Choppers, a Western Chimpanzee, played grandmother Ada Lott in the long-running marketing campaign while she was still a juvenile – but a new study has revealed the harrowing details of her life
Nine years on from the passing of a cherished chimpanzee who shot to fame in the telly adverts for PG Tips, shocking new findings about her life have emerged. Choppers, a Western Chimpanzee, portrayed granny Ada Lott for the ad campaign while she was yet a young ape.
She called Twycross Zoo in Leicestershire her home for a four decades, until she died in 2016, as stated by ITV. Now, scientists at National Museums Scotland (NMS) have shone a light on startling discoveries using what they’ve described as “cutting-edge” tech to delve into her past “like never before.”
Remarkably, it’s the same tech that peeled back the layers of King Richard III’s life after his skeleton turned up in a car park in Leicester. The techie process, known as osteobiographical analysis, gives bones and tissues the once over in fine detail.
Typically, it’s a tool for the archaeology buffs to piece together the backstories of ancient humans with astonishing precision.
The NMS scientists say the cutting edge technology is rarely used on animals. This could well be a pioneer moment – diving into the biography of a zoo resident in such depth is quite the rare spectacle, reports the Express.
Choppers, the chimp famous for her role as Ada Lott on telly, was snatched from poachers in West Africa when she was just six-weeks-old before she was brought to the UK. After captivating audiences nationwide, she retired from the role as she hit puberty aged around six or seven.
In 2014, the zoo – once a training ground for chimps in TV – admitted to the BBC that having apes on television was a mistake and that the primates endured lasting harm. Following Choppers’s death, Twycross Zoo handed over her skeleton to NMS to join a natural science treasure trove of more than 10m specimens.
At NMS, researcher Dr David Cooper, who wrote the study, said: “Choppers was beloved by audiences across the UK for years. Now the innovative application of osteobiographical analysis has allowed us to tell her story like never before.
“Her life is a testament to the many thousands of chimpanzees that were taken from the wild and charts a crucial shift in the priorities of zoos away from entertainment and towards education, conservation, research and welfare.”
The experts were able to piece together Choppers’s pivotal life moments, uncovering signs of harrowing injuries from her early brush with poachers.
These battle scars left a mark on her, restricting her movements and exacerbating aging problems, say the researchers.
Studies of Choppers’s teeth have revealed changes in geographical and dietary changes between the ages of three and four—lining up with her big move to the UK where she was placed on a zoological diet.
The experts believe reckon her upper jaw “significantly elongated” compared to wild chimps thanks to a diet if sugary soft fruit.
It turns out that zoos these days are swapping out the sweet stuff for tougher, low-sugar veggies, which has led to significant improvements in health and behaviour.
This study has been published Scientific Reports and features work from researchers at the University of Exeter, the University of Reading, Twycross Zoo, and the University of Edinburgh.
Phillipa Dobbs, veterinary services manager at Twycross Zoo, is pleased to have been part of this groundbreaking study.
She said “Choppers was an important part of our history and this pioneering research offers new insights into her life and the evolving role of modern zoos.
“By supporting studies like this, we can continue to learn from the past and drive progress in animal care, welfare, science and conservation. It’s an honour to be involved.”
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
