What Do Chimpanzees Eat? A Primate Culinary Exploration
Fishing for treats is a foraging behavior which is highly encouraged and time consuming. It keeps the chimps mentally engaged and mimics natural foraging behavior. We can always count on one of the younger females to be the first at the mounds and one of the last to leave.
6-Termites and ants (and their chitin)—Some chimps are good at eating termites, honey bees and driver ants. I’ve eaten both ants and termites, but I suspect that makes me weird rather than in touch with my ancestry. Interestingly, most of my friends seem to have eaten ants and termites too (which, friends, makes you weird too). No one seems to know if chimpanzees have any special ability to digest chitin. But there is more than chitin to these insects, particularly if one can find a fat and juicy queen.
Cylinders of material of known dimension were compressed and the elastic modulus calculated as the slope of the initial region of the stress strain graph65. For woody material, or that arranged in a rod-like manner, 4-point bending tests were used to calculate the elastic modulus. This is where a beam of known dimensions is bent and the elastic modulus estimated from the elastic phase of this bending behaviour65. All of LCRP’s chimpanzee family members are orphans whose mothers and other family members were killed to be eaten; the young chimps were kept alive to be sold into the local and international pet trade. Western chimpanzees, also known as West African chimpanzees, are found in western Africa in the countries of Ivory Coast (Côte d’Ivoire), Ghana, Senegal, Guinea, Liberia, Mali, Guinea-Bissau, Sierra Leone, and Burkina Faso.
They were then dried to constant weight at ~40°C using a Nesco plant dehydrator and weighed to the nearest 0.01g (dry unit weight) (Rothman, Chapman, & Van Soest, 2012). The mass of these unit measurements were used to calculate the feeding rate of each food item which was later used in the calculation of macronutrient intake. In fact, Dr. Jane Goodall was the first person to observe chimpanzees eating other animals when she saw them using sticks to extract termites and also hunting smaller mammals such as monkeys. Until then, chimpanzees were believed to be herbivores, like most other great apes. While most of a chimpanzee’s diet is made up of fruits, seeds, nuts, leaves, flowers and insects, they can be surprisingly creative with tool use and sourcing medicinal – and recreational – sources of food. Whilst extractive and percussive foraging behaviours are reported in savannah chimpanzee populations38,39,40,41, the majority of plant foods are likely processed orally.
And before you go, remember to be kind to all animals and protect their rights. If you have any thoughts or questions, we would love to hear from you. Chimpanzees have developed some fascinating techniques to extract as much nutrition as possible from leaves. They often use a technique called Nutrients in animal diets “leaf swallowing,” where they roll up the leaves into a ball and swallow them whole. This helps them break down the tough cell walls of the leaves and access the valuable nutrients inside. 2-Which makes me feel bad for eating animal crackers now while I drink my late night coffee.
This disparity in the types of foods consumed presents an opportunity to explore how female chimpanzees prioritise the intake of different macronutrients in the face of daily variation in diet composition (Raubenheimer & Simpson, 1997). Knowing what is being eaten allowed the selection of foods for measurements of the mechanical properties of individual tissues either ingested or masticated by chimpanzees. Foods were either dropped by focal animals, this may be because a plant tissue was not consumed, or it was dropped in the process of eating. However to increase the number of samples for testing, food items were also acquired directly from trees accessed using canopy access techniques60 that chimpanzees had been observed feeding in. Fresh samples of all the plant foods eaten during focal follows were collected in air tight bags on the same day or within the same week from the exact plant eaten by the chimpanzees or from adjacent plants of the same species. The samples were then processed in the same way the chimpanzee processed them before ingesting the food.
Adult chimpanzee populations are continually decreasing, having fallen significantly since the 1980s. Chimpanzees’ bodies are covered in a coat of dark brown or black hair and usually have a short white beard on their chins. Their skin colour is mostly white underneath their fur, although their faces, hands, and feet are all typically black. Younger chimps usually have pinker or whiter faces, which darken when they become adults. As they age, chimpanzees’ foreheads tend to go bald, while their fur often becomes more grey. Finally, the team tested the chimps with a different vegetable—carrots.
The original thought was that chimpanzee were more-or-less the same throughout the continent, but recent findings have shown that is simply not true. A universal truth in conservation is that the more educated the local population is on an animal, the better that animal is protected. With that said, more research can only benefit a species as intriguing and charismatic as the Western chimpanzee. Many organizations around the world exist to help chimpanzee conservation. Liberia Chimpanzee Rescue and Protection is a sanctuary and conservation organization based out of Liberia. They currently care for dozens of orphaned chimpanzees and work with the Liberian government to enforce wildlife protection laws.
Chimpanzees have an incredible sense of smell, allowing them to locate ripe fruits from a distance. They have been observed travelling long distances to find their favorite fruits, such as figs, bananas, and berries. As we conclude our primate culinary exploration, it’s clear that chimpanzees are anything but picky eaters. Their diet is a fascinating mix of fruits, nuts, leaves, insects, and meat. They are resourceful hunters and gatherers, utilizing their intelligence and adaptability to obtain their food.
