Thursday, January 27, 2000
Miami team off to Africa to take chimpanzee census
BY JENNY CALLISON
Enquirer Contributor
OXFORD — Using famed gorilla researcher Jane Goodall as her model, Jill Pruetz is off to study chimpanzees as no one has before.
Dr. Pruetz, a Miami University postdoctoral fellow in zoology, will lead three other Miami researchers to the West African country of Senegal to track chimps for four months. The group leaves Monday.
She calls it a chimpanzee census.
“First, we're going to establish the fact that the population is still there,” she says. “We do this through nest counts, since chimps are very shy and will run away from people.”
Other team members are Dr. William McGrew, a Mi ami anthropologist and zoologist; Dr. Linda Marchant, a professor of anthropology and sociology; and Janae Arno, a December graduate of Miami with degrees in zoology and anthropology.
Dr. McGrew has studied primates in various African habitats over the past 25 years. It was his research, Ms. Pruetz said, that drew her to Miami.
“We can no longer study our extinct ancestors, but we can try to learn something about their life ways by studying our closest living relation — the chimpanzee — in a habitat most like the one in which our ancestors lived,” Mr. McGrew says.
Ms. Marchant, who studies primate behavior, has worked largely with chimps in captivity. She also has observed chimps at close range in Tanzania. This study, she says, will expand on her earlier research by studying how
chimps relate to their habitats.
The team will be based in and around Senegal's Niokolo Koba National Park.
Mr. McGrew says technology exists today to study chimps in a way that was impossible 20 years ago. For example, scientists can extract DNA from hair and feces samples — and never have to touch the chimps themselves.
Senegal's chimpanzees, which number between 200 and 300, live in the hottest, driest and most open areas of Africa. And that will make living rough for the researchers.
They may live in tents the entire time. There will be plenty of insects to contend with, and they'll eat whatever is plentiful — mostly beans and rice.
The project is supported by Miami University and grants from the National Geographic Society, Primate Conservation Inc. and the L.S.B. Leakey Foundation.
Ms. Arno is the recipient of Miami's Rebecca Jeanne Andrew Memorial Award, which supports undergraduate research in primatology, the study of apes and monkeys.
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