That is a real photo from the Calgary Herald and a real knife in the hands of a real dangerous gorilla! It seems like a keeper dropped the knife in the enclosure while cleaning the cage. My guess is that they were using it to open bags of food or cut the string on bales of hay. This was something my keepers during my zoo time warned me about extensively.
The article goes on to lament the horrors of bad zoo keeping and attribute the incident to poor training. I think that's a bit harsh. Yes, the gorillas could have been hurt. But, in this case, the gorilla returned the knife to its keepers on request. It seems like human error-- a simple oversight. It was a really horrible oversight, but I doubt the keeper didn't know that she wasn' supposed to drop the knife. Taking care of gorillas is super hard work and doesn't pay very well. I'd like to see these watchdogs clean a gorilla cage.
Meanwhile, I hope CRD is okay. I don't think he said his meetings were at a zoo, but I can't really remember him saying at all. If he doesn't come back, it will sure be hard to update two blogs every day.
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