ALL WILD PRIMATES HUNT AND EAT FAUNA

[PaleoPhil]

I've recently collected a lot of fascinating stuff on primate hunting and meat eating, so I've created this thread as a repository so I can find it again later and refer people to it, as well as encourage others to contribute additional examples of hunting and meat eating by nonhuman primates. Some of the bits here are from past posts, but I've also added fascinating new stuff I found. I've divided it into sections so it's easier to reply to a specific section, if anyone wishes to.

There are many misconceptions about wild nonhuman primates, such as that they are all vegetarians or fruitarians, or that none of them are carnivorous, or that they don't hunt, or that none of them ever get cavities. I hope these posts help to clear up these misconceptions.

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In the wild, hunting is the practice of seeking out living wild animals for food. Fishing for fish or insects like termites is also a form of hunting. All primates consciously and determinedly seek out some fauna, ranging from gorillas that eat insects, grubs and other small animals, to tarsiers which eat only fauna.

"Tarsiers are totally faunivorous; they eat insects, arachnids, and small vertebrates such as snakes and lizards." --John G. Fleagle, Primate Adaptation and Evolution, Academic Press; 2nd edition (September 25, 1998), p. 120 (see also Duane E. Ullrey, Nutrient Requirements: Carnivores, Encyclopedia of Animal Science, and The Philippine Tarsier)

During the Paleolithic era, homo sapiens and other hominids were specialists in hunting and scavenging megafauna (large mammals like aurochs, mammoths, mastodons, bison, etc.). It is believed this niche became particularly open for hominids in Europe when the numbers of giant hyenas (which could crack open bones for marrow and skulls for brains--including Homo erectus skulls) and giant cats declined dramatically around 500Kyr BP (see The Paleolithic Societies of Europe by Clive Gamble).

Many vegetarians are finally admitting that chimps, and indeed all primates, eat some nonplant foods, but they argue that meats form a small part of their overall diet. This ignores such inconvenient facts as that Colobus monkeys are the FAVORITE food of the chimpanzees who hunt them. The rarity of animal meat and fat in their diet makes it more enjoyable--a treasured treat that generates an orgy of excitement among both male and female chimps in the following video:

Chimps hunting a monkey
To see the video, add the following video ID to the YouTube URL: watch?v=WDFh5JdYh7I

As the narrator explains, group hunting and sharing of the spoils likely played a large role in what made us human. In other words, without hunting and meat eating, the human race would never have developed.

It's quite a marvel to see the ingenious hunting tactics that chimps use in acquiring their favorite prey:

Chimpanzees team up to attack a monkey in the wild - BBC wildlife
To see the video, add the following video ID to the YouTube URL: watch?v=A1WBs74W4ik&feature=fvw

Given all the evidence that in recent years has been pouring in, it requires a willing suspension of disbelief to cling to vegetarian dogma.

[PaleoPhil]

CHIMP CHOOSES MEAT OVER MOM

Notice how dull and lackluster the chimps are when it comes to fruit, even when used to garner sex--ho hum:

Male Chimps steal fruit to solict females for sex
To see the video, add the following video ID to the YouTube URL: watch?v=IacW49c6Kvs

Here is another chimp eating fruit--once again, ho hum:

Goualougo Chimpanzee Eating Fruit
To see the video, add the following video ID to the YouTube URL: watch?v=WZXkNbXpfmk

Contrast this with the ecstatic excitement that the hunt and just the anticipation of meat generates. In this case the alpha male hunter keeps the spoils of the hunt for himself, despite his sickly mother's begging for some nutritious fresh meat:

Chimps vs red Colobus monkeys - BBC wildlife
To see the video, add the following video ID to the YouTube URL: watch?v=1bLhv-aQ5YY&feature=SeriesPlayList&p=5FFBECF1DACF7017

Remarkable. The desire for meat among chimps is so strong that it can cause a chimp to choose meat over his own mother. 

Once you see the bloodlust of chimps for meat, you never forget it, and you know viscerally that flesh is the favorite food by far of wild chimps. Clearly, if Colobus monkeys didn't move their groups about and defend themselves viciously, chimps would eat meat every day.

[PaleoPhil]

THE IMPORTANCE OF MEAT IN PRIMATE DIETS

Vegetarians make the mistake of assuming that the rarity of meats in nonhuman primate diets equates with unimportance. In fact, scientists are increasingly finding the opposite--that meats (especially the fat that comes with it) are crucially important in nonhuman primate diets.

