Latest / Science Show KY / 10.2.25
Transcript
- 0:01Speaker 1: Welcome to radioi's Diary of Science and Nature. Your reader's
- 0:04Kelly Taylor. I'll have articles on the topic of science
- 0:08and nature. But first a reminder that RADIOI is a
- 0:11reading service intended for people who are blind or have
- 0:15other disabilities that make it difficult to reprinted material. Well,
- 0:21today we're going to begin something a little different, commemorating
- 0:27the passing of Jane Goodall, one of the Titans of
- 0:32nature conservation, who passed away at the age ninety one.
- 0:37And National Geographic has published online a reprint of an
- 0:44article that originally appeared in that Geo August of nineteen
- 0:50sixty three. And this was written by Jane Goodall and
- 0:56is our original article about the chimpanzees of Gumbay Stream
- 1:03Game Game Reserve. Up on the mountains, the midday sun
- 1:09glared fiercely, but down in the valley near the swift
- 1:12running stream, it was cool and still. I stood listening
- 1:16until I heard a faint rustling of leaves, the only
- 1:20sound to betray the presence of the group of chimpanzees.
- 1:23I was trying to approach, slowly and quietly, but making
- 1:27no attempt to hide. I moved toward the great apes
- 1:30until I was only thirty feet away. As I sat down,
- 1:34they watched me, staring rather hard, and a young female
- 1:37who had been lying on the ground climbed a little
- 1:39way up a tall fig tree. One of the males
- 1:44stood upright to watch more closely. He was a superb specimen,
- 1:48standing about four and a half feet in height, his
- 1:51massive shoulders and bull neck suggesting the tremendous strength in
- 1:55his arms. He must have weighed a good one hundred
- 1:57thirty pounds, and he was strong enough to snapped me
- 2:00with one hand. I'm sorry he was strong enough to
- 2:04snap with one hand a branch so tough that a
- 2:08man would be hard put to break it with two.
- 2:12Later I was to learn how it feels to be
- 2:15slammed on the head from behind by a large male chimpanzee,
- 2:19but fortunately for me, he did not continue his attack.
- 2:23After a moment or two, the group stopped looking my way,
- 2:26recognizing me for the strange hairless primate they had grown
- 2:30accustomed to seeing amid the other mountain fauna. The six
- 2:34adults rested on the ground or stretched out along the
- 2:37branches of a wild fig near by. Four youngsters played quietly.
- 2:42I thought then, as I always think, when I am
- 2:44face to face with mature chimpanzees in their native forests,
- 2:49of the striking difference between the wild apes and those
- 2:52in captivity. The chimpanzee imprisoned behind bars is bad tempered, immaturity, morose, moody,
- 3:00and frequently rather obscene. In his freedom, he is majestic
- 3:05even when excited, and for the most part, dignified and
- 3:08good natured. For about an hour I sat with the group.
- 3:13Then one of the males stood up, scratched thoughtfully, and
- 3:16moved off down the valley one by one. The others followed,
- 3:20the infants riding astride their mother's backs like diminutive jockeys.
- 3:25The females and youngsters stared at me as they passed.
- 3:29The males scarcely glanced in my direction. To be accepted
- 3:33thus by a group of wild chimpanzees is the result
- 3:37of months of patients in England. Before I commenced my
- 3:41field study, I met one or two people who had
- 3:44seen champion chimpanzees in the wild. Quote. You'll never get
- 3:48close to chimps, not unless you're very well hidden, they
- 3:51told me. At first it seemed they were right, but
- 3:56gradually I was able to move nearer the chimpanzees, until
- 4:00at last I sat among them, enjoying a degree of
- 4:03acceptance that I had hardly deemed possible. At this intimate range,
- 4:09I observed details of their lives never recorded before. I
- 4:14saw chimpanzees in the wild hunt and kill for meat,
- 4:18though this had been suspected. Nobody dreamed that a chimpanzee
- 4:21would attack an animal as large as a bushbuck until
- 4:25I saw an ape with his kill. Most astonishing of all,
- 4:30I saw chimpanzees fashion and use crude implements, the beginnings
- 4:34of tool use. This discovery could prove helpful to those
- 4:38studying man's rise to dominance over other primates. I cannot
- 4:43remember a time when I did not want to go
- 4:45to Africa to study animals. Therefore, after leaving school, I
- 4:49saved up the fair and went to Nairobi, Kenya. There
- 4:52I was fortunate in meeting and working for doctor Lewis S. B. Leaky,
- 4:57then curator of the Corindan Museum. After a year, doctor
- 5:02Leaky asked me if I would undertake a field study
- 5:04of chimpanzees. Although the chimpanzee has been known to science
- 5:08for nearly three centuries and although because of its striking
- 5:13resemblance to man, it has been used extensively as an
- 5:16experimental animal in medical and other fields, no attempts had
- 5:21been made to study this ape in its natural habitat
- 5:24until doctor Henry Nissen made his pioneer study in French Guinea.
