Around the Zooniverse: Chimp&See featuring our mod Laura K Lynn!

After a brief zooniverse site-wide outage last week - we are back!

A big thank you to Zooniverse for putting this great intro video together featuring our amazing moderator Laura ( @LauraKLynn ) , also featured is our incredible field site manager Heather Cohen ( @heathenchimp ) setting up a camera at the current Chimp&See site : Sunlit Ruins !
 

New Chimp&See paper : Highly precise community science annotations of video camera-trapped fauna in challenging environments.

 New Chimp&See paper out in Remote Sensing in Ecology and Conservation: "Highly precise community science annotations of video camera-trapped fauna in challenging environments."  https://zslpublications.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/rse2.402

Even though they require more time for annotation as compared to stills, camera trap videos provide valuable acoustic and visual information on species behaviour and can improve identification of individuals. 

Using the Community Science (CS) platform Chimp&See (chimpandsee.org), we found that when comparing classification of 13,531 one-minute video clips done by a professional ecologist to those done by 1,744 Chimp&See community scientists, the overall, annotation precision was between 95.4% and 98.1%. Further, citizen scientists provide a wealth of additional information through additional annotations via hashtags in discussion boards. 

Our annotated video data set is already being used for AI algorithm training and our findings demonstrate the competence of community scientists with challenging videos, and hold great promise for future studies on animal behaviour and population monitoring. 

And a MASSIVE thank you and panthoot to our amazing mod @Eweforia (Carol) who made this incredible video abstract of our paper

Visit us at ChimpandSee.org today and contribute to research and conservation !

Chimp&See Tribute to Christophe Boesch

PanAf founder and co-director Christophe Boesch passed away suddenly on Sunday January 14th 2024

The PanAf was Christophe's legacy project, his great vision and he greatly supported our work on Chimp&See. He was a very great man and the world is a lot worse now that he is gone.

We even caught him on our PanAf/Chimp&See camera traps a few times at various sites:

Today at the MPI-EVA,I gave one of the speeches at his memorial tribute which mainly focused on his academic work. My friend and colleague Dr. Tobias Deschner, then focused on all the achievements of the Wild Chimpanzee Foundation.

My text is posted below, but I would like to encourage you to follow the WCF on youtube, linkedin, facebook, instagram and on their website. It is my favourite NGO and they do amazing grass roots, evidence-based conservation work, and supporting them is the best way to honour Christophe's memory.

Dr. Inza Kone's tribute post to Christophe also showcases beautifully the impact this amazing man had in the conservation world and beyond.

--
(extracted from the MPI-EVA Tribute to Christoph Boesch. January 25th 2024. M. Arandjelovic)

I came to this institute with a passion for wildlife conservation, genetics and an obsession with gorillas. But over the last 20 years Christophe Boesch managed to convince me that chimps were pretty cool too.

Christophe was a pioneer. I can list a ton of firsts. With his wife Hedwige, they established the Tai Chimpanzee Project in 1979 and were the first to habituate chimpanzees without provisioning. This meant they just followed shadows in the forest, hoping for years that one day the chimps would just stop running away. Legend has it that this was because the chimps wouldn’t eat the bananas Christophe tried to give them. But be it intentional or reactive, Christophe and Hedwige kept at it for 5 years, trusting a process no one had tried before, a mix of confidence and hope, that it would work, with enough persistence.

Christophe’s Tai Chimpanzee Project revealed western chimps to be more gregarious than those that had been documented in the east and taught us about chimpanzee adoption by males, of unrelated orphan infants. He was the first to document cooperative hunting in chimpanzees. He is one of the founding fathers of animal culture and it's basis in social learning. He debated tirelessly across fields, advocating for species-specific, culturally-relevant and ecologically-appropriate testing in both human and primate cognition studies. Christophe is also the founding father of primate archaeology, bringing archaeologists to Tai to excavate a 4000 year old chimpanzee stone tool use site in 2001.

In 2005 Christophe started the Loango Ape Project in Central Africa, and as was the trend at several of the newer chimp research sites, the more we looked, the more chimpanzee behavioural diversity was found.

This inspired Christophe’s legacy project the Pan African Programme: The Cultured Chimpanzee which he started with Hjalmar Kuehl in 2010. The ambitious idea of creating short-term research sites, for as many chimpanzee groups as possible across their range, to better understand the behavioural repertoire of chimps and the evolutionary drivers of that diversity. Over 10 years, non-invasive data was collected from 18 countries and over 50 chimpanzee sites, and has already led to exciting revelations on the evolution of behavioural diversity. At the time, the PanAf project was thought of as unfeasible and over reaching, but thanks to Christophe’s vision and leadership, its already being replicated in other taxa.

Christophe often said he felt indebted to the chimps. and that the only way he felt he could repay that debt, was to ensure their protection.

