For her 44th birthday recently, Koko the gorilla got the chance to pick a pet from a litter of kittens as part of a charity's campaign to raise awareness for their cause.
Koko is already well known for her ability to speak sign language, and was also the focus of a hugely popular children's book called Koko's Kitten, which told the story of the first time she got a cat.
In 1984, Koko signed that she wanted a pet and when she got a cat, she began to care for it like a child. According to her trainer Penny Patterson, Koko began crying when she learned a few months later that the animal, who she'd named All Ball, had escaped from its cage and been hit by a car.
However, Koko now has a pet once again after she chose two kittens from a litter for her birthday, and has been looking after them both for the last few months.
The Gorilla Foundation are hoping to raise awareness and funds through sharing a number of videos of Koko interacting with her pets, which show kind nature of the great apes, and how they are not all that different to humans.
Her caregivers say that since she got the animals, she has been signing more and they hope that they will soon be able to produce a multimedia sequel to Koko's Kitten.