- 5:29I found his nineteen thirty one report invaluable as I
- 5:33prepared my own program. The primary aim of my field
- 5:36study was to discover as much as possible about the
- 5:39way of life of the chimpanzee before it is too late,
- 5:43before encroachments of civilization crowd out forever all non human competitors. Secondly,
- 5:50there is the hope that results of this study may
- 5:54help man in his search toward understanding himself. Laboratory tests
- 5:59have revealed a surprising amount of quote insight in the chimpanzee.
- 6:05The rudiments of reasoned thinking, knowledge of social traditions and
- 6:10culture of such an animal studying under natural conditions could
- 6:14throw new light on the growth and spread of early
- 6:17human cultures. Nineteen months after doctor Leaky suggested the field study,
- 6:23I had received funds for a preliminary investigation from the
- 6:26Wilkie Foundation to Plains, Illinois, which supports studies of man
- 6:32and other primates. I was ready to set out for
- 6:35a three month visit to Lake Tanganika region. The authorities
- 6:39were unwilling to allow a single European girl to go
- 6:41off into the bush by herself, so my mother accompanied
- 6:45me from Nairobi. It took us more than five days
- 6:49to reach the Gombey Stream Game Reserve in Tanganika, a
- 6:52sixty square mile protected area set aside by the British
- 6:56where I would do my research. The land rover was
- 7:00overloaded and most of the eight hundred and forty miles
- 7:03of earth roads were in terrible condition. Eventually, after innumerable delays,
- 7:08we reached Kegoma, a small European settlement overlooking Lake Tenganyika.
- 7:15There I hired the government launch to take us on
- 7:18the last stage of the journey, the sixteen miles up
- 7:21the lake to the Gombey Chimpanzee Reserve. Game ranger David
- 7:28Anste had arranged one of his semi annual visits to
- 7:32the reserve to coincide with our arrival. As we traveled
- 7:36up the crystal clear lake, I studied the terrain where
- 7:39I was to work. The mountains rise steeply from the
- 7:43narrow beach and are broken by innumerable valleys and gorges.
- 7:48The valleys are thickly forested, but the upper slopes become
- 7:51open woodland, and many of the peaks and ridges are treeless.
- 7:55Most of the wild chimpanzees in Africa inhabit the dense
- 7:58rainforests of the Congo and West coast. The more open
- 8:02country of the Gombe Stream Reserve is ideal for field study,
- 8:06though behavior of apes living there might not be the
- 8:09same as that of apes in the dense forests. Our
- 8:14talk as we sailed the lake was about chimpanzees, and
- 8:17one of ranger Anstey's stories persuaded me that they can
- 8:22be dangerous when cornered. He told me of an African
- 8:26who decided to climb an oil palm tree to cut
- 8:28down some nuts for cooking oil. A chimpanzee was high
- 8:32in the tree feeding on the nuts, but the African
- 8:35failed to notice the animal until he had climbed well
- 8:37up the trunk. The ape, intent on feeding, only then
- 8:40saw the Africans started rapidly down and as he passed,
- 8:44the man hit out at him, slashing away half his
- 8:48cheek and one eye as he did so. At about
- 8:52two o'clock on the afternoon of July fourteenth, nineteen sixty,
- 8:56we arrived at Casikella, a campsite mid way along the
- 9:00ten mile coastline of the reserve. The motor launch went
- 9:04back to Kigoma with orders to return for David. A
- 9:07few days later. We found ourselves on the beach, surrounded
- 9:11by untidy looking crates and bundles, together with the small
- 9:15boat and its outboard motor, which would be our only
- 9:18link with civilization. Our permanent party numbered four, myself, my mother, Dominic,
- 9:26our African cook, and Dominic's wife. As we set up
- 9:30camp that first day, we found the heat almost intolerable,
- 9:33but the big tent was soon pitched and everything bundled inside.
