Meet the gibbons
I had the best week in Southern California playing with people and animals all week long!
Gibbon Mom Tuk & Baby Howard
During Joan Ranquet’s workshop, Communicating with Wildlife in Sanctuaries, I went to the Gibbon Conservation Center in Santa Clarita. The group communicated with a gibbon family: Domino (dad), Tuk (mom), Izzy (teenager), Boo (little girl) and Howard (baby). I connected with Domino, the dad. Domino was mad at Tuk about her parenting style. Afterwards, I found out their teenager, Izzy, had been acting out. The caretakers had seen when Tuk and Domino had disagreed about how to deal with Izzy. Obviously, Domino was still upset about this. What blew my mind is that my husband and I had similar problems – acting-out teens and different ideas about how to deal with them. I thought teenagers were a strictly human problem. Nope.
It’s comforting to know that parenting teenagers is cross-species challenge.
By the way, did you know that gibbons are almost extinct in the wild? Thanks to the Gibbon Conservation Center, their numbers are growing.
More animals in sanctuaries
Boxer, the African Serval
Mollie Hogan from The Nature of Wildworks brought more animals to communicate with.
Hootie
We connected with Boxer, an African Serval, Dragon, a red-tailed hawk and Hootie, a Great Horned Owl.
Dragon, Red-Tailed Hawk
Animals are in this sanctuary because they had contact with people at a very young age. Some imprinted on humans. None had learned how to survive in the wild. The Nature of Wildworks gives them a chance to live a decent life. Accredited zoos are also helping endangered species survive and are working hard to give the animals a decent life.
Second stop on my book tour – Altadena
Maribeth & Buddy
I gave another presentation on golden nuggets for communicating with your animals. We had a great discussion about our animals’ issues and what we could do about them. Attendees discussed energy healing and talking to our animal with intention and emotion. The stories about each person’s animal were endearing.
Finn
I finally got to meet my host, Heather’s family – her fiancée, John along with her dogs, Buddy and Finn.
And then there were the baby dolphins!
My final journey was visiting my cousin Ray and his wife Jill in Santa Barbara. They took me about 10 miles outside Santa Barbara in their boat. Our goal was whale watching, but no luck with that endeavor. But I think we got something better. We saw scores of dolphin pods and had bunches of baby dolphins swimming with us. The feeling from the dolphins was joy, family connection and love. Can it get any better than that?