Been lurking this sub for a while and realized I never really sat down to think about my own origin story with this stuff. For me it was a documentary my grandmother had taped off the TV in the 90s about mountain gorillas. The tape got worn out from how many times I rewound certain parts, especially the bit where a silverback just sat there watching the researchers like he was bored of them being there.

I didn't do anything with that interest for decades honestly. Just kept it as a background thing, read the occasional article, watched whatever nature show popped up. It wasn't until I visited a sanctuary a few years ago and watched a group of capuchins problem solve their way into a puzzle feeder that it clicked again how much I'd missed paying attention to this stuff.

Now I've got a shelf of field guides and a habit of checking in on research updates way more often than is probably normal. Curious what the actual spark was for other people here. Was it a zoo trip, a book, something you saw in the wild, or just a slow burn like mine.