The Terrifying Truth About Chimps 

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Chimps have always terrified me, way scarier than any shark. Mostly because they’re so human-like but also so unhinged and wild.

I’m genuinely shocked that any of these people managed to get so close to chimps and even escape alive.

I think what is so scary about the Travis story is that whenever you hear about for example somebody getting mauled by their "pet" tiger it's because the tiger was rough housing with their owner and just didn't know their own strength. If a tiger wanted to actually kill them, they would done it easily. Travis not only wanted to kill that woman but wanted to drag it out and make it as slow and painful as possible.

I have a friend named Glen who used to work at the Dallas Zoo. He told me he would rather go into the lion enclosure than the Chimpanzee's. He said people have no idea how strong they are--or how vicious!

Chimps are bloody terrifying. They've got the capacity to be both kind and cruel.

If anyone is interested in more chimp stuff, look up the Chimp War. Observed by Jane Goodall and her team, a community of chimps broke into two distinct tribes that systematically hunted each other down one at a time. They were seen using stealth tactics such as walking single file, and remaining silent as they crept up and encircled their targets before ambushing them.

Funny thing about Komodo dragons, is there was a recorded case of a man dying from TWO he had in his home. One of them had bit him, and causing paralysis, and with him unable to fight back, the two giant reptiles of them pretty much ate him alive. Police found his half eaten corpse 2-3 days later, when his boss (or family) reported him missing and they did a wellness check.

The 09 incident is honestly the most unsettling thing I’ve heard, I remember hearing about this when it happened, and I was young at the time (like seven years old) and even then I knew that would be terrifying, but after actually looking back, and seeing what happened, it’s truly unsettling. Also the fact that someone can have a pet that has almost 90 percent of their dna that is similar to ours is a little… odd to say the least

I volunteered at a zoo marketing department for a while, but by weird coincidence got to share the bus home with the animal care crew, they were very nice people, very open to chat and share photos and stories of the wild animals. I once asked them which animal was the one they had to be most careful around, expecting the answer to be tigers, all of them in unison agreed: never be alone or distracted in a room with Chimps.

How that man escaped with his doctorate intact is insane.

"I was seven but I wasn't stupid" 😅🤣...Loved the video, you have a great voice for this. I find the whole ape family interesting and watch a lot of videos about them. Good job. Thanks for making.

I love how comfortable you are just being real. Keep stepping bro

Sooooo I got a chimp throwing things story. Many years ago, I was visiting a zoo and went to check out the chimps. They had a fairly nice(for a zoo) open enclosure surrounded by a moat. Two girls standing next to me thought it would be funny to toss ice cubes at the chimps. I was going to hollar for a zoo keeper, but then the largest chimp started tossing TURDS at the girls. They ran away screaming, then the chimp looked at me with a "hey you're cool you can hang" expression and he settled back down.

Yeah the Komodo is an instant out for me. I remember watching Steve Irwin back in the day and I've never seen the man more scared than when he was on an island with those things. He had to be extra cautious with every move, and this is the man that would swim in shallow croc-infested waters. I gained a true appreciation and respect for the Komodo dragon after watching that episode.

Chimps have always scared me, I think it’s because they’re so close to humans but just off enough to give the uncanny valley feeling.

Lady: ~holds Travis the Chimps Elmo~ Travis the Chimp: "Peace was never a f***ing option!"

I remember being in kindergarten in a town right next to Stamford and hearing about Travis tearing that lady’s face off from two of the teachers having a discussion. The one telling the story was so surprised by it, but the other teacher was super nonchalant and just went “I don’t care that he was raised like a human, it’s still a fucking chimp.”

What's worse regarding Travis' case is one of his owners, Jerome, Sandra's late husband, actually told Sandra before his death to put Travis into a sanctuary after his death because he wasn't sure Sandra could take care of him on her own. But Sandra refused because she didn't want to be alone... To think that if she had done just that then that whole incident could've been avoided.

The sad thing is, they originally planned on sending Travis to a chimp sanctuary like her husband requested, but she couldn't bring herself to part with Travis. That whole event could have been avoided.

You sir, have made all of RU-vid a better place. If I'm like the average viewer, then you haven given smiles and laughter to thousands of people. Never stop making videos!