- 9:37I shall always remember David's expression when he found that
- 9:40our only tableware consisted of a couple tin plates, a
- 9:44cup without a handle, and a thermostop. Indeed, we were
- 9:48equipped with only the barest essentials, and I think even
- 9:51Dominic was secretly shocked. During the first two months of
- 9:55my field studies, I often despaired. Each dawn I set
- 9:59out alone, following the little streams as I explored the
- 10:02valleys one by one, forcing my way through the dense undergrowth,
- 10:06or scrambling up the steep slopes. Sometimes I saw a
- 10:09group of chimpanzees feeding in a tree, but seldom managed
- 10:13to get close enough before the shy apes moved away.
- 10:17Frequently I heard their noisy calling, but usually they had
- 10:21moved off before I could catch up with them. Disheartened,
- 10:25I trudged wearily back to camp each dusk. But those
- 10:29early days, however frustrating, initiated me into the ways of
- 10:33mountain life. The forests no longer seemed hostile after I
- 10:37learned to creep along the pig trails instead of forcing
- 10:40my way through the undergroup. The slopes were no longer
- 10:43a nightmare when I had discovered the baboon trails, or
- 10:47I could pull myself up the steepest parts by roots
- 10:50worn smooth by constant use. I became acquainted with other animals,
- 10:55troops of vervett and redtail monkeys, the beautiful red columbus monkey,
- 11:00the shy bushbuck, the fat ginger bush pig. One morning,
- 11:05while walking along the lake shore, I was approached by
- 11:08an excited fisherman who showed me a tree into which
- 11:11a bull buffalo had chased him before. Who you kalisana.
- 11:16The man said, he's a bad one, this fellow. Indeed,
- 11:21the tree was scored by innumerable gashes from the buffalo's horns. Mostly, however,
- 11:26the small herds are wary and hard to approach. Once
- 11:30I did have to climb a tree when I met
- 11:32two crotchety old bulls along a narrow track. My climb
- 11:35to safety was speeded by memory of Doctor Leaky's opinion
- 11:38of them quote, I'd rather meet a rhinoceros or a
- 11:43lion any day. I am more frightened of the buffalo
- 11:46than of any other creature in Africa. Often I saw
- 11:50tracks of leopard, or recognized its powerful feline smell, and
- 11:54sometimes I heard the soft rasping of its hunting call.
- 11:58Many months later I saw one. He passed only a
- 12:01few yards away in the long grass, and I felt
- 12:03slightly apprehensive, But when he winded me, he turned silently away.
- 12:10I never attempted to hide, and gradually the animals became
- 12:12used to the strange, pale skin primate that had invaded
- 12:16their territory. After about six months, most of the chimpanzees
- 12:20would sit and look at me calmly at distances of
- 12:23a hundred yards at first they fled if they saw me.
- 12:27Within five hundred yards three quarters of an hour's climb
- 12:31from camp, I discovered a peak overlooking two valleys and
- 12:35many open grassy ridges and slopes, an ideal place for
- 12:38long distance observation. From the peak, I could locate a
- 12:42group and then try to get closer. I had a
- 12:45tin trunk carried up there with blanket, electric torch, a
- 12:49couple of tins of baked beans, coffee, and a kettle.
- 12:53When the chimps slept close by, I stayed up in
- 12:56the mountains near them. So gradually I began to learn
- 13:00in the basic behavior patterns of the chimpanzees, and after
- 13:03six months I was able to pick out and name
- 13:05some individuals. When I saw Mike lazing in the sun,
- 13:09for example, or count Dracula ambling past, it was like
- 13:13meeting a friend. People often ask me how I choose
- 13:17such names for individual chimpanzees. My answer is that some names,
- 13:21such as Missus Maggs Spray and mister McGregor simply come
- 13:26to mind. Strange as it may sound, some chimpanzees remind
- 13:30me of friends or acquaintances in some gesture or manner,
- 13:34and are named accordingly, one chimpanzee had a pale, flesh
- 13:38colored face instead of the dark color common in adults.
- 13:41It gave me a slightly eerie feeling when I first
- 13:44saw him close by, and ever since that he was
- 13:48Count Dracula. When the three preliminary months came to an end,
- 13:52the National Geographic Society took over sponsorship of my research
- 13:57and financed a further twenty months. My mother had to
- 14:00return to England, but by then I was accepted by
- 14:03the authorities and so was allowed to stay on at
- 14:05the reserve. At this time I was joined by Hassan
- 14:09of the Cucamega tribe, an African who had worked for
- 14:13doctor Leaky for fifteen years. A most responsible and reliable helper,
- 14:18he took over the little boat and the monthly trip
- 14:20to Kigoma for stores and mail. The trial period was
- 14:24over and I could settle down to building a closer
- 14:26contact with the apes. Chimpanzees are nomadic within their territory,
- 14:31and they follow no fixed circuit. They have no regular
- 14:35sleeping trees. Most chimpanzees in the reserve, probably between sixty
- 14:40and eighty individuals, range at various times of the year
- 14:44over the whole sixty square miles and sometimes beyond the boundaries.
