Early human-made tools have been mentioned in a large number of scientific works. These toolkits contain hammerstones, stone cores, and sharp stone flakes. It is startling that chimpanzees possess distinctive stone tools for opening different kinds of nuts.
The researchers discovered various stone tools that were used to break several nut species early in 2022 while conducting fieldwork in the Ta Forest in Cote d’Ivoire to document a troop of wild chimpanzees’ usage of stone tools. The Royal Society Open Science website now hosts their research.
Experts claim that many chimpanzees have unique tool usage cultures comprising wooden and stone implements. However, only a few West African tribes used stone tools to enter caves.
By comparing the 3D models of numerous stone tools used by chimpanzees in the Ta Forest with those from another group in Guinea, researchers showed considerable variations between the two groups in terms of their material culture.
According to the research, this specific chimpanzee population in Guinea uses large stone anvils, some of which may reach more than one meter in length, as well as different kinds and sizes of stone hammers.
These sturdy stone tools, widely dispersed in the natural world, maintain varying degrees of wear and tear and act as a permanent record of chimpanzee behaviors.
In the wild, chimpanzees use tools in a variety of ways. One of these kinds that have been deemed to be the most challenging is nut cracking.
In its most sophisticated form, a chimpanzee strikes a nut to release the kernel of food using the flat surface of an anvil stone and the flat side of a hammer stone.
