The Chimpanzee and the Bonobo

by Bobby 7B

Swinging and swooshing around the trees, you will notice a few unidentified moving objects going around, and you wonder whether they’re the fearsome endangered monkeys or the large, wild king of the jungle. Swoosh! They reveal themselves to be the small monkeys of Africa. The bigger one is the almighty Chimpanzee and the smaller one is the very endangered playful Bonobo! These primates look so alike that some might think they’re the same animal, even though they’re very different in behavior and physical traits such as their skin color and size. Of course, that's just information that one can pick up from reading things briefly, but they're very similar, so they vary in size and color, therefore, you, the amateur, shall be guided through this and make sure you can classify both of these animals easily without any interference.

The Chimpanzee, also known as the socialites of the jungle due to their social nature., They form small societies led by an Alpha male chimpanzee. Members of this society are free to join and leave, much like a democratic human organization. Some chimpanzees even have a level of authority in these groups, just like human tribes! Anyway, enough about the social structure of the chimpanzees off to their physical bodies and features. Chimpanzees can live up to over 50 years old, which is pretty long. Fifty years old is like half of the human lifespan. Chimpanzees vary in size but according to the experts they're about 1 - 1.7 meters in height. They‘re omnivores like us, they eat plants, meat and so on. It's not all that surprising as both of these primates share 98% of our human genes. They evolved enough to team up and communicate well and are even able to hunt cooperatively. Although they're not as intimate as the bonobos, they reproduce to make more of their kind. We'll look into this behavior after this. Unfortunately, they're endangered due to the habitat loss of Africa since it's a developing country plus poachers, pretty depressing that these monkeys are executed by poachers. Let's talk about their taxonomy, shall we? Chimpanzees are from the Hominidae Gray Family. Its Genus is the Pan Oken, the same as the Bonobo. The Chimpanzee's scientific name or species are called Pan troglodytes. The Chimpanzee's order is Primates Linnaeus and its class is Mammalia Linnaeus or better known as mammals. Its phylum is Chordata. Okay, that's the Chimpanzee's taxonomy classification. Let's get into detail about the Bonobo.

The Bonobo, the smaller chimpanzees, much like chimpanzees' bonobos are also social but they're more peaceful in their behaviors. Like chimpanzees, they also build small societies but the difference is that they're led by female bonobos instead of the Alpha male. Bonobos maintain relationships and settle conflicts through mating. As I said before, bonobos are more intimate than chimpanzees. That's because bonobos mate for fun instead of mating to reproduce more of their kind. Bonobos are expected to live for more than 60 years, they can be as old as your grandfather unless you don't have one then my condolences to you. Unlike chimpanzees, Bonobos are frugivorous, which means they mostly eat fruits. The bonobo is smaller than the Chimpanzee; they're about 1.15 meters which is smaller, they're also thinner than the Chimpanzee. Taxonomy wise, bonobos are the same as the Chimpanzee except for the species which they're called Pan paniscus. They're also endangered like chimpanzees, obviously for the same reason. Let's compare them now with the facts we've learned!

So, from the facts we've read and learned about, we can tell the differences now! Both animals have black fur and their differences are in size, skin colour, taxonomy, and behavior. For behavior, the animals are different in leaders, societies, relationships, and how they settle their conflicts. Bonobos prefer peace over wars and settle conflicts by mating, and they’re also led by female bonobos instead of the dominant males and maintain relationships unlike chimpanzees. On the topic of chimpanzees, they're bigger and beefier than bonobos, which are thinner and skinnier than chimpanzees. In taxonomy, they're almost the same except for their species, it's probably why people mistake them together. Of course, their skin colour is different, bonobos are black and chimpanzees are usually brown or grey depending on their region. Chimpanzees are the wilder and larger version of the bonobo basically.

With all the information we've read and gathered, we now can tell apart which animal is which, congratulations! Now let's go back to the topic, the two monkeys are staring at you. Are you able to identify them? One is taller and beefier than the other one, let's call it Monkey A. The other one which is smaller and more passive than Monkey A. Let's call it Monkey B. Now from what we've learned, Monkey B fits the description of a Bonobo and Monkey A fits the description of a chimpanzee. Hooray! We've identified them. So, in our understanding now, they're different animals with very small differences like taxonomy, behavior, and physical sizes.

Bibliography

Integrated Taxonomic Information System. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.itis.gov/

Nishida, T. (n.d.). Bonobo. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/animal/bonobo

Nishida, T. (n.d.). Chimpanzee. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/animal/chimpanzee