- 14:49The distance and direction of their wanderings, they may travel
- 14:52as much as eight or ten miles in a day,
- 14:55depend on the seasonal availability of the fruits, leaves, and
- 14:58blossoms that form the bulk of their diet. The chimpanzees
- 15:03during much of the year move about in small groups
- 15:05of three to six animals. Such a group I discovered
- 15:08from observation may consist of adult males and females, of
- 15:12females and juveniles, of males only, or a mixture of
- 15:16sexes and ages. During the day, two or three small
- 15:20groups may join and move about together for a few
- 15:22hours or a few days. In certain seasons, mainly when
- 15:26some kind of favored fruit is plentiful, I've often seen
- 15:29as many as twenty five chimpanzees together. What makes the
- 15:33social patterns so complicated is that the small groups are
- 15:36not stable. When two groups which have joined temporarily separate again,
- 15:41there has frequently been an exchange of individuals. Males often
- 15:45leave the group they are with to move about alone,
- 15:49subsequently joining another group or another lone male. This casual,
- 15:54free and easy grouping makes it harder to recognize individuals.
- 15:58Yet it is essential to do so before one can
- 16:01even begin to understand the social pattern. From my mountaintop perch,
- 16:06I observed how chimpanzees go to bed every night. Each
- 16:10one makes its own sleeping platform or nest, except for
- 16:14the small infants, which sleep with their mothers until they
- 16:16are about three years old. The construction of a nest
- 16:21I found is simple and takes only a couple of minutes.
- 16:24After choosing a suitable foundation, such as a horizontal fork
- 16:28with several branches growing out, the chimpanzee stands on this
- 16:32and bends down a number of branches from each side
- 16:35so that the leafy ends rest across the foundation. He
- 16:39then holds them in place with his feet. Finally, he
- 16:43bends in all of the little leafy twigs that project
- 16:46around the nest, and the bed is ready. But the
- 16:49chimpanzee likes his comfort, and often, after lying down for
- 16:52a moment, he sits up and reaches out for a
- 16:56handful of leafy twigs, which he props under his head
- 17:00or some other part of his body. Then he settles
- 17:02down again with no obvious or with obvious satisfaction. One evening,
- 17:08I sat quietly below a group of five chimpanzees that
- 17:11were feeding in a tree. There was Missus Maggs with
- 17:14her two offspring, Little Joe about two years old, and Spray,
- 17:18then about five. There was another mature female, Matilda, and
- 17:22a young male Que. Just before sunset, there was excited
- 17:26calling as another male joined the Spray climbed down from
- 17:30the tree and ran up the slope to greet him.
- 17:33As they climbed the tree together, I saw that the
- 17:35newcomer was mister McGregor, an old male who had lost
- 17:38the hair from his shoulders and was almost completely bald headed,
- 17:42a rarity in chimpanzees. The group fed quietly until the
- 17:46sun had almost vanished behind the mountains acrossed the lake,
- 17:50and then Missus Maggs began looking for a place to
- 17:52make her nest. She tested the branches exactly the way
- 17:56a person tests the springs of a hotel bed. One
- 17:59by one, the other rapes began to make their nests.
- 18:02When the sun finally sank out of sight, Missus Maggs
- 18:05was lying on her back in her completed nest as
- 18:08the chill of night crept into the air. Little Joe
- 18:11ran to her mother, who put out her arm and
- 18:13drew the young one close to the warmth of her body.
- 18:17Darkness fell swiftly, and I climbed to my mountaintop lookout post,
- 18:22opened a tin of beams, and boiled my kettle over
- 18:25a little fire. The moon was nearly full, and the
- 18:28mountains were beautiful and rather ghostly. When I returned to
- 18:30the chimpanzees, I disturbed them as I settled down with
- 18:34my blanket about fifty yards away, and they began to call
- 18:37out loudly, alerting a troop of baboons sleeping in the
- 18:41valley below. The chimpanzees soon quieted down, but the baboons
- 18:45went on barking for a long time. The chimpanzees slept
- 18:49soundly for the rest of the night, but I was
- 18:52perched halfway down a steep slope with only a small
- 18:55tree to keep me from slithering into the ravine below.
