![]() ![]() When her breathing became erratic and labored, the head keeper decided to leave her alone with the other chimps. Three other adults - including Pansy’s 20-year-old daughter, Rosie - began grooming her, making nests for her and sleeping near her.Īs the days wore on, Pansy clearly was dying. The move indoors apparently was too much for her. In November 2008, Pansy became increasingly lethargic. Chimps in the park summer on an island and then are moved to heated indoor quarters for the winters. It tells the story of Pansy, a chimp of about 50 years old who lived at Blair Drummond Safari & Adventure Park in Scotland. ![]() That leads to the second and related report in Current Biology. He died at the age of eight and a half, within one month of losing his mother.”Īs the account says, Flint’s persistent dependence on his mother was “abnormal.”Ī “normal” adult chimp’s response to the death of another adult is an elusive research subject because older chimpanzees typically die alone, Wilson said. “Soon thereafter, Flint’s immune system became too weak to keep him alive. He stopped eating and interacting with others and showed signs of clinical depression. Flint became abnormally dependent on his old mother and when Flo died in 1972, he was unable to cope without her. “When Flame died at the age of six months, Flo stopped even trying to push Flint to independence. But she looked very old when the time came to wean young Flint and she had not yet fully succeeded in weaning him when she gave birth to Flame. She was a wonderful, supportive, affectionate and playful mother to the first three. “Flo gave birth to at least five offspring: Faben, Figan, Fifi, Flint, and Flame. Here is a version of the account from the website of the Jane Goodall Institute of Canada: “Jane Goodall vividly described how when old Flo died, her orphaned son Flint was listless and despondent and died soon after.” “Orphans are, as you might imagine, deeply affected by the loss of their mother, responding much as we would expect grieving children to respond,” Wilson said. There is no question that chimp mothers and their offspring bond tightly, perhaps for similar reasons. “It’s likely a more costly mistake not to carry an ailing infant long enough (because) a sick baby might, after all, get better,” he said, “than to carry it for too long … after it’s dead or even mummified. In that context, the chimp mothers’ behavior could be seen as “adaptive,” Wilson said. That force can extend to care of the offspring at least until they are able to reproduce on their own. ![]() Reproduction is a powerful evolutionary force for survival of a species. There could be other explanations, Wilson said. Are these caring mothers expressing grief as we understand it? What remains in doubt is the question of what it means. “It’s fairly common for chimpanzees, as well as various other primates, including baboons and rhesus monkeys, to carry their infants long after they’ve died.” “I’ve spent much more of my time than I would like watching dead and dying chimpanzees, and the responses of mothers and others to them,” Wilson told MinnPost. Wilson was not part of the Oxford research team reporting these latest observations of chimp mothers. Wilson is one of several U of M scientists who have studied chimps extensively in Tanzania’s Gombe National Park, where primatologist Jane Goodall began documenting chimp behavior in the 1960s. Professor Michael Wilson of the University of Minnesota is among experts who caution us not to anthropomorphize about other species, not to project our own natures on them. Were these animals - our close evolutionary cousins - grieving in human fashion? That is the fascinating question raised by this report and one other in the same journal. A research team led by Dora Biro of Oxford University in England reports in Current Biology observing two other chimp mothers stubbornly carrying the remains of their lifeless offspring for up to 68 days - even while the bodies stank with decay and eventually mummified. She groomed the little body, cuddled it in her nests and objected to any separation from it. There is no question that chimp mothers and their offspring bond tightly.ĭetails of the study are heart wrenching: A chimpanzee called Jire carried the corpse of her infant for some 27 days after the small chimp died in the forests surrounding Bossou, Guinea.
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