Kissing may seem like a modern expression of romance, yet emerging research shows it is rooted deep in our shared past with other species. According to Earth.com, scientists from Oxford examined primate behavior, oral microbes, and ancient DNA to understand how this intimate act began. Their findings suggest that early humans and even Neanderthals likely […]
Tag: chimpanzees
As long as a small car, it is one of the cutest, smiliest, most intelligent animals on the planet
Graceful, intelligent and endlessly charismatic, bottlenose dolphins are the ocean’s most recognisable ambassadors. This guide dives into their behaviour, biology and the remarkable social lives that make them one of the sea’s most captivating species. What are bottlenose dolphins? Bottlenose dolphins are marine mammals. There are two species of bottlenose dolphin: the common bottlenose dolphin […]
Bonobos transformed how we think about animal societies. Can we save the last of the ‘hippy apes’?
Afew dozen large nests appear in the mist of equatorial dawn, half-hidden behind a tangle of vines and leaves. That is where the bonobos sleep, 12 metres above the ground. But it has rained all night, and the primates are in no hurry to get up. It is 6.30am when the first head emerges. It gives […]
Chimps consume equivalent of a beer a day in alcohol from fermented fruit
Someone have a word with the chimps? Observations of the apes in the wild show them imbibing the alcoholic equivalent of a half pint of beer a day through the vast amount of fermented fruit in their diet. Researchers arrived at the first estimates of wild chimp daily alcohol intake after measuring ethanol levels in […]
Inside the chimpanzee medicine cabinet: we’ve found a new way chimps treat wounds with plants
As it turns out, chimpanzees make pretty good doctors. For decades, scientists have been studying what chimpanzees do when they fall ill. This search has led to the identification of medicinal behaviour, which often involves the ingestion of plants with chemical or physical properties that can help the animal’s recovery. My team’s recent study in […]
Chimps Found Treating Each Other’s Wounds
Chimpanzees in Uganda were found treating the injuries of other, unrelated chimps, including those caught in hunting snares. The finding comes from the Budongo Forest, where researchers followed two groups of chimpanzees for several months, watching as the chimps treated wounds caused by fights, accidents, or snares. In one group, 40 percent of the chimps […]
‘Some people will die’: Conversations with Nigeria’s gorilla hunters
On a night in 1997, Benjamin Dauda killed a gorilla for the first time. Shrouding his lanky frame in dark fog, he stalked a foraging troop, finally dispatching his bullet on his mark. It was a giant male, he says, struck in the chest. “When I came close to the dead body, it was exactly […]
Animals consume alcohol more often than previously known: Study
What’s new: Humans know a thing or two about drinking alcohol, but accounts of animals turning to booze have often been discounted as accidental, unnatural or rare. Researchers now argue in a new study that animals drinking alcohol, or more specifically ethanol, might be more commonplace in the natural world than previously thought. “We’re moving […]