Wild orangutans treat pain with natural anti-inflammatory

[Indenturedebtor]

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn14406-wild-orangutans-treat-pain-with-natural-antiinflammatory.html?DCMP=ILC-hmts&nsref=news5_head_dn14406&DCMP=ILC-arttsrhcol&nsref=specrt10_head_Apes%20on%20drugs

Wild orangutans have been spotted using naturally occurring anti-inflammatory drugs.

Four individuals have been seen rubbing a soothing balm onto their limbs, the first known examples of orangutans self medicating. Great apes have never before been seen using drugs in this way. Remarkably though, local people use the same balm, administering it in a similar way to treat aches and pains.

Primatologist Helen Morrogh-Bernard, of the University of Cambridge, UK, made the discovery while studying Bornean orangutans (Pongo pygmaeus) in the Sabangau Peat Swamp Forest in Central Kalimantan, Indonesia.

In 2005, she witnessed an adult female pick a handful of leaves from a plant and then chew them, mixing the leaves with her saliva to produce a green-white lather. The female then scooped up some of the lather with her right hand and applied it up and down the back of her left arm, from the base of the shoulder to the wrist, just as a person would apply sunscreen.

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More at link. Very cool stuff. I've read about monkeys eating charcoal to help with an upset stomach, but using a topical ointment strikes me as different. I'm much more ready to write something off as a genetically programed "hunger" for something that's consumed to treat an ailment, than I am for a topical ointment that has to be prepared before being applied.

[lala_rawraw]

1. god, can Lupus patients get to this

or will it be patented and provided to the rich only?

[Indenturedebtor]

4. Well no one said if it would be any good! n/t

[Ian David]

2. See also

[Indenturedebtor]

3. LOL no doubt

There's that one that smokes and bartends in NYC too ;)

[Ian David]

5. Ooh! Where!?! n/t

[Indenturedebtor]

8. Hehe I'm looking for it sec

Here's a story about a smoking chimp in China

http://forums.caranddriver.com/auto/board/message?board.id=17&message.id=225235&query.id=3993


Here you go -
http://www.cnn.com/2007/LIVING/worklife/11/26/famous.monkeys/index.html

Oliver -- One chromosome shy of a missing link

If David Greybeard blurred the line between humans and chimpanzees by fishing for termites, you can imagine all the evolutionary issues raised when a chimp named Oliver started mixing his own Highballs.

Oliver was a bald-headed, Spock-eared chimpanzee that, besides playing bartender, also walked on two legs, used a toilet, and loved watching TV. For most of his life, Oliver's various trainers paraded him around at carnivals and on television shows as a freak.

But things changed for Oliver in 1975. A Manhattan lawyer who caught his act decided the chimp was so human-like that he just might be the elusive "missing link" between man and beast and put Oliver through a battery of scientific tests to prove it. Sure enough, an exam conducted in Japan indicated that Oliver had 47 chromosomes -- more than a human's 46, and less than a chimp's 48. The results were more than enough to get the press and the public excited.

When subsequent exams proved inconclusive, though, the American media lost interest. But in 1996, researchers tested Oliver again. This time, they definitively concluded that he had 48 chromosomes, making him all chimp. He wasn't the missing link after all, but scientists still concede that he probably was the Albert Einstein of chimpanzees.

[YankeyMCC]

6. And the next step in their evolution will be the HMO nt

[Bonobo]

7. Chimps are known to (carefully) eat a type of leaf that helps "deworm" them.

Even bears use drugs!

http://www.carecentre.org.za/medicinal.htm

As an example of zoopharmacognosy (self medication in animals), chimpanzees in Africa travel miles in search of Aspilia , these plants are part of the sunflower family. They place the leaves in their mouths but do not chew them, they "tongue" them for a few moments. Their expression as they do this is one of distaste, much as humans have when obliged to take nasty medicine. After this they swallow the leaves whole. Aspilia leaves contain a red oil called Thiarubrine-A, this is a potent drug that kills bacteria and parasitic worms, and even some fungi. Chimps also eat Vernonia (bitter leaf) plant family when they have an intestinal disorder, they chew the shoots and swallow the bitter juice - these plants have antibacterial properties and can boost the immune system against virus's.
Grizzly bears display similar behavior, chewing on Ligusticum porteri, part of the Lovage family, and again the plant acts as a vermifuge. They even rub the juice into their fur to kill off ticks and fungi.

[Indenturedebtor]

9. Bears are mad smart man! And hell my dog will eat leaves and grass when

He has an upset stomach hehe.