page_title: Chimpanzee
section_title: Diet
hierarchical_section_title: Chimpanzee / Ecology / Diet
caption_attribution_description: Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii, Ficus sur Afrikaans: 'n Volwasse, wilde sjimpansee-wyfie met haar een jaar oue suigeling wat vreet aan Besemtrosvye in Kibale Nasionale Park, Oeganda. Daar is opgemerk hoe hy ook proe aan die vrugvlees van rooi (d.i. baie ryp) vye. Die foto is tydens my na-doktorale genootskap by Harvard Universiteit geneem, toe ek die verwantskap tussen eksklusiewe mededinging en voedingswaarde van wilde vrugte bestudeer het. Ek het die heel eerste gedetailleerde studie oor sjimpansees se voedings-ekologie gedoen met beskrywings van tot dusver onbekende gedrag. My waarnemings is oorwegend direk in die baldakyn gemaak met die wilde sjimpansees rondom my. Nodeloos om te sê dat dit die projek van my lewe was. Foto 25 m bo grondvlak geneem. English: “Adult female-infant wild chimpanzees feeding on Ficus sur fruits in Kibale National Park, Uganda. The infant was one-year old, and he was still breast feeding. However, he has been seen to taste the flesh of red (very ripe) fruits. The picture was taken during my postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University, during which I studied the relationship between contest competition and the nutritional quality of wild fruits. I made the very first detailed study on chimpanzees’ nutritional ecology with descriptions of behaviors never seen before. Most of my observations were collected directly in the canopy with wild chimpanzees all around. Needless to say that this was the project of my life. Picture taken at 25 m above the ground.”
context_page_description: The chimpanzee, also known as the common chimpanzee, robust chimpanzee, or simply chimp, is a species of great ape native to the forest and savannah of tropical Africa. It has four confirmed subspecies and a fifth proposed subspecies. The chimpanzee and the closely related bonobo are classified in the genus Pan. Evidence from fossils and DNA sequencing shows that Pan is a sister taxon to the human lineage and is humans' closest living relative.
  The chimpanzee is covered in coarse black hair, but has a bare face, fingers, toes, palms of the hands, and soles of the feet. It is larger and more robust than the bonobo, weighing 40–70 kg for males and 27–50 kg for females and standing 100 to 150 cm. Its gestation period is eight months. The infant is weaned at about three years old, but usually maintains a close relationship with its mother for several years more. The chimpanzee lives in groups that range in size from 15 to 150 members, although individuals travel and forage in much smaller groups during the day. The species lives in a strict male-dominated hierarchy, where disputes are generally settled without the need for violence.
context_section_description: The chimpanzee is an omnivorous frugivore. It prefers fruit above all other food items but also eats leaves and leaf buds, seeds, blossoms, stems, pith, bark and resin. A study in Budongo Forest, Uganda found that 64.5% of their chimp feeding time concentrated on fruits (84.6% of which being ripe), particularly those from two species of Ficus, Maesopsis eminii and Celtis durandii. In addition, 19% of feeding time was spent on arboreal leaves, mostly Broussonetia papyrifera and Celtis mildbraedii. While the chimpanzee is mostly herbivorous, it does eat honey, soil, insects, birds and their eggs, and small to medium-sized mammals, including other primates. Insect species consumed include the weaver ant Oecophylla longinoda, Macrotermes termites and honey bees. The western red colobus ranks at the top of preferred mammal prey. Other mammalian prey include red-tailed monkeys, infant and juvenile yellow baboons, bush babies, blue duikers, bushbucks, and common warthogs.
  Despite the fact that chimpanzees are known to hunt, and to collect insects and other invertebrates, such food actually makes up a very small portion of their diet, from as little as 2% yearly to as much as 65 grams of animal flesh per day for each adult chimpanzee in peak hunting seasons. This also varies from troop to troop and year to year. However, in all cases, the majority of their diet consists of fruits, leaves, roots, and other plant matter. Female chimpanzees appear to consume much less animal flesh than males, according to several studies. Jane Goodall documented many occasions within Gombe Stream National Park of chimpanzees and western red colobus monkeys ignoring each other within close proximity.
  Chimpanzees do not appear to directly compete with gorillas in areas where they overlap. When fruit is abundant gorilla and chimp diets converge, but when fruit is scarce gorillas resort to vegetation. The two apes may also feed on different species, whether fruit or insects. Chimps and gorillas usually ignore or avoid each other when feeding on the same tree, although hostile encounters have occasionally been documented.
caption: A mother with young eating Ficus fruit in Kibale National Park, Uganda
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