The Chimpanzees of the Taï Forest Behavioural Ecology and Evolution

by Boesch, Christophe; Boesch-Achermann, Hedwige

• ISBN13: 9780198505075
• ISBN10: 0198505078
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-06-15
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

The chimpanzees are the closest living evolutionary relatives to our own species, Homo sapiens. As such, they have long exerted a fascination over those with an interest in human evolution, and what makes humans unique. Chrisophe Boesch and Hedwige Boesch-Acherman undertook an incredibleobservational study of a group of wild chimpanzees of the Tai forest in Cote D'Ivoire, spending some fifteen years in the West African jungle with them. This fascinating book is the result of these years of painstaking research among the chimps. Chimpanzee behaviour is documented here in all itsimpressive diversity and variety. Aggression, territoriality, social structure and relationships, reproductive strategies, hunting, tool use - each of these is given its own chapter, along with topics such as chimp intelligence, life histories, and demography. The authors take care to place theirobservations within the broader context of research in behavioural ecology, and to compare and contrast their findings with other important work on chimpanzee groups, such as that by Jane Goodall. The book concludes with a summary chapter relating the chimpanzee findings to our understanding ofhuman evolution. Combining careful scientific observation with a store of entertaining anecdotes, this is a lively and readable book. It also succeeds in shedding light on some of the central questions around the evolutionary relationships between the primates, and in particular the affinity betweenchimpanzees and humans. 'This is a major contribution to the study of the great apes, and a significant addition to debates about human/ape evolution. It has all the makings of a classic monograph.'

Table of Contents

Chimpanzees, humans, and the forest	1	(14)
Demography of the Tai chimpanzee community	15	(28)
Female life histories	43	(23)
Reproductive strategies of male chimpanzees	66	(22)
Social structure of the Tai chimpanzees	88	(21)
Social relationships within the community	109	(19)
Inter-group aggression and territoriality in Tai chimpanzees	128	(30)
Hunting behaviour in wild chimpanzees	158	(33)
Tool-use in wild chimpanzees	191	(34)
Intelligence in wild chimpanzees	225	(33)
Chimpanzee and human evolution	258	(19)
Appendix	277	(5)
References	282	(25)
Index	307