He not only established the Wild Chimpanzee Foundation in 2000, but he also made sure his NGO would follow evidence-based ground-truthed practices. He supervised countless students whose research focus was improving conservation and biodiversity assessments, so that the basis of WCF recommendations and interventions would be to the highest scientific standards. This led to the birth of the A.P.E.S. database and eventually the A.P.E.S. wiki where all ape survey data is centralized and widely accessible.

I don’t want to just list his accomplishments though, I want you to know this man supported me and cheerleaded me, as he did for many others, and many other women in particular. He also understood the importance of nurturing chimpanzee range country scientists and did so enthusiastically. He supported them academically, but also encouraged them to take leadership roles in their home countries. So many students and researchers came through these MPI hallways from Cote d’Ivoire, Nigeria, Cameroon, Liberia, Rwanda, Gabon and more. This includes Christophe’s PhD student Dr. Simone Ban, the first woman to obtain her doctorate from the largest university in cote d'Ivoire in 2017.

Christophe valued a lot of things about people that don’t usually get valued in academia. He valued different view points, he liked to be challenged and to talk through difficult topics and he made us do the same, he brought us to the table. He didn’t mind if people felt passionately, feelings and topics were not scary or taboo, discussion was the way towards resolution.

When I joined the Max Planck, many moons ago, I had no field experience, I was a lab person and at that time, the two did not mix. But Christophe let me go to Tai anyway so that I could see the forest and the chimps. Specifically because he thought it would make me a better scientist. And it was indeed life changing. When he joined me in the forest a month after I had been there he was able to show me so much more than I had been seeing. I saw the forest through his eyes, i hadn’t been seeing the things I was looking at. His knowledge and passion were absolutely magical, and I am so very sad that I won’t get to be with that again.

During that trip, in a time before GPSs, he kept trying to teach me how to use my map and compass and find the trails at Tai. No matter how many times I screwed it up though, he was so encouraging when I succeeded. As if I had done it on the first try. I was also not the most agile primate ever to enter the Tai forest either, and there were a lot of snickers from the field assistants every time I tripped and fell to my face AGAIN on the forest floor . And I remember at some point in the afternoon, Christophe casually said to one of the assistants, but loud enough so that I could hear, “even though she falls a lot, she gets up really well”. And At the time, I mainly thought this was a kindness. a way to motivate me forward, to make sure I was still going to collect my data.

But now when I think about it, I think it was actually an overarching metaphor for how Christophe approached things and inspired people. Do your best, you may fail, try again, try again, don’t get discouraged, keep fighting, don't let the snickers of others keep you down, keep trying to figure it out. You will get there.

Christophe should still be here. He should be still fighting for the chimps. We need him, the chimps need him, the forests need him and I am absolutely ruined that he is gone. I only take solace in knowing how many people he inspired and that will carry on his amazing legacy.

Rest in Power Dear Christophe and thank you SO much for everything. Merci.

---

This video was made by/for the 2023 Indianapolis Prize for with Christophe was a finalist and showcases what an incredible force of nature he was.

New PanAf paper: Population dynamics and genetic connectivity in recent chimpanzee history

 

Our newest PanAf paper is out now in Cell Genomics, entitled "Population dynamics and genetic connectivity in recent chimpanzee history" 

For a great summary of what we found check out some of our press 

• Scientists produce chimp genetic map to combat trafficking
• U Pompeu Fabra/iDiv/MPI-EVA press release
• Des scientifiques aident à lutter contre le trafic de chimpanzés en étudiant leur ADN
• Scientists Create World's Largest Chimp DNA Genome From Poop

or read lead author Claudia Fontsere's fabulous Twitter thread !

New PanAf chimp microbiomes paper!

The PanAf has a new paper out examing the microbiomes of chimpanzees across their range!

tl;dr: 

Genetics/geography are correlated with prokaryotic and parasite community dissimilarity. When controlling for these, vegetation also has an influence on prokaryotic community composition.

We also found some site-specific differences in prokaryote community composition (though not in Western chimps). 

We discuss how regional tool use for resource extraction might be influencing site-specific differences & compare the patterns observed in chimps to those in humans.

Citation:

Bueno de Mesquita CP, Nichols LM, Gebert MJ, Vanderburgh C, Bocksberger G, Lester JD, Kalan AK, Dieguez P, McCarthy MS, Agbor A, Álvarez Varona P, Ayimisin AE, Bessone M, Chancellor R, Cohen H, Coupland C, Deschner T, Egbe VE, Goedmakers A, Granjon A-C, Grueter CC, Head J, Hernandez-Aguilar RA, Jeffery KJ, Jones S, Kadam P, Kaiser M, Lapuente J, Larson B, Marrocoli S, Morgan D, Mugerwa B, Mulindahabi F, Neil E, Niyigaba P, Pacheco L, Piel AK, Robbins MM, Rundus A, Sanz CM, Sciaky L, Sheil D, Sommer V, Stewart FA, Ton E, van Schijndel J, Vergnes V, Wessling EG, Wittig RM, Ginath YY, Yurkiw K, Zuberbühler K, Gogarten JF, Heintz-Buschart A, Muellner-Riehl AN, Boesch C, Kühl HS, Fierer N, Arandjelovic M*, Dunn RR* (2021) Structure of Chimpanzee Gut Microbiomes across Tropical Africa. Msystems doi: 10.1128/msystems.01269-20

