I'm Dr. Tara Stoinski, president, and CEO,
and chief scientific officer
of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund.
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And I'm here to talk about each great ape
that's featured in the new Planet of the Apes trilogy.
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What a lot of people don't realize
is that humans are considered great apes as well.
Great apes are a group of animals called hominids.
There's actually eight species,
but you might be familiar with the four most common types,
which are chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, and bonobos.
Chimpanzees.
Chimpanzees are the most featured ape
in the Planet of the Apes trilogy.
Although Caesar is shown to be a pet in the movie,
chimpanzees, and actually all primates,
do not make good pets.
For a chimpanzee to be a pet it has to be
taken away from its mother at quite a young age.
And mother infant bonds in chimpanzees,
and all the great apes,
just like in humans, are incredibly strong.
So that's a very traumatic experience
for a young chimpanzee.
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Chimpanzees communicate with each other
using a variety of both gestural and vocal communication,
the same way we do.
And they have a pant hoot,
which is a very loud sound that they make
when they're excited,
maybe when they find a good food,
or if they hear other chimpanzees in the region.
[chimpanzees hooting]
So Caesar communicates with humans in the movie
using sign language.
In the 1960s and '70s, sign language
was a really interesting area of research with chimpanzees,
but actually with all of the great apes.
So every one of the great apes, each species,
has actually been taught to use sign language.
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And one of the amazing things about chimpanzees
is they have the widest distribution
of any of the great apes.
And they can live in rainforests,
or they can live in savannas as well.
On the western side, there's the Western subspecies.
And they live in countries like Senegal and Mali.
And then you have the Nigeria Cameroon chimpanzee,
which not surprisingly is found in Nigeria and Cameroon.
Then there is the Central chimpanzee.
And they're found in Gabon,
the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea.
And then on the far east side
you have the Eastern chimpanzee.
And they live in countries like Rwanda,
Burundi, and Tanzania.
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When Caesar overtakes Rocket for alpha status,
he is showing one of the classic hallmarks
of chimpanzee behavior.
So male chimpanzees have linear dominance hierarchies,
and they definitely compete
over the course of their life to be dominant.
And the reason for that is related to reproduction.
So dominant male chimpanzees sire the majority of offspring.
In the movies, Caesar is portrayed when he has a infant
as sort of a king and queen type situation,
the two of them together.
And that is not actually what we see in chimpanzee society.
Chimpanzees have a mating system that is called promiscuous,
where males mate with multiple females,
and females also mate with multiple males.
I think one of the most incredible things about chimpanzees
that's been shown is that they actually have protocultures
that are just like human culture.
So culture is something that is not
something you learn in your environment,
but it's actually passed on socially.
So it's passed on generation to generation.
And researchers have documented that chimpanzees in the wild
have these different cultures.
So they have different behaviors
that have nothing to do with their environment,
but rather have been created by someone in their group,
and then passed on over time through social learning.
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In the movie, you see chimps using weapons quite a bit.
This is not something we generally
see a lot of in the wild.
However, there have been examples of chimpanzees
throwing sticks and other objects
down on human or other observers.
Probably the closest example is there are chimpanzees
in West Africa who have been observed using sticks
kind of as spears, and putting them in holes
to try and stab another species of primate
called a bush baby.
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In the Planet of the Ape trilogies,
we see the chimpanzees walking upright quite a bit.
And chimpanzees and other great apes can certainly do this,
they can walk upright, although they generally
don't do it for long periods of time.
And it's really because these animals
are well adapted for living in the trees.
And so the way that their bodies function
and are formed to enable them to climb
makes it really difficult for them
to walk upright for long periods of time.
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Bonobos.
Bonobos and chimpanzees look very similar.
Bonobos are slightly smaller than chimpanzees.
And that led to them being called
pygmy chimpanzees for a long time.
But we know them as a different species.
They're not just a different type of chimpanzee,
they're their own species.
But they are smaller.
They also are born with a very dark face,
whereas chimpanzees are born with
a light face that darkens over time.
And those are kind of some of the big physical differences.
Bonobos have the most restrictive range
of any of the great apes.
