World Chimpanzee Day
July 14 is World Chimpanzee Day. It marks the day when Dr. Jane Goodall began her pioneering study of wild chimpanzees in Gombe, Tanzania. It is also a day to learn more about chimpanzees and to take a moment to think about their precious lives and conservation.
To celebrate this day, I have gathered eight photos of our chimpanzees' play faces! Chimpanzees show these relaxed, open-mouth facial expressions while playing together—during tickling, wrestling, chasing, and other playful interactions. The shape of their mouth is somewhat similar to the way humans open their mouth when saying "ah." Sometimes you can hear laughter that sound like "ha ha ha" or "ga ha ha."
Ayumu enjoys playing with everyone, so he appears in 6 out of the 8 photos.
Of course, all the chimpanzees show their play faces.
On this World Chimpanzee Day, I hope that more people will discover how amazing chimpanzees are and join the efforts to ensure that chimpanzees around the world can keep happy faces.