A male orangutan, clinging precariously to overhanging branches, flails the water with a pole, trying desperately to spear a passing fish.

It is the first time one has been seen using a tool to hunt.

The extraordinary image, a world exclusive, was taken in Borneo on the island of Kaja, where apes are rehabilitated into the wild after being rescued from zoos, private homes or even butchers' shops.

"Orang hutan" means "forest man" in one of Indonesia's many languages and our long-armed cousins do indeed show a remarkable ability to mimic our behaviour.

This individual had seen locals fishing with spears on the Gohong River.

Although the method required too much skill for him to master, he was later able to improvise by using the pole to catch fish already trapped in the locals' fishing lines.

The image is part of a series taken for a new book, The Thinkers Of The Jungle, which also includes the first photograph of an orangutan swimming.

Thinkers Of The Jungle, by Gerd Schuster, Willie Smits and Jay Ullal, is published by Ullmann Publishing on May 5, RRP £29.99.

That orangutan is smarter than a good portion of the world

"Ah didunt evolve frum no munkeh."

oh wow thats intresting

Wow, +1 for evolution.

That's not evolution, that's adaptation to the environment. Genes don't teach you how to make a spear.

Interesting info though, imitation is a basic form of learning after all.

"monkey see, monkey do"
btw, wasn't there a certain species that stuck twigs down ant holes to find food?

Quote from Smashdood

That's not evolution, that's adaptation to the environment. Genes don't teach you how to make a spear.

Interesting info though, imitation is a basic form of learning after all.

Adaptation+adaptation+adaptation+adaptation=Big adaptation.


If one specific group of orangutans is separated from another group for long enough, the two groups will eventually become unable to inter-breed because of the genetic differences. This means that these two groups are different species.

That's evolution, numbskull.

And where in that article did it say that this was a skill aquired through imitation rather than the ape's own ingenuity?


Oh, and about genes not teaching you to make a spear:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider_web
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nest
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beaver#Habitat
http://www.springerlink.com/content/nnxdge13894eqk1a/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4Tm9QdI_eM
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v431/n7004/full/431039a.html
http://www.sciencemag.org/feature/data/crow/
http://primatology.net/2007/02/22/savanna-chimpanzees-hunt-with-tools/


No, these aren't the product of evolution, they're just the product of imitation!

That must be why they are able to do that even when spearated from others... of... their... species...


So who exactly is the spider imitating? Spider mothers don't look after their young. They leave them soon after the eggs hatch.

dw, they're only a few thousand years behind us.

Quote from Smashdood

That's not evolution, that's adaptation to the environment. Genes don't teach you how to make a spear.

Interesting info though, imitation is a basic form of learning after all.

I thought evolution was a bunch of adaptations.

WHERES YOUR "IF EVOLUTION IS REAL WHY ARENT TEH MONKEYS GETTING SMARTER?" ARGUMENT NOW MR CHRISTIAN MAN?z

Quote from MiniMan

I thought evolution was a bunch of adaptations.

It is, it's just that people like Smashdood are awful at math and don't understand the way addition works.

Quote from Myself

WHERES YOUR "IF EVOLUTION IS REAL WHY ARENT TEH MONKEYS GETTING SMARTER?" ARGUMENT NOW MR CHRISTIAN MAN?z

Actually, it's "If evolution is real and we evolved from monkeys, why are monkeys still around."

Whats a monkey?

If monkeys cold evole.Id try to own a monkey.Cool righy