So they are found in only one country,
Democratic Republic of the Congo.
And they are found south of the Congo River.
Whereas chimpanzees and gorillas
are found north of the Congo River.
So they actually are the only great ape
that lives in this particular part of Congo.
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What's really different about the way that Koba is portrayed
in Planet of the Apes is it's very unbonobo-like.
Where we see more striking differences
is in their behavior.
So he's a very aggressive individual.
And in actuality,
bonobos are really considered kind of pacifists.
They are very playful.
They keep their playful personality as adults.
They're known for being very calm,
using sex rather than aggression to settle fights.
Really it's chimpanzees in the wild
that have the more aggressive personality
that you see being portrayed in Koba.
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In the movie, you see that Koba and Caesar are split
over their relationship with humans.
In the wild, we don't see
that there is animosity towards humans.
Generally it's the opposite, where humans are aggressive,
and attack or kill great apes.
Human, work.
Human, work!
What we do see though, is animosity within a species.
Bonobos are actually the only species
where that hasn't been observed.
Actually, when groups come together,
they can be quite friendly.
Now what has happened in some places,
particularly with chimpanzees,
is that where human communities
and chimpanzee communities have come close together.
So for example, where humans have deforested areas
and chimpanzees are left in small,
little isolated forest patches.
We have seen chimpanzees attack humans.
And I think it's not an animosity thing,
but they're actually viewing humans as a source of prey.
And actually, just recently,
there was the first ever recorded siting
of chimpanzees killing a gorilla.
Even after 50 plus years of watching these animals
in the wild, it was just observed
for the first time earlier this year.
[gorilla growls]
Gorillas.
In the movie, the gorillas
are really portrayed as the guards.
And I think a lot of that
is just a result of their sheer size.
Gorillas are amazing.
They are the world's largest primate.
They start at four pounds at birth,
and males can grow to be 400 pounds.
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There's four types of gorillas in total,
and only one of those four are found in zoos.
And in West Africa, there are two subspecies.
There's the Cross River gorilla.
And then there's the Western Lowland gorilla.
And that's the type of gorilla you can see in a zoo.
There's a big area in the central part of Africa
where you don't find gorillas at all.
That's where you find the Bonobos.
In Eastern Africa there are another two species,
there are the mountain gorillas.
And they're the gorillas that were made famous
by Dian Fossey, and are featured
in the movies Gorillas in the Mist.
And then there's one called the Grauer's gorillas.
And like bonobos,
they are only found in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
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Male and female gorillas are the same exact size
until about the age of eight.
And at that point, female gorillas are considered adults,
and they sort of grow a lot more slowly until about 12,
when they're full size.
Male gorillas, however, at that age are really,
they enter a phase called the blackback phase.
So it's kind of an adolescence.
And they really shoot up in size.
And they continue growing until about the age of 15.
And at that point they've gained their adult characteristic.
A male gorilla is called a silverback,
it's just a process of maturation.
So every male gorilla becomes a silverback.
So just like human males, at a certain age,
get broader chest and facial hair,
male gorillas around the same age, will again,
get that broad chest, a big head.
And the hair on the back will turn silver.
And that's a sign that they've reached adulthood.
And male gorillas are really,
they are in charge of their family.
So they decide when it's time to eat,
when it's time to rest,
where the family's gonna sleep at night.
They really are the protectors of their family unit.
And in the wild,
the males really do take on this guard role.
I mean, all of that size and strength,
the purpose of it is to defend their family,
and to defend their family from other groups of gorillas.
And this is particularly evident with young gorillas,
if they lose their moms.
And in that situation, they basically will be
taken under the wing of the dominant silverback.
Even if it's not their kid,
they will still take on responsibility
for allowing this infant to feed near them,
so they can still have access to good food.
The infants will often travel near them.
And they'll even sleep with them at night in their nest.
So I do think this portrayal of male gorillas as protectors
in Planet of the Apes really gets at the core
of what male gorillas are in their own families.
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A couple of cool things about gorillas.
When Dian Fossey started her pioneering work
to study them 54 years ago,
the common perception of gorillas
were a King Kong, ferocious beast.