New PanAf paper: Recent genetic connectivity and clinal variation in chimpanzees

From our press release : Chimpanzees Without Borders

A new large-scale study uncovers recent genetic connectivity between chimpanzee subspecies despite past isolation events

Much like us, chimpanzees, occupy diverse habitats and exhibit extensive behavioural variation. Human genetic variation however changes along a gradient, with no races and some areas of local genetic adaptation. Chimpanzees, on the other hand, are divided into four subspecies separated by geographic barriers like rivers. Previous studies attempting to understand chimpanzee population histories have been limited either by a poor geographic distribution of samples, samples of uncertain origin or different types of genetic markers. Due to these obstacles, some studies have shown clear separations between chimpanzee subspecies while others suggest a genetic gradient across the species as in humans.

Chimpanzee dung samples were collected across Africa to determine if populations were recently connected despite historical barriers to gene flow.

To resolve this dichotomy, researchers from the Pan African Programme: The Cultured Chimpanzee (PanAf) at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology and a team of international researchers, collected over 5000 fecal samples from 55 sites in 18 countries across the chimpanzee range over 8 years. This is by far the most complete sampling of the species to date, with a known location of origin for every sample, thus addressing the sampling limitations of previous studies. “Collecting these samples was often a daunting task for our amazing field teams. The chimpanzees were almost all unhabituated to human presence, so it took a lot of patience, skill and luck to find chimpanzee dung at each of the sites,” explains Mimi Arandjelovic, co-director of the PanAf and senior author of the study.

Anthony Agbor, co-author of the study and field site manager at several PanAf sites, prepares samples for processing in the field.

Jack Lester, first author of the study, explains: “We used rapidly-evolving genetic markers that reflect the recent population history of species and, in combination with the dense sampling from across their range, we show that chimpanzee subspecies have been connected, or, more likely, reconnected, for extended periods during the most recent maximal expansion of African forests.”

So although chimpanzees were separated into different subspecies in their distant past, prior to the rise of recent anthropogenic disturbances, the proposed subspecies-specific geographic barriers were permeable to chimpanzee dispersal. Paolo Gratton, co-author of the study and researcher at the Università di Roma “Tor Vergata” adds: “It is widely thought that chimpanzees persisted in forest refugia during glacial periods, which has likely been responsible for isolating groups of populations which we now recognize as subspecies. Our results from fast-evolving microsatellite DNA markers however indicate that genetic connectivity in the most recent millennia mainly mirrors geographic distance and local factors, masking the older subspecies subdivisions.”

Furthermore, “these results suggest that the great behavioural diversity observed in chimpanzees are therefore not due to local genetic adaptation but that they rely on behavioural flexibility, much like humans, to respond to changes in their environment,” notes Hjalmar Kuehl, co-director of the PanAf and researcher at the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research.

The team also observed signals of reductions in diversity at some sites that appeared to be associated with recent anthropogenic pressures. In fact, at some locations PanAf teams visited no, or few, chimpanzees were detected despite recordings of their presence within the last decades. “Although not unforeseen, we were disheartened to already find the influence of human impacts at some field sites where genetic diversity was markedly lower than what we expected,” says Jack Lester.

These results highlight the importance of genetic connectivity for chimpanzees in their recent history. “Every effort should be made to re-establish and maintain dispersal corridors across their range, with perhaps special attention to trans-national protected areas,” notes Christophe Boesch, co-director of the PanAf and director of the Wild Chimpanzee Foundation. Chimpanzees are known to be adaptable to human disturbance and can survive in human-modified landscapes, however, habitat loss, zoonotic diseases, bushmeat and pet trades are all threats to chimpanzee survival. These results warn of future critical impacts on their genetic health and viability if habitat fragmentation and isolation continue unabated.

As the chimpanzees were not habituated to human presence, scat samples were used as sources of DNA for the study. Here a chimpanzee from one of the study areas is recorded by a PanAf camera trap. At the Chimp&See citizen science project, all PanAf videos can be viewed and annotated.