- 18:59I was glad for the first glimmering of dawn. As
- 19:02it grew lighter, I gradually made out the dark shape
- 19:05of Missus Maggs, with Joe curled up beside her. Soon
- 19:10Joe sat up, yawned, and gazed about. Missus Maggs rolled
- 19:15over onto her back, flung out an arm and also yawned.
- 19:18Joe jumped onto her chest, leaned forward and pressed her
- 19:21face against her mother's flinging her arms around her neck.
- 19:26The other apes began to move. I could see Matilda
- 19:29sitting up in her nest and spray feeding in a
- 19:33tree close by. Joe became restless. She climbed to a
- 19:38branch above the nest and hung down, kicking and twisting
- 19:41from side to side. Her mother reached up and patted her,
- 19:45pushing her to and fro until Joe, delighted, tumbled down
- 19:48on top of her. Missus Maggs, her legs in the air,
- 19:52bounced Joe up and down with her feet, and then
- 19:54suddenly bent her knees so that Joe collapsed in a
- 19:57heap of waving arms and legs. The game went on
- 20:01for about ten minutes than Missus Maggs suddenly sat up
- 20:05and peered through the branches. Matilda had left her nest,
- 20:10and sounds below indicated that the others are moving away.
- 20:13Missus Maggs touched Joe, who jumped to her at once,
- 20:18clinging under her belly as the mother swung down from
- 20:20the tree. When a chimpanzee is born, it is almost
- 20:25as helpless as a human baby, save that it rapidly
- 20:28develops great strength in hands and feet, enabling it to
- 20:31cling to its mother's long hair as she travels from
- 20:33place to place. For the first four months, the infant
- 20:37never leaves its mother, But after this it begins to venture,
- 20:40first a few feet and then a few yards away.
- 20:43It is still very unsure of itself, and the mother
- 20:45is always ready to reach out should it lose its balance.
- 20:48By the time the infant is about a year old,
- 20:50it has more confidence and spends hours playing gently, hanging
- 20:55from a branch and patting at its toes, or doing
- 20:57careful gymnastics on a branch. If two infants play together,
- 21:01they pat out at each other or have a tug
- 21:04of war with a twig. Always the games are slow
- 21:07and gentle. By the time they are about two years old,
- 21:10the little apes are very active, and their playing is
- 21:12far more adventurous. Whether they are swinging and leaping around
- 21:16in a tree or rolling over and over on the ground,
- 21:18they never seem to be still for a minute. Their elders,
- 21:22particularly the adolescents and the younger males, are amazingly good
- 21:26natured with them. I once watched little Fifi tormenting an
- 21:30adolescent male figan. He was resting peacefully when Fifi hurled
- 21:35herself onto him, pulling his hair, pushing her fingers into
- 21:38his face, biting his ears. She swung above him, kicking
- 21:42out while he indulgently pushed her to and fro with
- 21:46one hand. Finally, exhausted for the moment, she flung herself
- 21:50down beside him. From the ages of about three years,
- 21:54the young chimpanzee becomes more and more independent. Often it
- 21:58still moves around with its mother until it is five
- 22:00or six, but it no longer rides on her back
- 22:03or sleeps in the nest with her at night. Games
- 22:06become rougher and wilder, wrestling and chasing being the favorite sports.
- 22:10Occasionally a small infant tries to join in, and then
- 22:13the older ones treat it with great consideration. I saw
- 22:17one youngster swinging an infant gently by one arm, and then,
- 22:20after peering down, she dropped the little one to a
- 22:22leafy platform a few feet below. When the infant had
- 22:26difficulty in climbing up again, she gave a helping hand.
- 22:30At about eight years, the chimpanzee child attains puberty. During
- 22:34the next three or four years of adolescence, it gradually
- 22:37takes its place in society. How long it might live
- 22:41no one can say, pending further study, but a good
- 22:43guess for average lifespan in the wild would be forty
- 22:47to fifty years. In this society, relationships among the adult
- 22:51apes are more harmonious than had been assumed from observations
- 22:55of chimpanzees in captivity. Of course, if you judged from
- 22:59sound alone, you would imagine that wild chimpanzees were always
- 23:03fighting and quarreling. When two groups meet, there is sometimes
- 23:07a fantastic cacophony, as the males call loudly, drum on
- 23:12tree trunks, and shake branches, while the females and youngsters
- 23:15scream and rush out of the way. But this is
- 23:18merely excitement and pleasure. With his highly emotional, extrovert temperature temperament,
- 23:24the chimpanzee likes to express his feelings in action. When
- 23:29squabbles do arise, often over the merest triviality, they are
- 23:34usually settled by gestures and loud protests. Once I was
- 23:38watching a youngster feeding peacefully beside an adult male. By chance,
- 23:42they both reached for the same fruit. The youngster immediately
- 23:45withdrew its hand, but screamed loudly and flapped out at
- 23:49the male. The male screamed and flapped at the youngster.
