--- title: "Chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) | AnimalTracks.wiki" description: "DNA letters about 1.23% different from a human's, tool kits that vary from community to community, and Machiavellian troop politics." image: "https://animaltracks.wiki/images/animals/chimpanzee-1.webp" published: "2026-09-01" updated: "2026-09-23" --- # Chimpanzee (*Pan troglodytes*) > **Status**: Checked against 5 sources, listed under Sources below. > **Tagline**: DNA letters about 1.23% different from a human's, tool kits that vary from community to community, and Machiavellian troop politics. > **Soundtrack Vibe**: Industrial Noise & Avant-Garde Experimental // Einstürzende Neubauten, "The Garden" > **Soundtrack Links**: [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/track/4AIDG8oQzGYqnr6v01f8i5) > **Vibe Match**: A band that plays hammers, scrap metal and power tools as instruments, for an ape whose tool kit changes from forest to forest: in some populations chimpanzees crack hard-shelled nuts open with rocks or sticks used as hammers, while others often fish for termites with stripped twigs. ## Biological Superpowers & Stats - **Taxonomy**: *Pan troglodytes* - **Danger Level**: High - **Conservation Status**: Endangered ([IUCN Red List](https://doi.org/10.2305/iucn.uk.2016-2.rlts.t15933a17964454.en)) - **Superpower**: Regional tool kits (termite-fishing twigs, nut-cracking hammers, leaf sponges) that differ from community to community, plus a male dominance hierarchy whose alpha may take meat from subordinates and monopolize mating. - **Habitat**: Tropical rainforests, forest-savanna mosaics and montane forests up to 2,750 m, from West Africa east to western Uganda and Tanzania - **Diet**: Fruit, leaves, seeds and insects, hunted meat such as monkeys and small antelope, and in some populations nuts cracked open with stone or stick hammers - **Tags**: mammal, primate, tool-user, omnivore, social ## Natural History & Behavior ## An Ape With Local Customs A chimpanzee (*Pan troglodytes*) in one forest strips a twig and dips it into a termite mound to fish out the insects inside. In some other populations, chimpanzees crack hard-shelled nuts open with rocks or sticks used as hammers. In 1999, researchers pooled the seven longest-running chimpanzee field studies. They found 39 behaviour patterns, including tool use, grooming and courtship, that are customary or habitual in some communities but absent in others, in cases where they had ruled out the local environment as the explanation. That was far more variation than had been documented for any animal species except humans. Adult chimpanzees measure about 3 feet (0.9 meters) from head to rump. Females weigh 70 to 100 pounds (32 to 45 kilograms) and males 90 to 120 pounds (40 to 55 kilograms). San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance puts the average lifespan at 32 years for males and 40 years for females. ## About One DNA Letter in a Hundred Line up a human genome and a chimpanzee genome, and on average 1.23% of the single DNA letters differ. At most 1.06% are fixed differences that separate the two species. Orthologous proteins, the matching versions of each protein in the two species, are extremely similar: about 29% are identical, and the typical orthologue differs by only two amino acids, one per lineage. > **A Second Kind of Difference** Insertions and deletions of DNA are fewer in number than single-letter substitutions, but they leave about 1.5% of the euchromatic sequence in each species lineage-specific, found in that lineage alone. ## Communities That Patrol Their Borders Home is a community that can sometimes number as many as 100 chimpanzees, made up of family groups of usually about 6 to 10. The community splits into small parties that come together from time to time, a pattern behaviorists call a fusion-fission society. Males form coalitions, which in both wild and captive groups may let males dominate a third individual they could not dominate by themselves. Males patrol the community's borders, or raid into a neighboring group's range, almost entirely in silence, as if they understand that the mission's success depends on staying covert. Between communities, aggression seems to be the rule: at Gombe and Mahale, larger communities exterminated smaller neighboring ones through brutal attacks between males of the rival groups. It is not all conflict, though. A dominant chimpanzee that has attacked a subordinate often reassures it afterwards. ## Food, Medicine and Threats Chimpanzees eat a wide variety of food, including fruit, leaves, bark, seeds, flowers and insects, and they also hunt other animals such as monkeys and small antelope for meat. When water is scarce, they chew leaves to make them soft and sponge-like, then use them to soak up rainwater inside tree holes. Some observers have noted chimpanzees eating medicinal plants when they are ill or injured. Keeping chimpanzees as illegal pets has caused a decline in their populations, and people also hunt them for bushmeat or to protect their crops. These conditions, plus loss of habitat, have led to the chimpanzee's Endangered status on the IUCN Red List. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### Do wild chimpanzees make and use tools to find food? Yes, and the toolkit changes from community to community. Chimpanzees often strip the leaves off a branch and dip it into a termite mound to fish out insects, chew leaves into a sponge to soak up rainwater from tree holes when water is scarce, and in some populations use rocks or sticks as hammers to crack open hard-shelled nuts. A 1999 synthesis of the seven most long-term chimpanzee field studies found 39 separate behaviour patterns, including tool usage, grooming and courtship behaviours, that are customary or habitual in some communities but are absent in others where ecological explanations have been discounted, a pattern the researchers said was far more extensive than had previously been documented for any animal species except humans. *(Source: [Whiten et al. 1999]())* ### How close is chimpanzee DNA to human DNA? Line up the two genomes and on average 1.23% of the single DNA letters differ, and at most 1.06% are fixed differences that separate the two species. Insertion and deletion events are fewer in number, but they leave about 1.5% of the euchromatic sequence in each species lineage-specific. Orthologous proteins, the matching versions of each protein in the two species, are extremely similar: about 29% are identical, and the typical orthologue differs by only two amino acids, one per lineage. *(Source: [The Chimpanzee Sequencing and Analysis Consortium 2005]())* ### Do chimpanzee communities really fight wars with each other? Something close to it. Male chimpanzees patrol their community's borders in near silence, and they aggressively search out members of neighboring communities, often entering the neighboring range to do so. The duration and nature of their attacks on neighboring males clearly indicated an intent to do harm, and some males are known to have died from their wounds. At Gombe and Mahale, larger communities exterminated smaller neighboring ones through brutal attacks between males from the different communities. *(Source: [Animal Diversity Web, University of Michigan]())* ## Sources 1. [Chimpanzee. San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance.]() 2. [Pan troglodytes (chimpanzee). Animal Diversity Web, University of Michigan.]() 3. [The Chimpanzee Sequencing and Analysis Consortium (2005). Initial sequence of the chimpanzee genome and comparison with the human genome. Nature.]() 4. [Whiten et al. (1999). Cultures in chimpanzees. Nature.]() 5. [Humle et al. (2016). Pan troglodytes. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2016: e.T15933A129038584.]() *Published September 1, 2026. 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