Koko, the lowland gorilla who used and understood hand signs and spoken English words, demanded a real cat, not a plush toy. Her teacher, Penny Patterson, let her choose and adopt a gray male Manx kitten that Koko named All Ball. Together Koko and All Ball were on the cover of an issue of National Geographic. When Penny told Koko that All Ball had been killed by a car, Koko signed “bad, sad, bad” and “frown, cry, frown, sad” and started crying.
Pets, Primates, Parasites