And when she studied them,
and got to know them as individuals,
and got to see their family social structure,
she really changed the narrative.
And so gorillas are actually known now as gentle giants.
Gorillas are strict vegetarians.
So don't ever let anyone tell you
you can't get big and strong just by eating your vegetables.
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Gorillas are always black,
but they do have a lot of color variation.
Particularly in the Western species,
you will get a lot of red, particularly around their heads,
and then they have that silver back.
But I've never seen a red gorilla.
In the films, there's a white gorilla named Winter,
but we have not observed any white gorillas in the wild.
There was one in a zoo in Spain, his name was Snowflake.
But white gorillas would really not camouflage well
in the dark forest environments of Africa.
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Orangutans.
Maurice in the movie is seen as a very wise and smart ape.
And certainly, orangutans are incredibly intelligent.
There's a joke that said,
if you were to give a screwdriver to a chimpanzee,
they'd break it.
If you gave it to a gorilla, they'd throw it away.
And if you gave it to an orangutan,
they would sort of squirrel it away.
And then at some point use it to dismantle
whatever was in the room.
So they are known for their incredible intelligence.
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Orangutans are the only great ape found in Asia.
So they live on the islands of Borneo and Sumatra.
Orangutans are divided into three species.
Up until recently, actually, two were only recognized,
the Bornean and the Sumatran.
And then in 2017, the Tapanuli orangutan was also described.
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They are a beautiful red color
and have incredibly long arms.
That really is because of
the particular niche that they fill.
So they are the most frugivorous of all the apes,
meaning they rely a lot on fruit.
This part of their diet makes it hard
for them to live in social groups.
So you can imagine if you're a 200 pound male orangutan,
and you need to find enough food to eat,
and you come across a food tree.
If there's 12 other orangutans in that fruit tree,
that fruit's gonna be gone pretty quickly.
And as a result,
they spend a lot of time high up in the trees.
And so these long arms enable them to kind of
move from branch to branch, and span across these tree tops,
as they move through the forest, looking for food.
So orangutans actually are primarily solitary.
Whereas the African great apes live in social groups,
orangutans spend most of their lives
as solitary individuals.
And the males in particular have this really unique look.
So they have what are called flanges around their face,
so these cheek pads around their face.
It's one of their secondary sexual characteristics.
And they emit these very loud, long calls.
[orangutans calling]
Because these animals are solitary,
so they need to communicate with other orangutans
over a much larger distance, than say a gorilla might,
who lives in a close-knit, social family.
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Humans.
A lot of people don't realize,
but humans are also considered a great ape.
So they're kind of the fifth type of great ape.
In the movie, we see complex relationships
between humans and great apes.
And I think the same exists in real life.
Unfortunately for great apes,
humans are really their greatest threat.
Whether it be through habitat destruction,
through poaching, climate change,
we are unfortunately pushing great ape populations
to the brink of extinction.
But, I think one of the reasons that these movies resonate
so much with people, is because we see
so much of ourselves in great apes.
They share the same emotions as us.
They share the same kinds of relationships that we do.
And so, my hope is when people see movies
like Planet of the Apes, they recognize
kind of the common humanity that we have
with our closest relatives.
And that makes people interested in
preserving them in the wild.
That these aren't gonna be just animals
that we might see in a zoo, or in a movie,
but that these animals will retain their incredible cultures
and social lives in the wild as well.
Ape home!
To me, one of the best things about
the Planet of the Ape movies
is that no actual apes were in these movies.
The fact that these are all computer generated apes
with humans behind them, to me, is incredible.
And the technology is amazing.
And I was lucky enough to get to work with Andy Serkis
when he was actually preparing to be Kong
in the King Kong movies.
And I think that his portrayal of apes is truly amazing.
I mean, he really captures just the subtleties
of the way they move and interact.
Great apes are so much like us.
Like us, they have friends and enemies.
Like us, they have emotions.
Like us, they have really rich, complex social lives.
And so, I think, my career as a primatologist
and a conservationist, I hope that we can
cohabitate together maybe a little bit better
than the apes did in the Planet of the Apes trilogy.
