Chimpanzee learns tool construction using video...

Dr Elizabeth Price and colleagues at St Andrew's University in Scotland, UK have found that Chimpanzee's are able to copy tool construction from conspecifics using video.

Access the paper here for free:-

http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/early/2009/06/30/rspb.2009.0640.full.html#ref-list-1

Gibbon adds slamming door percussion to song

White Handed Gibbon female enhances her song using the slamming of a door.

Geissman a leading primatologist specialising in primates such as the gibbon observed.



http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8150000/8150604.stm

If you are interested in knowing more about Gibbon behaviour follow the attached:-
http://www.gibbons.de/main/index.html

Red Mangabey Filmed in Central Africa - a Rare Opportunity

The elusive Red Mangabey have been filmed in Central Africa for the first time.

Little is known of these wonderful primates.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8090000/8090412.stm

Captive Siamang's and Matching

I recently conducted another observational study; of Siamang's at Adelaide Zoo. Again this study was aimed at observing any imitative behaviour between mother and infant. I was priviledged to spend 3 days with these acrobats of the jungle! Despite losing one day of data due to an Orangutan escape, I was intrigued to find matching in Siamang's for a tiny infant only 3 months of age! These creatures continue to surprise me. It was much more difficult to keep up with them, given my ancient video camera! It was most interesting that I found the infant opening and closing its mouth spontaneously when the mother chewed on food. This was a rare sight and only occured on 1 or 2 occasions. I would need to do a longer study to verify these findings. I hope to be replicating these studies again end of July, beginning of August! Keep posted.

Evidence of dancing in birds...

Despite this blog being predominantly relating to primates, last year I gave a presentation relating to the autopomorphy of humans being able to dance and keep to a beat. I did argue that no other species have been found to dance in tempo with a partner for recreation. I think part of this argument still stands as no other species do partner dance. However, there is new evidence that birds dance to the beat, so despite there being no evidence for partner dancing this is really an amazing discovery. Indeed, it is suggested that it is linked to vocal learning and mimicry. Is it absence of evidence or evidence of absence? Indeed, why would they need to partner dance, and is recreation potentially a human autopomorphy? It depends on how recreation is defined, indeed, this warrants an in-depth discussion beyond a blog post. Nevertheless, a great discussion point!

http://news.mongabay.com/2009/0430-hance_birddance.html

Habitat Crisis Orangutans, Logging and Palm Oil

This documentary portrays the reality behind the crisis facing Orangutans at the hand of all of us due to our consumerism.

We all need to be more vigilent about products we buy, how they are made and where they come from and refrain from buying products with palm oil.

http://greenfilm.free.fr/

Matching in Gorilla gorilla gorilla

I recently did a short observational study of a captive Gorilla Gorilla carer and infant dyad and found some evidence for matching. This is only preliminary data and is part of my honours thesis. To my surprise often the infant (male, 8 months old) showed most matching during carer feeding time. The infant would watch the carer eating and would pick up a branch and try and imitate chewing (the infant is not weaned and will only be so at 2.5 years, it is still suckling). This was observed on several occasions. Indeed, only one bout of imitation from a juvenile playing was observed, the juvenile threw himself backwards and the infant immediately did the same! Despite as mentioned this being preliminary data and the many limitations (eg crowd management, distraction, and captivity to name a few) it is promising for further studies. Furthermore, due to the paucity of observational studies on imitation in primates this may provide some evidence for future directions. I will be conducting another short observational study in a captive Siamang carer dyad in May 2009 (infant is approximately 4 months old). Watch this space!