Citation:

Lester JD, Vigilant L, Gratton P, McCarthy MS, Barratt CD, Dieguez P, Agbor A, Álvarez-Varona P, Angedakin S, Ayimisin EA, Bailey E, Bessone M, Brazzola G, Chancellor R, Cohen H, Danquah E, Deschner T, Egbe VE, Eno-Nku M, Goedmakers A, Granjon AC, Head J, Hedwig D, Hernandez-Aguilar RA, Jeffery KJ, Jones S, Junker J, Kadam P, Kaiser M, Kalan AK, Kehoe L, Kienast I, Langergraber KE, Lapuente J, Laudisoit A, Lee K, Marrocoli S, Mihindou V, Morgan D, Muhanguzi G, Neil E, Nicholl S, Orbell C, Ormsby LJ, Pacheco L, Piel A, Robbins MM, Rundus A, Sanz C, Sciaky L, Siaka AM, Städele V, Stewart F, Tagg N, Ton E, van Schijndel J, Vyalengerera MK, Wessling EG, Willie J, Wittig RM, Yuh YG, Yurkiw K, Zuberbuehler K, Boesch C, Kühl HS, Arandjelovic M (2021) Recent genetic connectivity and clinal variation in chimpanzees. Communications Biology

First Chimp&See Paper (and new PanAf paper): Chimpanzee Identification and Social Network Construction through an Online Citizen Science Platform

Our first ChimpandSee.org paper! 

We find that citizen scientists can reliably identify chimpanzees from camera trap videos. 

McCarthy MS, Stephens C, Dieguez P, Samuni L, Després-Einspenner ML, Harder B, Landsmann A, Lynn LK, Maldonado N, Ročkaiová Z, Widness J, Wittig RM, Boesch C, Kühl HS, Arandjelovic M (2020) Chimpanzee Identification and Social Network Construction through an Online Citizen Science Platform. Ecology and Evolution doi : 10.1002/ece3.7128

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/ece3.7128

Video abstract:

Abstract:

Citizen science has grown rapidly in popularity in recent years due to its potential to educate and engage the public while providing a means to address a myriad of scientific questions. However, the rise in popularity of citizen science has also been accompanied by concerns about the quality of data emerging from citizen science research projects. We assessed data quality in the online citizen scientist platform Chimp&See, which hosts camera trap videos of chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and other species across Equatorial Africa. In particular, we compared detection and identification of individual chimpanzees by citizen scientists with that of experts with years of experience studying those chimpanzees. We found that citizen scientists typically detected the same number of individual chimpanzees as experts, but assigned far fewer identifications (IDs) to those individuals. Those IDs assigned, however, were nearly always in agreement with the IDs provided by experts. We applied the data sets of citizen scientists and experts by constructing social networks from each. We found that both social networks were relatively robust and shared a similar structure, as well as having positively correlated individual network positions. Our findings demonstrate that, although citizen scientists produced a smaller data set based on fewer confirmed IDs, the data strongly reflect expert classifications and can be used for meaningful assessments of group structure and dynamics. This approach expands opportunities for social research and conservation monitoring in great apes and many other individually identifiable species.

Visit us at ChimpandSee.org and participate in citizen science!

 

New PanAf paper: Chimpanzees show greater behavioural and cultural diversity in more variable environments

An international team of researchers led by Ammie Kalan and Hjalmar Kühl of the Pan African Programme: the Cultured Chimpanzee (PanAf) at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology compiled a data set combining fieldwork conducted by the PanAf at 46 field sites, plus an in-depth literature search on chimpanzee research. For 144 chimpanzee social groups they investigated the long-standing question of under which environmental conditions chimpanzees acquire more behavioural traits. They used their unique dataset to test whether chimpanzee groups were more likely to possess a larger set of behaviours if they lived in more seasonal habitats or habitats where forest cover repeatedly changed over the last thousands of years. The behaviours largely included tool use and more than half have been described as cultural in previous studies.

Press Release HERE

Original Paper HERE

citation:

Kalan AK, Kulik L, Arandjelovic M, Boesch C, Haas F, Dieguez P, Barratt CD, Abwe EE, Agbor A, Angedakin S, Aubert F, Ayimisin EA, Bailey E, Bessone M, Brazzola G, Buh VE, Chancellor R, Cohen H, Coupland C, Curran B, Danquah E, Deschner T, Dowd D, Eno-Nku M, Fay JM, Goedmakers A, Granjon AC, Head J, Hedwig D, Hermans V, Jeffery KJ, Jones S, Junker J, Kadam P, Kambi M, Kienast I, Kujirakwinja D, Langergraber KE, Lapuente J, Larson B, Lee KC, Leinert V, Llana M, Marrocoli S, Meier AC, Morgan B, Morgan D, Neil E, Nicholl S, Normand E, Ormsby LJ, Pacheco L, Piel A, Preece J, Robbins MM, Rundus A, Sanz C, Sommer V, Stewart F, Tagg N, Tennie C, Vergnes V, Welsh A, Wessling EG, Willie J, Wittig RM, Yuh YG, Zuberbuehler K, Kühl HS (2020) Environmental variability supports chimpanzee behavioural diversity. Nature Communications 11 (4451) doi: 0.1038/s41467-020-18176-3

Rainforest Redux virtual seminar series with Dr. Ammie Kalan

On Wednesday, June 24th 2020, Chimp&See science moderator Dr. Ammie Kalan gives an online talk about Chimpanzee diversity across their range and her research within the PanAf (which Chimp&See is a part of) at the Max Planck Institute for Science of Human History (MPI-SHH) in their Pan-African Evolution Research Group Monthly Virtual Seminars.

