Rocky, the youngest Javan gibbon at the Gibbon Conservation Center in Saugus, will turn 2 years old on July 2, and the Center is seeking help in getting him a birthday gift.
Rocky was rejected at birth by his mother and has been raised by the experts and volunteers at the Gibbon Center.
A fundraising effort to build “Rocky’s House,” an enclosure for the youngster has raised enough money to build a structure with insulation, specialty windows and plenty of attachment points for enrichment.
However, the structure still needs specialty paint, a specialty heating and air conditioning unit with the potential to hook up to solar panels and platforms for sleeping and relaxing.
The Gibbon Conservation Center was established in 1976 by Alan Richard Mootnick who died in 2011.
The center houses the rarest group of apes in the Western Hemisphere. It is the only institution in the world to house and breed all four genera of gibbon, an endangered small ape, and has successfully reproduced seven gibbon species.
The center also provides observation and non-invasive research opportunities for students and scientists.
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