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Does the Bili Ape Exist?
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Bili ape, also Bondo mystery ape, is the name given to large chimpanzees that inhabit Bili Forest in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.[1]
"The apes nest on the ground like gorillas, but they have a diet and features characteristic of chimpanzees", according to a National Geographic report.[2] While preliminary genetic testing with non-nuclear DNA indicates a close relationship with the eastern chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) subspecies of the common chimpanzee,[3][4][5][6] a range of behaviors that are more closely related to those of gorillas have greatly intrigued primatologists from around the globe. Though their taxonomic classification has been clarified[citation needed], the need for further information about these chimpanzees persists. In local parlance, the great apes of the Bili Forest fall into two distinct groups. There are the "tree beaters", which disperse high into the trees to stay safe, and easily succumb to the poison arrows used by local hunters. Then there are the "lion killers", which seldom climb trees, are bigger and darker, and are unaffected by the poison arrows. When Karl Ammann, a Swiss photographer and anti-bushmeat campaigner, first visited the region in 1996, he was looking for gorillas, but instead discovered a skull that had dimensions like that of a chimpanzee, but with a prominent crest like that of a gorilla. Ammann purchased a photograph, taken by a motion-detecting camera, from poachers that captured an image of what looked like immense chimpanzees. Ammann also measured a fecal dropping three times as big as chimp dung and footprints as large as or larger than a gorilla's. In 2000, Ammann returned to the area described by the bushmeat hunter with a group of ape researchers. Although they did not find a live Bili ape, they did find several well-worn ground nests, characteristic of gorillas rather than chimpanzees, in swampy river beds. Scientific field research In 2001, an international team of scientists, including George Schaller of the Wildlife Conservation Society and Mike Belliveau of Harvard University were recruited by Karl Ammann to search for the elusive Bili ape, but the venture came up empty. After a five-year-long civil war ended in 2003, it was easier for scientists to conduct field research in the Congo. The first scientist to see the Bili apes, and also recruited by Ammann, was Shelly Williams, PhD, a specialist in primate behavior. Williams reported on her close and chilling encounter with Bili apes, "We could hear them in the trees, about 10 m away, and four suddenly came rushing through the brush towards me. If this had been a mock charge they would have been screaming to intimidate us. These guys were quiet, and they were huge. They were coming in for the kill – but as soon as they saw my face they stopped and disappeared."[7] "The unique characteristics they exhibit just don't fit into the other groups of apes", says Williams. The apes, she argues, could be a new species unknown to science, a new subspecies of chimpanzee, or a hybrid of the gorilla and the chimp. "At the very least, we have a unique, isolated chimp culture that's unlike any that's been studied", she says.[6] Scientists believe they are dealing with a very inbred population, in which even a large number of animals could share identical or near identical haplotypes. Bili ape reports have also been investigated by Esteban Sarmiento, who has said "I would think there is a strong possibility that south of Bili on the other side of the Uele River there may be gorillas, and this would seem an important area to turn our attention to." Scientists working within these forests south of the Uele, however, have found no such evidence, nor heard any such reports from local communities. It remains an important region, however, based on the discovered presence of other flagship species, like chimpanzees and elephants.[8] In June 2006, British Science Weekly reported that Cleve Hicks and colleagues from the University of Amsterdam had completed a year-long hunt for these apes during which they were able to observe the creatures a total of 20 full hours. Hicks reported,"I see nothing gorilla about them. The females definitely have a chimp's sex swellings, they pant-hoot and tree-drum, and so on."[9] DNA samples recovered from feces also reaffirmed the classification of these apes in the chimp subspecies Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii. Hicks encountered a large community of the apes to the northwest of Bili that displayed interest in him and his colleagues reminiscent of previous reports (this was misreported in the New Scientist as being 18 km from Bili, but it was actually considerably farther from the village. This was the first group of Bili apes to be encountered where the adult males did not flee immediately upon seeing the humans). The apes, including adult males, would surround their human visitors and show curiosity towards them, but would not attack or become threatening.