You can listen online via zoom. You need to register (please be aware that it is a two-step registration process) via e-mail: pan-ev.seminars@shh.mpg.de.

It’s at 5 p.m. CEST

Here a link to the flyer: https://www.shh.mpg.de/1738610/rainforest-redux-2020.pdf

Update (2020/06/29)

If you missed this talk by Ammie Kalan, there is a second chance to listen to her on Tuesday, June 30th, also at 5 p.m. CEST, on youtube. There will be a livestreaming at the Primate Conversations Seminar Series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sGVAaXo0nw.

No registration needed. Just tune in!

A Pan-African Perspective: Chimpanzee Behavioural Diversity across their Range

The Pan African Programme: the Cultured Chimpanzee ('PanAf') began in 2010 and has used a standardized protocol for collecting data on wild chimpanzees at more than 40 sites across equatorial Africa. All chimpanzee communities studied to date were unhabituated to researchers at the time of data collection therefore remote camera-trap devices were the primary method for recording behavioural observations. Using such an approach, the PanAf has identified new behavioural variants in wild chimpanzees and has recently described unprecedented cultural complexity in community-specific termite fishing techniques. By combining PanAf data with what we already know about chimpanzees, we also demonstrated that just as wild populations are declining, both behavioural and cultural diversity are similarly threatened across their range due to increasing anthropogenic disturbance. Combined, this research highlights the need for widespread conservation efforts to encompass a variety of wild populations if we are to ever know the true extent of chimpanzee cultural diversity.

The talk will be available later at the same URL in case you can't make it to the livestream.

Update (2020/07/04)

New PanAf paper: Chimpanzee Ethnography Reveals Unexpected Cultural Diversity

How complex are chimpanzee cultures?
Chimpanzee groups each have their own unique termite fishing cultures

The transmission of cultures from generation-to-generation is only found in a few species besides humans. Chimpanzees are one such species and exhibit a large diversity of cultural and tool use behaviours. Although these behaviours have been well documented at a handful of long term research sites, the true cultural repertoire of chimpanzees across populations is still poorly understood. To better understand this diversity, researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, initiated the ‘Pan African Programme: The Cultured Chimpanzee’ (PanAf) in 2010. Using a standardized protocol, researchers set up camera traps, collected samples and recorded ecological data at over 40 temporary and long-term research sites across Africa.

Prior to this study, termite fishing was thought to occur in only two forms with one or multiple tools, from either above-ground or underground termite nests. By carefully observing the techniques required to termite fish at 10 different sites, lead author Christophe Boesch created a catalogue of behaviours (or ethogram) for each chimpanzee in the study.

What was found was 38 different technical elements making up the various termite fishing techniques, all of which were combined in different ways in each of the chimpanzee communities. In addition, individuals in the same community shared more of the termite fishing technical elements, and unique combinations of the technical elements, when compared to chimpanzees from other groups. 

“The diversity of techniques seen in chimpanzee termite fishing was a huge surprise to me. Not only does each community have a very unique way of fishing, they also combine a number of different elements into specific termite fishing etiquettes” explains Dr. Christophe Boesch “the most striking examples of this are how the Wonga Wongue chimpanzees of Gabon usually lie down on their sides to termite fish, while the Korup chimpanzees in Cameroon lean on their elbows, and the ones from Goualougo in the Republic of Congo sit while fishing”.

Wonga Wongue, Gabon

Korup, Cameroon

Goualougo, R-Congo

Because the communities of chimpanzees live in similar habitats with access to the same resources, ecological differences could mostly be ruled out to explain the observed differences. “This supports the idea that chimpanzees are capable of imitating social techniques in ‘how to termite fish’ which goes beyond alternative explanations such as each individual reinventing termite fishing each time they learn it” explained co-author Ammie Kalan.

Much like in human etiquette, not everything is about increased efficiency but rather about conforming to what the rest of the group is doing. In humans, this is observed in the different chopstick cultures across Asia. “For example, in Thailand and Japan not only are chopsticks somehow shaped differently, but the way they hold them differ as well, and this is very reminiscent of what we see here with chimpanzees. In La Belgique in Cameroon, chimpanzees fashion their stick by opening the fibers to obtain a long brush and then rest the termite-covered stick on their wrist while they eat. On the other hand, at another site in Cameroon called Korup, the chimpanzees do not make a brush at all and use their mouth to shake the inserted stick while it is in the mound”, explains Christophe Boesch.

La Belgique, Cameroon

In humans, cultural variation has been documented in hundreds of different populations which is one explanation for why chimpanzee culture seems so limited in comparison. “What we knew before about chimpanzees came from at most 15 communities” noted co-author Hjalmar Kuehl,  “through the PanAf we have been able to study many more communities and by this we are able to learn more about the richness of chimpanzee diversity and culture and could demonstrate that there is so much more to discover out there.”