Female chimps love meat so much that they will give sexual favors in return for some of the spoils of the hunt and will mate more frequently with males who give meat gifts than those who give fruit. This impacts fertility rates and whose genes get passed on. Plus, flesh is dense in vital, bioavailable nutrients like proteins and fats.

What’s amazing is that if a male shares with a particular female, he doubles the number of times he copulates with her, which is likely to increase the probability of fertilizing that female. ...

Meat is important for the animals' diet because it is so high in protein [and fat]. ...

Dr Gomes thinks that her findings could even provide clues about human evolution.

She suggests this study could lay the foundations for human studies exploring the link between "good hunting skills and reproductive success". (From: "Chimpanzees exchange meat for sex")

[PaleoPhil]

WILD PRIMATES GET CAVITIES FROM TOO MUCH FRUIT

When primates come close to eating a diet that a fruitarian would approve of, they suffer the consequences of caries and gum disease. Doesn't look like we should be emulating heavy-fruit-eating chimps. A zero carb Paleo diet can actually remineralize cavities.

From "Tooth Decay in Chimps," in Wild Health By Cindy Engel:

"Kenneth Glander, director of primate research at Duke Primate Center, studied the teeth of more than 950 mantled howler monkeys in South America and found a complete absence of cavities and gum disease. These monkeys not only have a low-sugar diet, they also eat a great quantity of cashew pedicels (Anacardium occidentale)-which contain the phenolic compounds anacardic acid and cardol that are active against tooth-decay bacteria. This diet of low sugar and high phenols may be helping to protect the monkeys against tooth decay. Phenols such as tannins are common in many plants, and are known to inhibit the growth of Streptococcus mutans, a main protagonist in tooth decay.

Chimpanzees, which eat far more sugary fruit than howler monkeys, suffer from both tooth decay and gum disease. To cope with this ailment, they chew on antibacterial barks-which local people use to keep teeth healthy-and inspect and clean each other's teeth. In captivity, one chimpanzee was even seen to pry out the bad teeth of another by means of a simple wooden lever she had made."

(See also Dental pathologies in ten free-ranging chimpanzees from Gombe National Park, Tanzania and EPIDEMIOLOGY OF DENTAL DISEASE)

[PaleoPhil]

DO ALL MAMMALS EAT A HIGH FAT DIET IN THE WILD?

Not only does too much fruit cause tooth decay in chimps, Barry Groves of the WAPF camp (who I disagree with about dairy and cooking, but agree on animal fat) suggests that, when one takes into account the fat-producing capabilities of bacteria in herbivores, the natural diet of all mammals in the wild is actually high in fat and low in carbs.

Should all animals eat a high-fat, low-carb diet?
Barry Groves, PhD
Second Opinions: Exposing dietary misinformation
http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/should-all-animals-eat-a-high-fat-low-carb-diet.html

[goodsamaritan]

Very nice link.
One of Barry's best articles.

All his arguments sound convincing to me except this part:

We have little caecum to speak of and, while we do have fermentative bacteria in our colons, their products are only poorly absorbed into our bodies if at all. Those facts put us clearly into the carnivore class of animals.

My opinion is that humans do have fermentive bacteria and their products of digestion are absorbed well enough... until you get your next animal meat meal.  This is a vital survival trait of the human species which makes us true omnivores.

Yes humans thrive on higher meat consumptions, but it is vital that humans are able to eat other natural foods because the cycle of living means there are good times and bad times, times of plentiful animal food and times of less animal food... we are survivors.

[PaleoPhil]

Yes, Goodsamaritan, I do wish he had given a specific reference re: the fermentative bacteria. If you have one I would be interested to read it.

I agree with your basic point that early humans had to rely on plant foods during times of meat scarcity. I think even Groves would agree with that.

Keep in mind that Groves is connected with the WAPF, which I believe is funded in part by cattle and dairy farmers, so he is going to tend to talk mainly about stuff that will support eating meat and dairy. However, his analysis of mammalian diets AFTER bacterial processing is a useful approach. Since humans are not gifted with the same levels and quantities of bacteria as ruminants and other herbivores (which even honest vegans must surely admit), it is instructive to compare the diets of mammals AFTER their bacteria have processed them. If Groves is right and they all come out as low-carb, high-fat, it could help explain why so many people (such as I) do better on low carb diets.

[goodsamaritan]

I'm doing really well on high fat low carb myself!