[10][11] Hicks has emphasized that there is little evidence suggesting that they are any more aggressive than other chimpanzees (predatory behavior being the norm for the species). However, he has been misquoted in the press about this.[5] Further study was undertaken by Hicks between July 2006 and February 2007, accompanied by Jeroen Swinkels of the University of Amsterdam. A new base camp was established in the Gangu Forest.[12]  *This image is copyright of its original author DNA tests solve mystery of giant apes By Emma Young and Adrian Barnett ARE they a giant new species of great ape, or a hybrid of a chimp and a gorilla? The mysterious population of apes living in the remote north of the Democratic Republic of the Congo has been the subject of a heated debate. Now genetic evidence and a comprehensive survey suggest that, despite their size and unusual behaviour, the apes belong to a recognised subspecies of chimpanzee, Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii. People living around the town of Bili, about 200 kilometres east of the Ebola river, have long swapped stories of ferocious apes with a penchant for killing lions (New Scientist, 9 October 2004, p 32). The apes seemed too large to be chimps. From photographs, they were estimated to weigh up to about 100 kilograms, and their footprints at up to 34 centimetres long were bigger than a gorilla’s. To solve the mystery Cleve Hicks and colleagues at the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands, spent a year in the field tracking the apes. During that time, Hicks logged an unprecedented 20 hours observation. “I see nothing gorilla about them,” he says. “The females definitely have a chimp’s sex swellings, they pant-hoot and tree-drum, and so on.” Analysis of mitochondrial DNA taken from faecal samples also puts the animals within the P. t. schweinfurthii group. Hicks is now analysing samples of nuclear DNA in the expectation that this will rule out a chimp-gorilla hybrid. “I would say that possibility is negligible,” he says. The Bili apes are, nevertheless, unusual. Their skulls have a gorilla-like sagittal crest, but also many chimp-like features. Recordings reveal that they howl during the full ... https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg1...iant-apes/ Others say they are just E. Chimpanzees Lukuru Foundation, Democratic Republic of Congo http://www.lukuru.org This video footage offers a small window into a mystery crafted by time and the vast, isolated forest block of northern DRCongo. In 2003 John Roach (National Geographic News) wrote : "The detective story began in 1908 when a Belgian army officer returned home with several gorilla skulls from near the town of Bili on the Uele River and gave them to the Belgium's Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren. In 1927 the museum's curator classified the skulls as a new subspecies of gorilla, Gorilla gorilla uellensis. " Yet these skulls were collected thousands of miles/kilometers away from any documented presence of gorillas. What followed were tales of a mythical beast; tales that tantalized primatologists around the world with images of a new species of giant ape, yet to be formally discovered. Roach wrote: "In 1996, Swiss-born, Kenya-based wildlife photographer and conservationist Karl Ammann embarked on a quest to rediscover the mysterious gorillas." The media flocked to the story and told of a huge creature, part chimp / part gorilla, known to be fearless and free from any predators, including man. This mythical monster that sleeps in big ground nests, was alleged to kill and eat lions, leopards or hyenas. It was reported to howl at the rising and setting of the moon. In 2001 two of the worlds' leading authorities on chimpanzees ventured into the Bili forest in search of the Bili Ape. They returned home with no answers. In the summer of 2003 fecael and hair samples were collected in order to analyze the DNA of this potentially "new ape" compared to gorillas, chimpanzees, and bonobos. The results were far less spectacular than the magical forest lore. The Bili apes are eastern chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii). This camera trap footage was a result of a joint 1 year project by the Panafrican Research and Monitoring Program at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, The US Fish and Wildlife Service, and The Lukuru Foundation, with additional funding provided by The Lucie Burgers Foundation for Comparative Behavior Research, Arnhem, The Netherlands, The Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics at the University of Amsterdam, and The African Wildlife Foundation. Cleve Hicks led the survey mission and Karsten Dierks served as Panafrican Team Leader in charge of the camera trap project. They were accompanied by a team of six guards from L'Institut Congolais pour la Conservation de la Nature. 
