Hundreds of chimpanzees have been dying in Africa, and also gorillas and bonobos, captured by traps that human hunters install in their forests, aiming to catch them and other animals.

One of the tasks of NGOs and organizations that defend them in the continent is to disarm these traps. But it is a work that never ends.

Now this work has reinforcement. Not from humans, but from chimpanzees themselves, who have been learning, at least at Guinea Republic, on West Africa, to disarm these traps and teach other members of the group to do it. This culture developed at Guinea was observed by primatologists Gaku Ohashia and Tetsuro Matsuzawa, from Kyoto University Primates Research Institute, in Japan, who have been following a group of these primates in a forest located at Bossou.

These researchers observed in six different cases how chimpanzees handle the trap not touching the most dangerous part and were able to disarm it. The observations were reported at Primates publication and published by BBC.

Only beings with superior intelligence can understand what a trap represents, how it works and disarm it; one more proof that chimpanzees have observation and discernment abilities very similar to humans.

Dr. Pedro A. Ynterian
President, GAP Project International