Special to The Hays Daily News

SALINA -- Rolling Hills Zoo lost a special friend this weekend. Cocoa, the alpha male chimpanzee, died Saturday morning after a brief illness. He was 37 years old.

Cocoa was born in the forests of Africa in 1971. He was kidnapped from the wild as an infant for sale into the pet trade. Cocoa lived with an individual as a pet for a few years before he was donated for biomedical research. He lived at the Primate Foundation of Arizona until age of 25. After retiring from research in August 1996, Cocoa and his family were provided sanctuary at Rolling Hills Wildlife Adventure.

Cocoa was the alpha male in an all-male group. This group of chimps was the only all-male group in the Association of Zoos and Aquariums and one of only a few in the country. As the alpha male, Cocoa led his small family with a gentle and wise spirit, Rolling Hills staff said. He was patient, kind and faithful, they added, and the remaining three chimpanzees are grieving the loss of their leader.

Wild chimpanzees rarely live to the age of 50, although captive chimps have been known to live 60 years and beyond. It is estimated that millions of chimpanzees roamed the forests of Africa in the early 1900s. Today, they are listed as an endangered species with fewer than 150,000 remaining in the wild. The main threats to their survival are habitat loss and hunting for the bushmeat trade.