Called it. These "Bili Apes" are no more than a figment of human lore: they are simply a genetically-different subpopulation of the Eastern Chimpanzee.
The visual representation of apes in comparison to humans is partially incorrect. The Eastern Lowland Gorilla does not weigh 551-pounds on average, but 175 to 190 kilograms (385 to 418-pounds) on average. 250-kilogram specimens of primates are exceptional specimens, with the exception of Gigantopithecus. Also, the size of these "Bili Apes" are not well-documented. *This image is copyright of its original author Other than that, the topic on "Bili Apes" proves to be a learning opportunity to learn about the sub-specific and individual differences (both physical and genetic) between chimpanzee groups. 
http://scienceheathen.com/2015/01/11/bil...ubspecies/
Off in one of the few remaining relatively primeval natural environments of the world — the Bili Forest of the far-northern portion of the Democratic Republic of the Congo — lives a band of very large chimpanzees that possess a number of very strange qualities and behaviors. The local folk-stories of the surrounding region make note of massive ape-like creatures that kill and hunt lions, catch fish, and — the stories go — howl at the moon. With many local hunters mentioning an animal that looks something like a cross between a chimpanzee and a gorilla — an animal that apparently, according to the stories, is unaffected by poison darts, as the other apes are. While you may be now making the assumption that such stories can’t possibly be true, you’d actually be wrong — a fair amount of research has gone into this subspecies of chimpanzee over the last few decades, and there is apparently quite a lot of truth to the stories.  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author
People have always created monsters from the unknown. Logic: if these apes were indeed lion-killers, such ferocious beasts would have long ago spread throughout Africa as a dominating species. However, they are rather large apes. Edgar Rice Burrough's fans claim them to be the 'mangani' which were the great apes which adopted the infant, Tarzan.
(11-08-2016, 12:24 AM)brotherbear Wrote: People have always created monsters from the unknown. Logic: if these apes were indeed lion-killers, such ferocious beasts would have long ago spread throughout Africa as a dominating species. However, they are rather large apes. Edgar Rice Burrough's fans claim them to be the 'mangani' which were the great apes which adopted the infant, Tarzan. Just like the infinite amount of gorilla/primate/human-fanatics out there, mass media also overrates the typical (and exceptional) behavior of all primates, making them cold-blooded, savage, infinitely-strong killers, when in reality, these are peaceful and socially-conducting creatures that are notably more herbivorous and possess strength that always pales in comparison to a lion (or most medium/larger-sized predators). 
If a gorilla is not a lion-killer, I doubt this smaller XL chimp could do any better. Interesting nonetheless, it's as a bigfoot story with a factual basis and eventual proof of existence. In post #4, are those pictures of the subspecies or just general chimp photos?
If this is true I suppose they are the groups of chimps who must have ruthlessly targeted by big cats in their previous generations. Their companions must have been ruthlessly killed in front of their eyes. But they must have been helpless in saving them. That must have invoked severe shock in them followed by burning desire for evolution into targeting these big cats. They must have undergone modifications in social communication ultimately targeting these big cats and also slight changes in other factors as well. The same must have been in case of poisonous arrows. They must have developed resistance due to ruthless hunting in previous generations. Some of them must have struggled with poisonous arrows yet must have somehow managed to survive fighting due to various factors like inadequate poison injected, low concentration of poison injected etc. Hence they must have developed resistance for next generation. The same happens with humans. I manipulated it for animals.
The Bondo or Bili ape is said to be a group of huge chimpanzees in the deep Congo, gorilla sized, and dubbed by locals "lion eaters". Not much is known about these beasts but a few scary images have been captured and they are truly mind blowing. Here is one and you can see the sheer scale next to these people, not a lot of forced perspective too.
