Her mate is a very robust male, seen here also examening the crowd in the middle of a snack. He shows one of the interesting physical characteristics of Bonobos, which is the more human-like proportions of arms and legs.

Here the older female grooms the male (right) while she holds a new infant, barely visible between her right arm and her body. I once observed him gently cradling her head in his arm while picking stuff out of her teeth.

One of their older kids (left) maintains reassuring contact with her.

Here the two young females groom each other.

And here the older female sits with one of her preadolescent youngsters, who appears to be in an unusually quiet mood. More often they're "bouncing off the walls" like any human children at that stage of development.

This and the following photos were taken on 9/18/05. The old male (see above) had died, leaving the group with only adult females and kids.

At right, several group members gather.

Here the older female nurses her most recent offspring.

Two of the young females play. At one point they engaged in face-to-face coupling.

The most interesting behavior I saw on this visit was performed by this young female. She sat at the water edge, a pile of ape biscuits by her side, dipping the biscuits in the water. At first I thought she was wetting the biscuits to make them more palatable, but in fact she was holding them in the water and watching small fish gather to nibble on them! At one point, a turtle also came up to feed. I never saw her actually eat one herself, and she kept at this activity until they had all been fed to the fish and turtles.

Portrait: young female Bonobo.

Here is one of the younger females carrying her youngster.

The older female enjoys some lettuce (12/19/06).

And here's the older female, apparently in a pensive mood.