Further analyses of videos and other data collected from the PanAf are currently underway. “Termite fishing and other cultural behaviours of wild chimpanzees can be observed first hand by signing onto our citizen science platform Chimp&See”, says co-author Mimi Arandjelovic. At Chimp&See citizen scientists can watch the over 1 million video clips the PanAf has recorded from all across Africa of chimpanzees, gorillas, elephants, buffalo, leopards and many more species. Visit www.chimpandsee.org and you could be a citizen scientist contributing to analyzing data and help with further discoveries in the wild!

citation:
Boesch C, Kalan AK, Mundry R, Arandjelovic M, Pika S, Dieguez P, Ayimisin EA, Barciela A, Coupland C, Egbe VE, Eno-Nku M, Fay JM, Fine D, Hernandez-Aguilar RA, Hermans V, Kadam P, Kambi M, Llana M, Maretti G, Morgan D, Murai M, Neil E, Nicholl S, Ormsby LJ, Orume R, Pacheco L, Piel A, Sanz C, Sciaky L, Stewart FA, Tagg N, Wessling EG, Willie J, Kühl HS (2020) Chimpanzee Ethnography Reveals Unexpected Cultural Diversity. Nature Human Behaviour doi: 10.1038/s41562-020-0890-1
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-020-0890-1

• Press release in English
• Pressemitteilung auf Deutsch

Commentary: Chimpanzee termite fishing etiquette

A fantastic commentary on our new paper by Dr. Kathelijne Koops:  Chimpanzee termite fishing etiquette

Summary:
Human culture is unique. Or is it? A new study reveals unexpected cultural diversity in the fine-grained details of chimpanzee termite fishing behaviour. These novel findings shed light on the richness of chimpanzee cultural diversity and reveal a narrower gap between the cultures of humans and other apes

original citation
Boesch C, Kalan AK, Mundry R, Arandjelovic M, Pika S, Dieguez P, Ayimisin EA, Barciela A, Coupland C, Egbe VE, Eno-Nku M, Fay JM, Fine D, Hernandez-Aguilar RA, Hermans V, Kadam P, Kambi M, Llana M, Maretti G, Morgan D, Murai M, Neil E, Nicholl S, Ormsby LJ, Orume R, Pacheco L, Piel A, Sanz C, Sciaky L, Stewart FA, Tagg N, Wessling EG, Willie J, Kühl HS (2020) Chimpanzee Ethnography Reveals Unexpected Cultural Diversity. Nature Human Behaviour doi: 10.1038/s41562-020-0890-1
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-020-0890-1

Prof Dr Christophe Boesch talks about chimp culture, the PanAf and citizen science

Inclusive chimpanzee conservation

"Thanks to a pair of great primatologists we had the chance to highlight chimpanzee conservation in a recent letter published today in Science. Check out the important discussion about culture, conservation and of course chimps!" - Ammie Kalan

Read the letter and the PanAf response here: https://science.sciencemag.org/content/sci/364/6445/1040.2.full.pdf

Novelty Response of Wild African Apes to Camera Traps

Another new paper from Ammie Kalan and collaborators including data from the PanAf and Chimp& See's animal selfie's miniproject!! :) Thanks to all the citizen scientists who helped hashtag camera reaction videos !!!

Novelty Response of Wild African Apes to Camera Traps (Current Biology)

And watch some best of videos HERE

Highlights
• Bonobos and gorillas had stronger looking impulses compared to chimpanzees
• Young apes looked longest at camera traps compared to mature individuals
• Presence of a research site or conspecifics reduced the duration of looking
• Both social and environmental factors affect great ape curiosity in the wild

Abstract
Temperament and personality research in humans and nonhuman animals measures behavioral variation in individual, population, or species-specific traits with implications for survival and fitness, such as social status, foraging, and mating success. Curiosity and risk-taking tendencies have been studied extensively across taxa by measuring boldness and exploration responses to experimental novelty exposure. Here, we conduct a natural field experiment using wildlife monitoring technology to test variation in the reaction of wild great apes (43 groups of naive chimpanzees, bonobos, and western gorillas across 14 field sites in Africa) to a novel object, the camera trap. Bonobo and gorilla groups demonstrated a stronger looking impulse toward the camera trap device compared to chimpanzees, suggesting higher visual attention and curiosity. Bonobos were also more likely to show alarm and other fearful behaviors, although such neophobic (and conversely, neophilic) responses were generally rare. Among all three species, individuals looked at cameras longer when they were young, were associating with fewer individuals, and did not live near a long-term research site. Overall, these findings partially validate results from great ape novelty paradigms in captivity. We further suggest that species-typical leadership styles and social and environmental effects, including familiarity with humans, best explain novelty responses of wild great apes. In sum, this study illustrates the feasibility of large-scale field experiments and the importance of both intrinsic and extrinsic factors in shaping animal curiosity.

