The Rosamond Gifford Zoo is celebrating the first birthday of one of its most unique additions: Iniko, a patas monkey.

Iniko was born in June 2020, and unfortunately, her mom did not survive the birth. She was hand-reared by two of the zookeepers and lived at their home for months. The zoo director believes this is the first time a patas monkey has been hand-reared.

Every day is a milestone for the special monkey. On Tuesday, Iniko got a monkey-friendly “cake” and presents for her birthday.

The zookeepers are preparing Iniko to be integrated back into her family group. It’s a slow and controlled process.

“She’s extremely outgoing,” said Ted Fox, the zoo director. “One of the things that makes us so confident that this is going to work in the end is she has a confidence about herself and she’s very grounded.”

Iniko first met her family group through glass. She could see them and they could see her. Second, the monkeys were in the same room, but very far apart. It allowed them to see, hear and smell one another.

Slowly, the zookeepers have moved to step three: allowing Iniko to meet one of her half-sisters through a fence. They can touch each other and experience a lot more.

“Just like people and just like especially children, when you get a group that whole mob mentality comes into play and we don’t want that to happen, we want it to be as controlled as possible,” explained Fox.

Iniko’s health and nutrition are great, according to Fox. She’s playing, learning and exercising a lot; but since she is hand-reared, she is not learning that from other monkeys. The zookeepers are slowly working on socializing her.

“She’s not afraid of a lot of things,” said Fox. “She always is trying to interact with whatever the experience is within her environment - whether it’s new toys or new people or scents or what she can see from a distance. So all those things make it — this lines up to be a success because she’s confident in who she is as a little monkey and wants to engage with other things.”

The big celebration day will be when she’s fully integrated into her family group, Fox said.