Friday, February 23, 2007

Weapon yielding chimps

From the article:

Chimpanzees have been seen using spears to hunt bush babies, U.S. researchers said on Thursday in a study that demonstrates a whole new level of tool use and planning by our closest living relatives.

Perhaps even more intriguing, it was only the females who fashioned and used the wooden spears, Jill Pruetz and Paco Bertolani of Iowa State University reported.

Bertolani saw an adolescent female chimp use a spear to stab a bush baby as it slept in a tree hollow, pull it out and eat it.
Well, there you have it....proof positive that we share common ancestry with those little cuties. Dang, it must have really been a feat to grab a stick, do a little whittling and stab that bush baby.