Cheryl Ramalho/Getty Images/iStockphoto
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A group of chimpanzees crossing the street.
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Nationalgeographic.co.id—All this time the group chimpanzee and group gorilla not known to be violent towards one another. Two species of hominids are known to coexist peacefully in certain areas. So it is surprising and sad that researchers have witnessed a deadly fight between them for the first time.
Two separate battles between the two species were observed in Loango National Park in Gabon in 2019. In the two wars the number chimpanzee exceeds the amount gorilla and they trigger the attack first. In those two attacks, baby gorilla was killed.
In a new study documenting the battle, researchers hope to shed light on what may be behind the unusual aggression. They wanted to identify whether it was related to territorial battles, competition for resources, or something else.
“Our observations provide the first evidence that the existence of chimpanzee can have a lethal effect on gorilla, ”Said Tobias Deschner, a primate expert at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany.
“We now want to investigate the factors that trigger this surprising aggressive interaction,” Deschner said Science Alert.
Interaction or conflict first between groups chimpanzee and group gorilla in the area of the national park occurred in February 2019. This war involved 18 chimpanzee and five gorilla (one silver back, three adult females, and one baby), and lasted 52 minutes. Group chimpanzee it meets the group gorilla it was on their way back from their visit to the neighboring region.
The second battle took place in December 2019, involving 27 chimpanzee (some of whom were involved in the first incident) and seven gorilla (one silver back, three adult females, one juvenile, and two babies), and lasted 79 minutes. In conflict this, group chimpanzee it finds the group gorilla it was at the start of their territorial border patrol.
In both cases, the group chimpanzee can separate baby gorilla from its mother and kill it. Even in the second incident, baby gorilla eaten by chimpanzee. Gorilla–gorilla others fled, while some chimpanzee wounded in battle in the first clash.
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Elisabeth Newspaper
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Gorilla group.
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With these rare battles now on record, the next question is what caused them. Researchers think that the chimpanzees may have seen the baby gorillas as prey, or that they were competing for food, or that the fight was for territory.
“It is possible that the sharing of food resources by chimpanzees, gorillas and forest elephants in Loango National Park results in increased competition and sometimes even lethal interactions between the two great ape species,” said Deschner.
Observing the interactions between chimpanzees and gorillas is not easy. Because researchers need to give the primates space and respect. In addition, the large area involved, the rarity of the gorilla population, the nature of the habitat, and so on also make observing them quite difficult.
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Nicolas Johnson/QUORA
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So far, groups of chimpanzees and groups of gorillas are known to live together peacefully in certain areas of the wild.
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With that in mind, it’s possible that killings between the two species are actually more common than the researchers’ records suggest. However, it is interesting to note that the two deadly encounters occurred during parts of the year when food such as fruit was less available.
The research report on these two encounters of chimpanzees and gorillas has been published in the journal Scientific Reports on July 19, 2021. But observational work in Loango National Park continues, and researchers hope they can learn more about attitudes chimpanzee and gorilla each other, and other hominid species.
“We are only at an early stage to understand the effects of competition on interactions between two great ape species at Loango,” said Simone Pika, a cognitive biologist from the University of Osnabrück in Germany.
“Our study shows that there is still much to be explored and discovered about our closest living relatives, and Loango National Park with its unique mosaic habitat is a unique place to do so.”
National Geographic
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Loango National Park is a sustainable area in western Gabon. The area protects diverse coastal habitats, including the 220 square kilometer Iguéla Lagoon, the only significant example of a typical west African lagoon system protected within the national park.
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