The bonobo and the mongoose !
Christian Ziegler records the unusual sight of a young male bonobo gently holding a mongoose pup deep in the rainforest.
Christian tracked a group of bonobos that are being studied by Barbara Fruth of the Max Planck Society. He set out each day before daylight, waded chest-deep through flooded forest and often walked 20 kilometres each day. Catching up with the group, Christian recalls how 'the bonobo held and stroked the little mongoose for more than an hour, carrying it carefully, as it climbed a tree to eat fruit'. At first look you might think that this scene is sweet, but it likely has a darker origin. Bonobos are mainly herbivores but do occasionally hunt and eat small mammals. This mongoose pup was eventually released unharmed, but it might have been taken when its mother was killed. Similar behaviour has been observed at this site before when, following the killing of a female colobus monkey, a bonobo kept her orphaned infant for several days.
