Apes - Gorilla, Orang-utan, Chimpanzee, Gibbons
primates
Apes are a group of primates that includes gorillas, orang-utans, chimpanzees, and gibbons. These are the primate species that are the most closely related to humans. The hands, feet, and face of an ape are hairless, while the rest of its body is covered with coarse black, brown, or red hair. Apes share some characteristics that set them apart from other primates: they have an appendix, lack a tail, and their skeletal structures have certain features not found in the skeletons of other primates.
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Gorillas (Gorilla gorilla) inhabit forests of Central Africa and are the largest and most powerful of all primates. Adult males stand 6 ft (1.8 m) upright (although this is an unnatural position for a gorilla) and weigh up to 450 lb (200 kg), while females are much smaller. Gorillas live to about 44 years old. Mature males (older than about 13 years), called silverbacks, are marked by a band of si…
The orang-utan (Pongo pygmaeus) is restricted to the rainforests of the islands of Sumatra and Borneo in Indonesia and Malaysia. The orang-utan is the largest living arboreal mammal. It spends most of the daylight hours moving slowly and deliberately through the forest canopy in search of food. Sixty percent of its diet consists of fruit, and the remainder is composed of young leaves and shoots, t…
The common chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) is relatively widespread in the forested parts of West, Central, and East Africa. A closely related species, the pygmy chimpanzee or bonobo (P. paniscus), is restricted to swampy lowland forests of the Zaire basin. Despite their names, common chimpanzees are no longer common, and pygmy chimpanzees are no smaller than the other species. Chimpanzees are partly…
Gibbons (genus Hylobates) are the smallest members of the ape family. Gibbons are found in Southeast Asia, China, and India, and nine species are recognized. They spend most of their lives at the tops of trees in the jungle, eating leaves and fruit. They are extremely agile, swinging with their long arms on branches to move from tree to tree, and they often walk upright on tree branches. Gibbons a…
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