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Long-Term Studies on Wild Bonobos at Wamba, Luo Scientific Reserve, D. R. Congo: Towards the Understanding of Female Life History in a Male-Philopatric Species

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Abstract

Long-term studies on wild bonobos began at Wamba, in the current Luo Scientific Reserve, in 1973. Except for several interruptions due to political instability and civil war, we have been conducting studies of identified individual bonobos over 35 years, providing valuable data on their population dynamics and life history. Although the number of groups and number of individuals in the northern section of the reserve decreased by half during the interruptions of the study, the number of members of the main study group has steadily increased since 2002 when we resumed the study. Our long-term data demonstrated the male-philopatric structure of the group. There is no confirmed case of emigration of males from the study group, and no case of immigration of males into the group. On the other hand, all females born into the study group disappeared by the age of 10 years, and females with estimated ages of 6–13 years immigrated into the study group. These ages of intergroup transfer are much earlier than those reported for chimpanzees. Exceptional cases of immigration of two adult males and two adult females with offspring occurred right after the war. It is likely that remnants of extinct groups joined the study group. Such integration of members of foreign groups highlights the peaceful nature of bonobo society. The study group is characterized by an extremely high tendency for female aggregation. Various factors, including high density of food patches, female initiative in ranging, prolonged estrus of females, and high social status of females, seem to be responsible for the high attendance ratio of females in mixed-sex parties. Our long-term observations therefore provided evidence for interesting behavioral contrasts with chimpanzees.

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Acknowledgments

All research and conservation activities reported here have been carried out with Drs. Takayoshi Kano, Kohji Kitamura, Akio Mori, Evelyn Ono-Vineberg, Tomoo Enomoto, Naobi Okayasu, Ellen J. Ingmanson, Hiroyuki Takemoto, and other researchers who visited Wamba for short periods. Mr. Ekam Wina, Dr. Mwanza N. Ndunda, Mr. Mikwaya Yamba-Yamba, Mr. Balemba Motema-Salo of the Research Center for Ecology and Forestry, Ministry of Scientific Research, D.R. Congo also carried out research with us. Though we could not include their names as coauthors, we’d like to give special thanks for their great contributions to this work. We also thank Drs. Toshisada Nishida, Juichi Yamagiwa, and Tetsuro Matsuzawa for their continued support of our studies, and members of the Laboratory of Human Evolution Studies and Primate Research Institute of Kyoto University for providing valuable suggestions. This study was mainly supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) Grants-in-aid for Scientific Research (X491036, X501069, X501032, X511074, X511034, X521081, X521033, X00160-304330, X00160-304135, X00160-404337, 59041053, 60043055, 61041071, 62043067, 63041078, 02041049, 06041064, 09041160, 10640613 to Kano; X00160-404120, X00160-504319, 56041018, 57043014, 58041025, 59043022, 60041020, 62041021 to Nishida; 10CE2005 to Takenaka; 12575017, 17255005, 22255007 to Furuichi; 17570193, 19405015 to Hashimoto; 19107007 to Yamagiwa; 21255006 to Ihobe), the National Geographic Fund for Research and Exploration (7511–03 to Furuichi), JSPS Core-to-Core program (15001 to Primate Research Institute), Toyota Foundation (D04-B-285 to Furuichi), JSPS International Training Program (2009–8 to Primate Research Institute), JSPS Asia-Africa Science Platform Program (2009–8 to Furuichi), JSPS Institutional Program for Young Researcher Overseas Visits (2009–37 to Primate Research Institute), Japan Ministry of the Environment Global Environment Research Fund (F-061 to Nishida), Africa Support Fund (2010 to Support for Conservation of Bonobos), and Japan Ministry of the Environment Research and Technology Development Fund (D-1007 to Furuichi).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Primate Research Institute, Kyoto University, Inuyama, Aichi, Japan

    Takeshi Furuichi, Chie Hashimoto & Tetsuya Sakamaki

  2. Wildlife Research Center, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan

    Gen’ichi Idani

  3. School of Human Sciences, Sugiyama Jogakuen University, Nisshin, Aichi, Japan

    Hiroshi Ihobe

  4. Hayashibara, Great Ape Research Institute, Tamano, Okayama, Japan

    Yasuko Tashiro

  5. Research Center of Ecology and Forestry, Ministry of Scientific Research, Bikolo, Eguateur, Democratic Republic of Congo

    Mbangi N. Mulavwa & Kumugo Yangozene

  6. School of Human Cultures, The University of Shiga Prefecture, Hikone, Shiga, Japan

    Suehisa Kuroda

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  1. Takeshi Furuichi
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  2. Gen’ichi Idani
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  4. Chie Hashimoto
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  7. Mbangi N. Mulavwa
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  8. Kumugo Yangozene
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Correspondence to Takeshi Furuichi .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. , Dept. of Behavioral Ecology, University of Göttingen, Kellnerweg 6, Göttingen, 37077, Germany

    Peter M. Kappeler

  2. Dept. Anthropology, Yale University, Sachem Street 10, New Haven, 06511, Connecticut, USA

    David P. Watts

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Furuichi, T. et al. (2012). Long-Term Studies on Wild Bonobos at Wamba, Luo Scientific Reserve, D. R. Congo: Towards the Understanding of Female Life History in a Male-Philopatric Species. In: Kappeler, P., Watts, D. (eds) Long-Term Field Studies of Primates. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-22514-7_18

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