Press release:
Wild African ape reactions to novel camera traps

Human impact erodes chimpanzee behavioral diversity

photo: Liran Samuni

We are so super proud to announce the publication of our latest PanAf paper "Human impact erodes chimpanzee behavioral diversity" We hope it helps spur the call-to-action for conserving chimps and their behaviours across their range! 

Abstract:
Chimpanzees possess a large number of behavioral and cultural traits among non-human species. The ‘disturbance hypothesis’ predicts that human impact depletes resources and disrupts social learning processes necessary for behavioral and cultural transmission. We used an unprecedented data set of 144 chimpanzee communities, with information on 31 behaviors, to show that chimpanzees inhabiting areas with high human impact have a mean probability of occurrence reduced by 88%, across all behaviors, compared to low impact areas. This behavioral diversity loss was evident irrespective of the grouping or categorization of behaviors. Therefore, human impact may not only be associated with the loss of populations and genetic diversity, but also affects how animals behave. Our results support the view that ‘culturally significant units’ should be integrated into wildlife conservation.

Paper: 
Kühl HS, Boesch C, Kulik L, Haas F, Arandjelovic M, Dieguez P, Bocksberger G, McElreath MB, Agbor A, Angedakin S, Ayimisin EA, Bailey E, Barubiyo D, Bessone M, Brazzola G, Chancellor R, Cohen H, Coupland C, Danquah E, Deschner T, Diotoh O, Dowd D, Dunn A, Egbe VE, Eshuis H, Fernandez Rumen, Ginath Y, Goedmakers A, Granjon AC, Head J, Hedwig D, Hermans V, Imong I, Jeffery KJ, Jones S, Junker J, Kadam P, Kambere M, Kambi M, Kienast I, Kujirakwinja D, Langergraber K, Lapuente J, Larson B, Lee K, Leinert V, Llana M, Maretti G, Marrocoli S, Mbi TJ, Meier AC, Morgan B, Morgan D, Mulindahabi F, Murai M, Neil E, Niyigaba P, Ormsby LJ, Pacheco L, Piel A, Preece J, Regnaut S, Rundus A, Sanz C, van Schijndel J, Sommer V, Stewart F, Tagg N, Vendras E, Vergnes V, Welsh A, Wessling EG, Willie J, Wittig RM, Yurkiw K, Zuberbuehler K, Kalan AK (2019) Human impact erodes chimpanzee behavioral diversity. Science. doi: 10.1126/science.aau4532


Press: 

• We Are Destroying Chimpanzee Cultures (Ed Yong, The Atlantic)
• Humans are wiping out chimpanzee cultures (Gretchen Vogel, Science magazine)
• Human encroachment threatens chimpanzee culture (Sujata Gupta, Science News)
• Dr. Ammie Kalan on the BBC live!
• Chimps varied ‘culture’ matters for conservation, study says (Christina Larson, Associated Press)
• MPI Press Release English
• MPI Press Release Deutsch
• ...and more

Video Abstract:

Chimp&See will soon be paused till 2019 but chimp matching will still continue on Talk!

Hi everyone!

We have been revamping the chimp&see site to move to the new Zooniverse platform and make a lot of improvements along the way

We are working on making some of the workflows more fun, easier and more tailored to what people like to do :) and best of all, we'll be adding versions of the site in more languages!

While we go through this process we've decided to pause videos going up on chimpandsee.org [after this current set is done] but there will still be lots of discussions going on, on talk.chimpandsee.org to do chimp matching and chimp naming! Our amazing mods have been incredible in committing to finishing up all the pending chimpIDs so we can move forward with a clean slate and no more back log!

We will need your opinions on chimp matching and look forward to having you around Talk during the main platform pause!

New to chimp matching? check out this awesome how to video and then get started here: https://talk.chimpandsee.org/#/boards/BCP0000007/discussions/DCP00002pu

and check out this amazing chimp identification guide and quiz from BBCOne:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/1XYlD34lc2hhVtgK2rWZnNc/chimp-id-guide

and if chimp matching isn't your thing - we hope to see you back in January for a big new set of videos to annotate!

Thank you so much for your contribution so far and looking forward to working together with you in the future!

Pant hoots to you all!

~The PanAf and ChimpandSee team

New paper: An assessment of the efficacy of camera traps for studying demographic composition and variation in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes)

New seminal paper from the PanAf's Maureen McCarthy and colleagues at the Tai Chimpanzee Project

An assessment of the efficacy of camera traps for studying demographic composition and variation in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes)

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/ajp.22904

Abstract
Demographic factors can strongly influence patterns of behavioral variation in animal societies. Traditionally, these factors are measured using longitudinal observation of habituated social groups, particularly in social animals like primates. Alternatively, noninvasive biomonitoring methods such as camera trapping can allow researchers to assess species occupancy, estimate population abundance, and study rare behaviors. However, measures of fine‐scale demographic variation, such as those related to age and sex structure or subgrouping patterns, pose a greater challenge. Here, we compare demographic data collected from a community of habituated chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus) in the Taï Forest using two methods: camera trap videos and observational data from long‐term records. By matching data on party size, seasonal variation in party size, measures of demographic composition, and changes over the study period from both sources, we compared the accuracy of camera trap records and long‐term data to assess whether camera trap data could be used to assess such variables in populations of unhabituated chimpanzees. When compared to observational data, camera trap data tended to underestimate measures of party size, but revealed similar patterns of seasonal variation as well as similar community demographic composition (age/sex proportions) and dynamics (particularly emigration and deaths) during the study period. Our findings highlight the potential and limitations of camera trap surveys for estimating fine‐scale demographic composition and variation in primates. Continuing development of field and statistical methods will further improve the usability of camera traps for demographic studies.

