Long before Pan-kun became a star on Shimura Zoo, there was another famous performing chimp on Japanese TV: Momo-chan. A chimp from the Nasu World Monkey Park, Momo-chan was raised like a human child by animal trainer Atsushi Miyazawa and appeared regularly on the TBS program Amazing Animals (Doubutsu Kisoutengai)　until about 5 years ago.

The final episode of Amazing Animals will air next Sunday night, so the last few episodes of the show have been highlighting some of its greatest moments. The previous episode had a special section about Momo-chan. Here’s a clip showing Miyazawa raising her and teaching her some really neat tricks:

And a clip of Miyazawa instructing her not to eat a cake (when she realizes that Miyazawa is not physically present, she ignores the image on the TV):

Momo-chan is given some tools to retrieve fruit from the bottom of a plastic container:

And she figures out how to pick up an eel:

As the years went by, Momo-chan grew larger and she was retired from her performing career. Miyazawa realized that as soon as she reached adulthood and began menstruating, it would be incredibly hard to control her and she would have to wear a collar or some other kind of restraint. He couldn’t bear the thought of forcing her to wear a collar, so her shows were stopped and she now lives a life similar to normal zoo Chimpanzees.

Miyazawa left Nasu World Monkey Park and moved to Cuddly Dominion in Kumamoto Prefecture, where he began training a baby chimpanzee named Pan-kun and a bulldog named James. Pan-kun appeared a few times on “Amazing Animals,” but was eventually added to the regular cast of NTV’s Shimura Zoo.

• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)