The use of stick- or probe-tools is a chimpanzee universal, recorded in all long-term study populations across Africa, except one: Budongo, Uganda. Here, after 25 years of observation, stick-tool use remains absent under both natural circumstances and strong experimental scaffolding. Instead, the chimpanzees employ a rich repertoire of leaf-tools for a variety of dietary and hygiene tasks. One use of stick-tools in other communities is in feeding on the aggressive Dorylus ‘army ant’ species, consumed by chimpanzees at all long-term study sites outside of mid-Western Uganda. Here we report the first observation of army-ant feeding in Budongo, in which individuals from the Waibira chimpanzee community employed detached leaves to feed on a ground swarm. We describe the behaviour and discuss whether or not it can be considered tool use, together with its implication for the absence of stick-tool ‘culture’ in Budongo chimpanzees.
CITATION STYLE
Mugisha, S., Zuberbühler, K., & Hobaiter, C. (2016). First observation of Dorylus ant feeding in Budongo chimpanzees supports absence of stick-tool culture. Primates, 57(3), 389–394. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10329-016-0533-3
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