[PaleoPhil]

Good to hear Goodsamaritan! I was quite surprised myself when I first discovered that I do worse on even small amounts of carbs. Quite unexpected. I used to think that a plant-heavy diet like that of the !Kung San would be fine for me, though I knew that they ate more meat in the past when game was less scarce. Now I find that I fare much better on an Inuit/Lakota-type carnivorous diet. That doesn't necessarily mean I'll do best on a 100% meat/fat/organ obligate carnivore diet in the longer run, and I'm hoping I'll be able to add berries and a few other plant foods back in some time in the future without ill effects. It will be an adventure and I'm curious to see how it will turn out.

Here's more evidence supporting the thread title:

Chimpanzee Hunting Behavior and Human Evolution

Chimpanzees are efficient predators that use meat as a political and reproductive tool. Are there implications for the evolution of human behavior?

by Craig B. Stanford
May-June 1995
American Scientist
http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/pub/chimpanzee-hunting-behavior-and-human-evolution/2
With images: http://www.unl.edu/rhames/chimphunt/chimphunt.html

"In the early 1960s, when the British primatologist Jane Goodall first observed wild chimpanzees hunting and eating meat in Gombe National Park, Tanzania, it was widely believed that these animals were strict vegetarians. Skeptics suggested that the diet of the Gombe chimpanzees was aberrant. Others suggested that the quantity of meat the chimpanzees ate was trivial. After more than 30 years of research, however, it is now clear that meat is a natural part of the chimpanzees' diet. Indeed, hunting has been observed at most of the other sites where chimpanzees are studied across central Africa. And, it turns out, a chimpanzee community may eat several hundred kilograms of meat in a single year."

[TylerDurden]

I hope there's no suggestion in this thread that chimps and other primates eat meat as a staple of their diet. Sources online give only a 3% figure of meat in the chimp diet, though if one adds insects that(I think) gives a usually quoted figure of animal-food-intake being as much as 7%. Of course, gorillas would have only insects as food so have an even lower percentage of animal food in the diet.

All in all, no animal can be said to be a perfect herbivore or carnivore, anyway as even herbivores eat insects accidentally when chewing on grass every day, and, similiarly, carnivores must also eat grass or herbs or seeds by accident when gorging on carcasses(or eating the fermented stomach contents of herbivores)

[TylerDurden]

The trouble with barry groves' rather fanatical stance is that fruit isn't unhealthy for chimps, overall, and any caries issues are dealt with, seemingly, via use of bark. In some ways, Barry Groves does seem very much like a carnivorous equivalent of those militant vegans who deliberately force their pets to go vegan as well even if their pets are generally carnivorous by nature(a frightening example being Heather Mills, the ex of Paul McCartney). In short, fruit isn't unnatural for chimps, and, technically speaking, we are the freaks among the primates, because of our vastly increased intake of animal food.

[PaleoPhil]

Maybe I misread it, but I don't think Groves was saying that chimps shouldn't eat fruits--he was saying that the bacteria in their guts convert much of the fruit fiber into fats, so that the result of their diet is a high intake of fats.

[goodsamaritan]

Maybe I misread it, but I don't think Groves was saying that chimps shouldn't eat fruits--he was saying that the bacteria in their guts convert much of the fruit fiber into fats, so that the result of their diet is a high intake of fats.

That's how I understand Dr. Barry Groves' article too.  He theorizes that the end result of herbivorous animal digestions is to supply a high fat low carb.

I didn't catch that thing with the chimps though.

[PaleoPhil]

Thanks for that confirmation on the gist of the article, Goodsamaritan. You're quite helpful, as usual.

Tyler, could you choose a specific passage from Groves' piece or one of my posts to ask questions about or comment on? I think that will improve the dialogue.

Thanks,
Phil

[PaleoPhil]

Orangutans eating slow loris(Warning: some may consider the video "graphic.")

Orangutan loris capture and meat-eating
by John Hawks
http://johnhawks.net/weblog/reviews/behavior/orangutans/orang-hunting-hardus-2012.html

Synopsis:
A discussion of early hominin meat-eating emerges from observations of orangutan hunting
Madeleine Hardus and colleagues [1]  describe long-term observations of hunting by Sumatran orangutans.
The paper is straightforward in its description of the hunting observations: They hunt slow lorises, the practice is rare, it occurs at times when their other preferred foods are scarce, some individuals hunt but most don't, and food sharing among individuals other than mother-infant pairs wasn't observed. This isn't the first time hunting has been reported by wild orangutans, what it does is report a longer-term observation of one hunting female, tying this case to earlier observations. ....

[Projectile Vomit]

Very cute. Mommy & baby chewing on opposite ends of the same carcass!

[PaleoPhil]

Ah yes, reminds me of home.