{"id":336952,"date":"2025-12-10T14:27:12","date_gmt":"2025-12-10T14:27:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/336952\/"},"modified":"2025-12-10T14:27:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-10T14:27:12","slug":"13-years-later-the-ikea-monkey-is-all-grown-up-and-his-sanctuary-is-at-capacity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/336952\/","title":{"rendered":"13 years later, the IKEA monkey is all grown up \u2014 and his sanctuary is at capacity"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Text<\/p>\n

Listen to this article<\/p>\n

Estimated 4 minutes<\/p>\n

The audio version of this article is generated by text-to-speech, a technology based on artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n

Darwin knows what cameras look like \u2013 and how to avoid them. From inside his enclosure, the monkey of Toronto Ikea parking lot fame spots us out of the corner of his eye and bolts under the table.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The now 13-year-old Japanese macaque has seen enough of the spotlight to last a lifetime. <\/p>\n

Darwin was just a baby when he was found in a North York Ikea parking lot in 2012, wearing a diaper and shearling coat, and seized by animal services. He\u2019s been living at Story Book Farm Primate Sanctuary in Sunderland, Ont., ever since.<\/p>\n

Executive director Daina Liepa had just started volunteering at the sanctuary when Darwin first arrived.<\/p>\n

When she saw the videos of Darwin circulating online, she noticed he was walking around on two feet \u2013 Japanese macaques are naturally quadrupeds. She said the video made her think the coat and diaper were too small for his body. <\/p>\n

Liepa said she thinks Darwin’s upbringing around humans has made him shy around strangers as an adult. “He probably doesn’t feel as comfortable being around people, because he was forced to be around people when he didn’t necessarily want to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tuesday marked the 13th anniversary of Darwin\u2019s escape from the parking lot and the beginning of his life at his newfound home. <\/p>\n

These days, Liepa said Darwin loves using his indoor swing and eating grapes. She’s considering introducing Darwin to his next-door neighbour, Chiquita \u2013 another Japanese macaque who calls the sanctuary home \u2013 to encourage companionship.<\/p>\n

Story Book is the only primate sanctuary in Canada, and at 24 monkeys and lemurs, it’s reached maximum capacity.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"AFive-year-old Misha is a monkey at Story Book Farm Primate Sanctuary. (Mike Cole\/CBC)\u2018We\u2019ve never had to say no until now\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n

Liepa said the sanctuary recently had to turn away two monkeys who were referred there because it doesn’t have space for more. <\/p>\n

“We’ve never had to say no until now,” she said. “Not only are there two monkeys out there that need a home, but I know there’s a lot more.”<\/p>\n

When it does accept new primates, the animals often arrive at the sanctuary in need of immediate medical care.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of monkeys and lemurs lose their lives during the process of being trafficked,\u201d Liepa adds. \u201cWhen they arrive, they\u2019re close to death.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like in Darwin’s case, primates are most often referred to the sanctuary through animal welfare services.<\/p>\n

Camille Labchuk, animal rights lawyer and executive director of Animal Justice, an animal law advocacy organization, said the responsibility to care for exotic animals seized from zoos, lab testing and other consequences of the exotic animal trade fall disproportionately on sanctuaries like Story Book.<\/p>\n

Zoos in particular are frequent senders to Story Book, the sanctuary says. Once an animal has been surrendered, the sanctuary takes on full financial responsibility for its care. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhy is it that we’re letting these businesses get away with causing problems and then fail to clean them up?\u201d Labchuk said. <\/p>\n

At-risk animals likely in the \u2018hundreds of thousands\u2019: advocate<\/p>\n

In Ontario, municipal bylaws prohibit exotic pet ownership \u2013 not provincial ones.<\/p>\n

Labchuk said she\u2019d like to see the province create strict laws to protect animals from the exotic animal trade. She said she estimates the exotic animal trade in the province has likely trafficked “hundreds of thousands” of primates, birds, reptiles and more. <\/p>\n

“Because there’s no provincial restrictions on ownership or breeding, it’s open season,” she said. \u201cAnd there are still people who would like to purchase and have monkeys as pets, even though the evidence is very clear that it’s not appropriate.\u201d<\/p>\n

CBC Toronto has reached out to the province for comment.<\/p>\n

\"aExecutive director of Story Book Farm Primate Sanctuary Daina Liepa feeds a monkey a grape. (Mercedes Gaztambide\/CBC)<\/p>\n

At Story Book, fundraising is key to keep operations running. Liepa said the sanctuary is working on a million-dollar fundraising campaign to build space for more monkeys.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But she wishes there was no need for sanctuaries like Story Book to fundraise, or exist, at all.<\/p>\n

\u201cNone of these monkeys or lemurs asked to be captive,\u201d she said. \u201cPart of sanctuary life is that they come here and they die here because there is nowhere else for them to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo we do what we can for them while they’re here.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 4 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by text-to-speech, a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":336953,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-336952","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=336952"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336952\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/336953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=336952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=336952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=336952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}