-conceptive sex cultures may neutrally drift from behavioral adaptations to by-products and that some object play cultures may exaptively afford tool use. Our approach dovetails with, and expands upon, a pluralistic perspective on evolutionary theory."

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

Just saw this viral video of kids climbing gas pipes to get on top of a wardrobe, and my first thought was "these kids must be living in a region with monkeys." www.reddit.com/r/BeAmazed/comments/1uy8pjq/a_mother_asked_her_children_to_recreate_how_the/

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

Solly Zuckerman’s 1933 primates physiology textbook includes a single photo to illustrate chimpanzees. Mind-boggingly dense about animal emotions, he (likely unwittingly) used a pic that poetically represented the captive experience.

An adult female chimp sits alone in something approximating a fetal position, curled up on a fake tree stump in a zoo enclosure. She has a "lost" expression on her face, and is self-grooming the hair on her head.
Photo is credited to F.W. Bond

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

New monkey alert! A colobus with curiously orange lips! Detail: www.nytimes.com/2026/07/15/science/meet-earths-newest-monkey-and-check-out-its-orange-lips.html. video via the original paper journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0349857

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

In the category of things likely funny only to someone who searches Google every day for monkey news, I love how the headline writers here managed to add in the "abandoned at birth" trope to the ol’ "zoo captive picks a winner" classic. 1/2

A screenshot of Google News results for "monkey" shows a number of stories about the same press release: a chimp predicting England will beat Argentina in the World Cup semi-final. But one of those headlines [indicated with a hand-drawn red arrow] is different and reads "Adorable chimp abandoned at birth predicts England will win World Cup semi-final"

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

An excerpt from the book in question (The Ape People, 1971, by Geoffrey Bourne of the Yerkes Center)

Photo is of a book page that reads:

"Literature, particularly early literature, is full of references to the sexual behavior of apes and their desire to have sexual contact with human females. But any woman who believes this would be a thrill would undoubtedly be disappointed by the penises of those animals. A woman ravished by an ape would scarcely feel a thing."

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

The Fresno Bee, California, included this detail in their September 28, 1930 story. 2/2 www.newspapers.com/image/701471546/

A photo of 4 hot air balloons on the beach, each with monkey-sized baskets beneath them. This event was a promotion for the coconut market.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

In 1930, many newspapers reported that Joe Doaks (pictured) won the International Monkey Balloon derby. What most papers didn’t mention is that Joe won because all 3 of his competitors climbed the ropes and tried to puncture the balloons, presumably to ground them. 1/2 #RESISTANCE

Photo of a macaque monkey in the basket of a hot air balloon, holding on to the ropes and staying put.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 08/07/2026

R.I.P. to Marco, who died at 67 from heart failure at the Center for Great Apes Sanctuary. Marco was a short dude with a lot of "pizazz," always eager to greet people with a clap and a toss of a big toy in the air. 1/2

A very sweet-faced, happy chimpanzee with slightly silver hair and a warm smile

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 07/07/2026

In case a visual helps here. A red-mantled howler.

A scowling, bright orange monkey stares down at the photographer, presumably ready to let loose.

Apologies to the photographer -- couldn't find the online source for this pic.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

Baby gorilla forced to pose with hairless white monster for author photo again #primates

Many captive apes develop a sort of Stockholm Syndrome with their captors. Not this little gorilla, who eyes medical researcher Geoffrey Bourne warily as Bourne grips him tightly in a forced embrace.

This photo is on the back cover jacket of Bourne's book _The Ape People_ (1971)

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

Photos of baby gorilla John Daniel (1917-1922) helped counter the then-prevailing view of gorillas as ferocious beasts. But a few months after this one was taken, John Daniel was sold to Ringling Brothers and died shortly thereafter.

A young gorilla, John Daniel, poses lovingly with a 3 year old white girl with a bowl haircut, in this b&w studio photo from December 1920. John has one arm gently embracing the girl around her shoulder.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

Love this baboon's speedy, two-legged retreat. I'm guessing this was taken in South Africa. via Reddit

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 28/06/2026

In the early 1900s, published reports claimed that an ape species had been discovered in S. America. The story was traced back to a faked photo by a scientist working for Shell oil. He staged the pic of a taxidermied spider monkey for a greeting card.

Black and white photo of a bizarre-looking, stuffed spider monkey holding an egg and sitting on a log. He wears a vapid expression, with eyes half-closed and his mouth agape, revealing crooked teeth.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 25/06/2026

My new favorite book based on the title alone

Yellow and blue book cover, titled "Raccoons are the Brightest People" by Sterling North, author of Rascal (a memoir about raising a young raccon that was later adapted and turned into a dreadful Disney movie).

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 22/05/2026

Postures and Gestures of the Young Chimpanzee in a Temper Tantrum. From N. Ladygina-Kohts. 1935.

Black and white photos of a young, terribly unhappy chimp in poses similar to that of a human toddler. In most photos, his mouth is wide open (in a couple of cases, with eyes closed) and his hands/arms are stretched out all over the place.

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Ape Shit the zine for primates @monkeywire.bsky.social · 05/05/2026

The white-faced saki was named for the white faces that appear only on males. The females have gray faces, w/ a few bits of white, but they have bright orange chests, which males don’t. So you could alternately call these the orange-chested sakis (not really). (Photo: Christina/Adobe Stock)

Photo of a monkey with very dark body hair but a face encircled by an off-white mane. He is chewing on a broken tree branch and looing up toward the sky. His eyes are brown and look very human, owing to the white sclera.

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