Chimp&See on German TV mdr

A big Dankeschoen to German TV station MDR - Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk who did a segment on Chimp&See this week!

Features some really nice video from chimpandsee.org and the chimp matching tutorial our mod Kristeena made!

You can check out the video here: https://www.mdr.de/wissen/video-218832.html

Don't forget to tag all your favourite videos with #dailyzoo and check out the chimp matching tutorial here if you need a refresher: https://youtu.be/PZHb3yPGKm0

New publication using Chimp&See data investigates nocturnal activity in wild chimpanzees

The Pan African Programme: The Cultured Chimpanzee (PanAf) in collaboration with Dr. Nikki Tagg Nama (PGS Cameroon, Royal Zoological Society of Antwerp) have just published a research paper investigating the nocturnal activities of wild chimpanzees. Using data from camera trap videos annotated on Chimp&See and from the PanAf collection, the researchers have been interested in the influence of different environmental factors that could lead to more nighttime activities of chimpanzees and possibly disturb their sleeping patterns.

Chimpanzees are rarely active at night after building their nests. So, it was a surprise for me and other volunteers at Chimp&See to see them on our camera trap videos at almost all sites at least occasionally walking in the darkness. We decided to tag and collect those videos. While only a tiny fraction of videos at Chimp&See show what we call the “nightchimps”, it is an interesting phenomenon and leads to questions about what general or site-specific environmental circumstances might cause more or less nocturnal activities.
After starting and curating the Chimp&See “nightchimps” collection, we got the chance to join the project to get a different perspective on the science part and support the science team beyond our regular Chimp&See moderators’ tasks.

Using the nighttime video clips identified and tagged by our volunteers and video material from other PanAf research sites, as well as associated data from environmental surveys of these sites, this study provides a first comprehensive analysis of nocturnal chimpanzee activity in the wild spanning their range and all four subspecies. The study shows that chimpanzees indeed are active at night on the terrestrial camera trap videos at almost all sites (18 out of 22 in the study), but only infrequently, making it a rare behavior still. From all observed chimpanzee activity in the videos only 1.8% occurred at night, but this amount differed from site to site considerably, from 0 videos to more than 8% of all observed chimpanzee activity at one site. The video material shows chimpanzees mostly traveling during these times, but also some social activities and feeding.

The researchers then tested whether different environmental factors like percentage of mature forest at a given site, the abundance of predators (lions, leopards, and hyenas), the abundance of other large mammals (buffalos and elephants), average daily temperature, rainfall, observed human activity, and the percentage of moon illumination on a given night affect the probability of observing chimpanzee nocturnal activity. Only three of these factors showed an effect on increased night activity: lower levels of human activity, more forest coverage of the site, and higher day temperatures – as we’ve seen at the Chimp&See site “Dry Lake” during the dry season.

As data was collected exclusively via camera trap videos, the authors speculate that these initial data might underestimate the amount of nocturnal activity. When more camera trap videos become available in the future – including at Chimp&See – they hope to find more evidence for nocturnal behaviors and its relevance for conservation and also human evolution.

This study demonstrates the unique advantage of using camera traps to find and investigate new and rare behaviors in chimpanzees and other animals, here especially those occurring at night. While it is possible to watch chimpanzees by staying at the nesting site all night, this can only be done at one of the few sites with habituated chimpanzees and a dedicated nocturnal field team. Moreover, the huge collaborative effort of the PanAf program provides the first opportunity to compare sites, environmental factors, and different populations to learn more about the evolutionary drivers of chimpanzee behavior.

• Watch the Chimp&See “nightchimps” collection here.
• More information about the Pan African Programme: The Cultured Chimpanzee and its mission.
• Original publication: Tagg, N. et al.  “Nocturnal activity in wild chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes): Evidence for flexible sleeping patterns and insights into human evolution” American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 166(3), 510-529.

If you want to join Chimp&See helping us to find more exciting chimpanzee videos and, for instance, contribute to the leopard mini-project please visit www.chimpandsee.org!

Chimp&See at the Citizen Science awards in Vienna!

PanAf co-director Dr. Hjalmar Kuehl presenting Chimp&See at the Citizen Science awards in Vienna!

For more information visit: https://www.meine-technik.at/verleihung-der-citizen-science-awards-am-21-november-2017/

via the Zentrum fuer Citizen Science facebook page