 *This image is copyright of its original author more pictures  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author SCALE: The Bili ape has been reported to walk upright, bipedally 5 to 5 feet 6 inches tall, with the looks of a giant chimpanzee. Their footprints, which range from 28 to 34 centimeters, are longer than the largest common chimp and gorilla footprints, which average 26 cm and 29 cm, respectively. Bili ape skulls have the prominent brow ridge and may sometimes have a sagittal crest similar to that of a gorilla, but other morphological measurements are more like those of chimpanzees. Only one of the many skulls found at Bili had a sagittal crest, thus it cannot yet be considered typical for the population. Chimpanzee skulls are 190 to 210 millimeters long, but four out of five Bili ape skulls measured more than 220 millimeters, well beyond the end of the normal chimpanzee range.
ive often wondered --- are there any records of interactions between chimps and gorillas in the wild. i know there is some overlap in their respective ranges
  (07-24-2017, 02:25 AM)Sully Wrote: The Bili ape has been reported to walk upright, bipedally 5 to 5 feet 6 inches tall, with the looks of a giant chimpanzee. Their footprints, which range from 28 to 34 centimeters, are longer than the largest common chimp and gorilla footprints, which average 26 cm and 29 cm, respectively. About this part... Do you guys know of the chimpanzee captured from Congo, called Oliver (c. 1957 – 2 June 2012) He was famously bipedal & lauded as one of the missing link gene carrier between apes & humans! Born sometime in the late '50s & acquired as a young animal in 1960 by trainers Frank and Janet Berger, Oliver had supposedly been caught in the Congo. His physical and behavioral evidence led the Bergers to believe Oliver was a creature other than a chimpanzee, perhaps even human-chimp hybrid (later refuted by genetic analysis). Oliver possessed a flatter face than his fellow chimpanzees; was in the habit of walking bipedally, rather than on his knuckles, much more often than his chimpanzee peers, until he was later struck with arthritis. Oliver during the 90s, still bipedal  *This image is copyright of its original author Now the whole thing could be a scam! His genetic test found no anomaly, nor was his skeleton found to be any special. Chimps are not hard to train bipedalism & his looks could be mere individual variation. But he was claimed to stand more than 5'5" tall. But still, the Bondo apes need not have any skeletal or genetic differences & he could have been one of them. Also the Yaounde Zoo of Cameroon (Congo's neighbour) had a mystery ape too, whom the original photograpers thought might be a gorilla-chimp hybrid. Locals called his type Kooloo-Kamba thought to inhabit Cameroon, Gabon and the former French Congo. CNN covered it once with no follow-up. Ground nests & created skulls have been in areas of DRC with no gorillas, but leopards present. That link to an article by Wildlife photographer Karl Amman's work, is the best & most detailed one on the subject.
"My very first contact, on April 8 2005 with the naïve Gangu Chimpanzees. Up until this point the bili apes near the road would always flee our team in terror. But just as tracker Ligada had said, these chimpanzees in the remote Gangu Forest reacted more with curiosity than fear. The adult male in the video continues feeding as he watches us. In the weeks ahead, as we travelled deeper into the forest, the chimpanzees would get less and less afraid. (Cleve Hicks / Wasmoeth Wildlife Foundation)
"In January 2007, deep in the Gangu Forest, we encountered multiple individuals at this fig tree over a three day period. One adult male even approached us on the ground to check us out. Here is footage of another adult male peering down at us from the canopy. He moved off at the end, but apparently not very far. His companion, another adult male, remained in the canopy peering at us from behind the leaves. Cleve Hicks, The Wasmoeth Wildife Foundation" Here the woman claims the chimpanzee Kermit is the size of a female gorilla, and the largest in captivity (video posted in 2007 though the description notes the facility no longer exists). She further adds he may be one of the newly discovered species of "giant chimpanzee" (presumably referring to the Bili ape). She says they took a DNA sample and were going to analyse it of which I have yet to find results. |
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