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from the must-have-watched-'King-Kong' dept.
Cool. Calm. And oh, so calculated. That's how a chimpanzee living in the Royal Burgers' Zoo in the Netherlands set out to swat an aerial drone that was filming her group. In an article in the journal Primates² published by Springer, Jan van Hooff and Bas Lukkenaar explain it as yet another example of chimpanzees' make-do attitude to using whatever is on hand as tools.
The incident happened earlier this year, on 10 April, when a Dutch television crew was filming at the zoo in Arnhem. The idea was to use a drone to film the chimpanzees in their compound from different close-up angles. The drone already caught the chimpanzees' attention during a practice run. Some grabbed willow twigs off the ground, while four animals took these along when they climbed up scaffolding where the drone was hovering. This behavior is not frequently observed among these chimps.
Filming started when the next drone flew over. It zoomed in on two chimpanzees, the females Tushi and Raimee. They were still seated on the scaffolding holding on to twigs that were about 180 cm (ca. six feet) long. Tushi made two long sweeps with hers -- the second was successful in downing the drone and ultimately broke it. Before and during the strike, she grimaced. Although her face was tense and her teeth were bared, she showed no signs of fear. This suggests that she quite deliberately and forcefully struck at the drone, rather than fearfully or reflexively.
Fascinating. Evidence that drones do indeed provoke a response in the monkey ape brain, which could explain the drone antipathy felt by many humans. But what is it, a response to hovering insects or predatory birds?
(Score: 2) by RedBear on Sunday September 06 2015, @02:04AM
Just because they might be a little more used to people staring at them from far away doesn't mean they like it, or that they won't be annoyed by someone staring from up close. Zoo animals don't generally react very well to people besides their keepers entering their enclosures. And I daresay that being stared at all their lives could easily be one of the many factors that makes it difficult to keep many animals alive for long in captivity. It may very well be a constant stressor for every zoo animal.
I don't recall saying that people are always watching all CCTV feeds. I said that there is supposedly an experimentally measurable effect when a person is actually staring at you, even through a (live) CCTV circuit.
¯\_ʕ◔.◔ʔ_/¯ LOL. I dunno. I'm just a bear.
... Peace out. Got bear stuff to do. 彡ʕ⌐■.■ʔ
(Score: 2, Insightful) by frojack on Sunday September 06 2015, @02:54AM
And I daresay that being stared at all their lives could easily be one of the many factors that makes it difficult to keep many animals alive for long in captivity.
Boy, you are just one conclusion jumped to after another aren't you.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.