Chimpanpee

Tuesday, 15th July. Semliki Time: 08:42pm

A long day today, but none-the-less, a good one. We caught up with the chimps at around 9am. They were in the same spot that they’d been in yesterday, happily rolling about in the trees. Mzee, our friend from yesterday, was there, as well as an old, grey, wizened looking chimp called “Buzz” and a young, hungry chimp named Fuller. Buzz was quite sincerely startled by our arrival and, after some hooting, hid himself in the top branch of a coula tree and gazed at us suspiciously through the leaves. Mzee was less timid and obviously didn’t care. Fuller was less timid still. A young male, he spent most of the morning climbing over our heads and searching for saba, splashing water down as he did. While I lay back admiring his young, energetic, chimpish form, he passed right overhead. The usual dripping of water came off the leaves as he rustled past and some of it landed on my notebook. I looked at it. It was yellow. The dripping became a shower and before I had time to react, I was soaked in chimpanzee pee. As I dived out of the way, a brown lump landed where my head has been and sat there, steaming ominously. My admiration for the fullhardy Fuller waned somewhat.

Fuller, locked, loaded and full of Saba-fruit, picks his next victim

(Photo courtesy of Alex and her zoom lense)

With the exception of my hot shower, the rest of the morning continued with the chimps rustling around overhead, eating saba fruit, resting and occasionally defecating. This was done by all with the exception of Buzz, who sat at the top of his tree, gazing at us with fearful eyes and not eating a shred. I fear we may have been starving the poor creature. Just as all this eating was starting to get monotonous and I was starting to wonder whether chimpanzees actually ever ate bark at all, Edson grasped my shoulder and pointed. Fuller sat, at the top of the coula tree, tearing long strips of bark with his teeth. He then took the bark strip, tore out the vascular cambium and stuck the whole lot into his mouth. Jumping out of the coula tree, I yelled for Alex, who turned her high-mag binoculars on him and described his behaviour. He rubbed the bark around the front of his mouth before spitting it out and picking pieces of bark and saba fruit from between his teeth. He then filled his mouth with leaves which he chewed for a while and ejected. Having had enough of this, he scratched his bottom, turned away and began to eat again.

No sooner had my excitement worn off, Buzz wandered down from his seat to the patch of freshly stripped bark. He, too, stripped some bark in his teeth and ate the vascular cambium, chewing it for a minute before spitting it out. Next and even more interestingly, he ran his hands down the side of the wound in the tree and licked the sap from his fingers.

Sadly, after this, the chimps spent the rest of the day eating, resting and relieving themselves. Buzz, after bark stripping, returned to his perch and cowered. Seven hours of constant observation on top of two hours of trekking is demanding work and, while I certainly hope we see the chimps again tomorrow, something in me wouldn’t mind if they left us a little earlier next time. After eating lots of bark. Of course.