- 23:53This went on for a few moments, and then the
- 23:55quarrel ended, neither ape having touched the other. Relationships between
- 24:00mature and adolescent males are particularly harmonious. They do not
- 24:04even fight over females. I once saw seven males in
- 24:08succession mate with a single female with no sign of
- 24:12jealousy or antagonism. As to mating in general, chimpanzees in
- 24:17captivity breed all year round, and it seems likely that
- 24:21this is the case in the wild, because females appear
- 24:23receptive toward males during all months of the year. In addition,
- 24:28I saw small infants in April, June, September, and October.
- 24:33During September and October, however, when the chimpanzees are frequently
- 24:37seen moving about in large aggregations, excitement caused by this
- 24:42social stimulation does appear to have a very marked effect
- 24:45upon reproductive behavior. I saw the animals mating almost daily
- 24:50during these two months Spring and Tanganyika. Thus, although it
- 24:55would appear that a certain amount of mating must take
- 24:57place throughout the year. There is apparently a very definite
- 25:00mating season. Mutual grooming plays an important role in the
- 25:05social life of chimpanzees, and two friends or even a
- 25:08small group will sit quietly for hours, searching through each
- 25:12other's long black hair for specks of dirt, grass, seeds,
- 25:16or chicks. Some students of animal behaviors see in this
- 25:20grooming activity the first beginnings of true social and altruistic
- 25:25behavior in the whole animal kingdom. I am often asked
- 25:29do chimpanzees have a language. They do, not, of course,
- 25:33have a language that can be compared with our own,
- 25:35but they do have a tremendous variety of calls, each
- 25:38one induced by a different emotion. The calls range from
- 25:42the rather low pitched who of greeting and the series
- 25:46of low grunts that is heard when a chimpanzee begins
- 25:49to feed on some desirable food, to the loud, excited
- 25:53calls and screams which occur when two groups meet. One
- 25:58call given in defiance of apon predator, or when a
- 26:01chimpanzee for some reason is angry at the approach of another,
- 26:04can be described as a loud raw. This is a
- 26:08single syllable several times repeated, and is one of the
- 26:11most savage and spine chilling sounds of the African forest.
- 26:15Another characteristic call is a series of hoots, the breath
- 26:19drawn inaudibly after each hoot, an ending with three or
- 26:23four roars. This is the cry of a male chimpanzee
- 26:26as he crosses a ridge. It seems to be an
- 26:29announcement to any other chimpanzees that may be in the
- 26:32valley below here I come. These calls, while they are
- 26:36not a language in our sense of the word, are
- 26:38understood by other chimpanzees and certainly form a means of communication.
- 26:44In addition, chimpanzees communicate by touch or gesture. A mother
- 26:48touches her young one when she's about to move away,
- 26:51or taps on the trunk when she wants it to
- 26:53come down from a tree. When a chimpanzee is anxious
- 26:56for a share of some delicacy, he begs out his
- 27:00hand palm up exactly as we do. He may pat
- 27:03the branch beside him if he wants a companion to
- 27:06join him there. When two animals are grooming each other
- 27:09and one feels that it's his turn to be groomed,
- 27:11he often reaches out and gives his companion a poke. Once,
- 27:16when three males were grooming one another, I saw a
- 27:19female going around, poking at each of them in turn.
- 27:22But she was completely ignored and so sat down sadly
- 27:26and groomed herself. There are also many gestures of greeting
- 27:30and friendship. Sometimes, when two friends meet after separation, they
- 27:34fling their arms around each other in a delightful embrace.
- 27:38Despite this fairly well developed system of communication, a chimpanzee
- 27:43suddenly confronted with danger gives no alarm call to warn
- 27:46his companions, but simply runs off silently. Well, there's quite
- 27:53a bit more to this article from Doing Good All,
- 27:57but we'll have to stop because of time. This week's
- 28:02edition was a little different for a diary of science
- 28:05and nature, but I hope you enjoyed that, and please
- 28:08stay tuned for more on RADIOI