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• Llorente, M
• Riba, D
• Mosquera, M
• Ventura, M
• Feliu, O
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• Riba, D
• Mosquera, M
• Ventura, M
• Feliu, O
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• Riba, D
• Mosquera, M
• Ventura, M
• Feliu, O

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Animals 2012, 2(3), 363-376; doi:10.3390/ani2030363

Article

Hunting Activity Among Naturalistically Housed Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) at the Fundació Mona (Girona, Spain). Predation, Occasional Consumption and Strategies in Rehabilitated Animals

Miquel Llorente ^1,2,* , David Riba ^1,2 , Marina Mosquera ^2,3 , Mei Ventura ¹  and Olga Feliu ¹

¹ Unitat de Recerca i Laboratori d’Etologia, Fundació Mona, Carretera de Cassà km4, Riudellots de la Selva, 17457 Girona, Spain ² Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social, 43007 Tarragona, Spain ³ Àrea de Prehistòria, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, 43002 Tarragona, Spain

* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.

Received: 25 June 2012; in revised form: 2 August 2012 / Accepted: 9 August 2012 / Published: 14 August 2012

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Simple Summary: Hunting is well documented in wild chimpanzees, but has rarely been documented in captive chimpanzees. At Fundació Mona Primate Rescue we have obtained evidence of five episodes of hunting in rehabilitated chimpanzees who had no previous experience of these types of behaviors. This demonstrated that they were able to perform this species-typical behavior in a naturalistic environment without learning it in the wild.

Abstract: Predatory behavior in wild chimpanzees and other primates has been well documented over the last 30 years. However, as it is an opportunistic behavior, conditions which may promote such behavior are left up to chance. Until now, predatory behavior among captive chimpanzees has been poorly documented. In this paper, we present five instances providing evidence of predatory behavior: four performed by isolated individuals and one carried out in cooperation. The evidence of group predation involved the chimpanzees adopting different roles as pursuers and ambushers. Prey was partially eaten in some cases, but not in the social episode. This study confirms that naturalistic environments allow chimpanzees to enhance species-typical behavioral patterns.

Keywords: predatory behavior; hunting; cooperative behavior; captivity; welfare

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