Chimpanzee diet based on dentition11/7/2023 These “cheetahs of the primate world” are more likely to take off running (as I had seen them do that summer), even bypassing nearby trees. I wanted to know: How would the structure of these habitats affect the responses of vervets and patas monkeys to alarm calls that signal the approach of a terrestrial predator like a lion? Not surprisingly, when vervets are near the river, they climb the tall trees to seek refuge from such predators. But they also venture into patas habitats, the short trees with canopies that do not overlap. In contrast, vervets (Figure 6.4a) spend most of their time along rivers, with access to tall trees with overlapping canopies (Figure 6.4b) that provide good escape routes from terrestrial predators. These trees have little to no overlapping canopy, so climbing one to escape a lion in pursuit can result in a literal dead end. Patas monkeys (Figure 6.3a) live far from rivers, in habitats composed of short trees spaced far apart (Figure 6.3b). I would spend two years at that same field site collecting data on anti-predator behavior of patas monkeys and vervets, two closely related species who occupy different habitats. (We slowly backed away and got in our car.) My research interests changed in that moment: I wanted to study primate antipredator behavior, the strategies primates use to escape from predators. It did not even occur to me that they had sounded an alarm and then run away from something -until my advisor pointed to the lioness hidden in the grass at the base of a tree. Patas monkeys are, after all, the fastest primate, capable of running 20 miles per hour for short distances. I was awestruck as I watched the entire group take off at breakneck speed. One day we were following our patas study group when several females and juveniles began giving high-pitched “nyow” alarm calls. Isbell, to her field site in Laikipia, Kenya (Figure 6.2) with the intention of studying the play behavior of juvenile patas monkeys. In the summer of 1996, I went with my dissertation advisor, Dr. I have been fascinated by primates since I was a young child. Figure 6.2 Map of Kenya with Laikipia District, where the author conducted her fieldwork, highlighted. If you’ve ever seen a female monkey at your local zoo cooing over her newborn baby (Figure 6.1a) or watched a video of a tufted capuchin monkey using rocks as a hammer and anvil to crack open a nut to access the edible kernel inside (Figure 6.1b), then you know how interesting they can be. Nonhuman primates (from now on simply referred to as “primates”) are our closest living relatives, and their behavior is often strikingly similar to our own. Figure 6.1a A female Japanese macaque nursing her infant. Evaluate the evidence for primate cultural variation.įigure 6.1b A juvenile capuchin monkey in Serra da Capivara, Brazil, uses a stone as a tool to open a seed.
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