A chimp drinks fermented palm sap from a leaf in Guinea. Credit: G. Ohashi Alcohol consumption by humans exists in almost every known society, but until now, it’s never been conclusively documented among other primates. But it turns out that chimps have a taste for alcohol too: Wild chimpanzees in Guinea have been observed drinking fermented tree sap on multiple occasions.
The raffia palms that grow around Bossou, Guinea, produce a sweet sap whose natural sugars ferment quickly in the tropical heat, yielding a sweet, mildly alcoholic drink that the local people harvest. However, anthropologists noted that humans weren’t the only ones imbibing. While the elevated sap bucket was left unattended during afternoons researchers documented occasional chimp visitors to the alcoholic drink. And in fact, the chimps devised a tool to help them steal the sap. In groups, they climb to the crown of the palm and take turns dipping ...
