Dear Great Ape Supporter,

In this video, Koko and I are looking at one of her favorite books together. Koko is around 6 years old. She loved to look at photos of natural things — plants and animals — and alligators always caught her attention.

Koko and I played games with alligator toys, pretending to bite each other, and if there was ever an alligator in a book she would point it out, and sign “alligator” quite emphatically.

Another animal Koko would usually pick out in books was spiders, which she reacted to like many human do.

And of course her favorite animals to pick out in books were cats and in particular kittens, because she knew so much about them (she lived with one in the nursery at the zoo) and eventually got to take care of them throughout her life.

But what you might not know about Koko is that because she grew up at the San Francisco Zoo, she got to visit many different kinds of animals (escorted by me and other caregivers). Thus she formed some pretty strong opinions about different species (like alligators) from direct observations.

Stay tuned for more Koko Video Newsletters every week, and please use them to learn as much as you can about Koko and gorillas, because they need our help — and being understood is a first step in that direction!

Conservation through Communication

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