Komodos have actually been clicker trained, are as intelligent as a dog, and can recognize the zoo keepers and other humans who have interacted with them. They also don't generally bite unless they are hunting or hungry. I love but respect them. The ones at the Memphis Zoo are awesome! Love from Memphis!

There was a story I heard of a chimp warlord (for lack of a better term) who was the head of one of the most brutal chimp bands in a region, but after one of his closest 'friends' was killed he seemed to lose interest in his ongoing brutal gang wars and vanished, and his massive group fell into infighting and split up. The old warlord was found some time later with a new band, mostly young orphans and they all stayed WELL out of the monkey warzones on their travels. Guess he had a change of heart and felt that his remaining years were better served protecting instead of murdering.

My dude, you've got an interesting delivery with your videos, quick, informative, and funny. And it's refreshing to hear someone make light hearted jokes about race, especially when that person is a minority. You've earned yourself a sub. Keep doing what you're doing ✌🏻

I stumbled across your channel a few months back, my son and I love it! We make it a thing every weekend to get up and watch a few episodes so thank you for being funny and educational to us both :)

I’ve always disliked chimps. Not to the point where I’m like “take them out.” More like that one uncle you just avoid at bbqs. This was reinforced in a science class I once took. The professor recounted how during an observation, two chimps approached a younger member from another group and then pretended to be its friend and entice it away from the safety of its family members. Then when it was isolated and brought into their own territory, they killed it. He ended it by saying that some theorized that since the chimps encroached onto the other group’s territory to lure the young chimp out and that resources were not scarce, it may have just been something they enjoyed doing. 🤯😱

Just want to add that it was Kellog's wife who made him kill the project, not him. She was the one who was worried about the son's development. Learned about this one in an ethics course.

I rarely comment on videos. Actually, I'm commenting on you. What an amazing talent you are. I can see you going mainstream and doing the nightly news. Thank you so much for all the effort and thought you put into your videos. I have enjoyed them all. Take good care.

I love how you tell each story with hilarious commentary 😂😂😂

also! definitely agree on the gorilla part. gorillas are terrifyingly strong, but they are also pretty passive if you're not threatening. theres videos of wild life photographers being approached by whole families of gorillas who just sorta chill around them and sniff them and play with their clothes.

I knew the tragic story of Travis, and there are plenty of gut-punching details I guess couldn’t be mentioned for time reasons: his foster father had died of cancer a few years before, so did his foster sister in car accident; those events and the subsequent depression of his foster mother sunk the chimp into a depressive state of mind as well, so much that his foster mom thought it was a good idea to cure him with antidepressants for humans. The day he mauled Charla Nash she had her hair dyed red, she exited the car with an Elmo toy which was also bright red, that may be the reason he snapped. That and the fact he was overweight, depressed and on drugs. It’s still uncertain. Oh and you forgot a couple of disturbing facts: the humanzee experiments/theories and the chimp clans war known as the Chimp Gombe War.

Quick PSA on chiggers (yeah, I know, the name 😑) - I think some of what was pictured here were actually clover mites, which are also tiny and red but don’t bite and are just a nuisance. Chiggers tend to favor heavy brush or wooded areas, so if you see a bunch of tiny red bugs in or immediately around your home they’re probably clover mites, so don’t freak.

Thanks man I appreciate you making these videos and I hope that you have a blessed day

7:20 it was stated that the chimp was mourning his "father", who died from cancer but with Travis being a chimp, he couldn't express his emotions properly and started acting out more, hence the medication. She should've listened to her late husband who told her that if anything happened to him, to give Travis to the zoo. It's all in a documentary about the chimp.

I'm a zoologist, and I work with primates for a living. I just wanted to say thank you for making these videos. I genuinely learn something new every time, and you present it in such a way that it feels easily accessible for everyone. Your RU-vids very own Steve Irwin in my book.

I am really entertained by this channel and this Host. His wit and sense of humor is 2nd 2 none.

Just discovered this channel and it’s literally one of my favorites by far already 😂😂😂

That second to last video made me realize that if you do not do anything absolutely stupid with the gorilla, you can eat fruit with it, sit around, look non-threatening, and just chill out.

my girlfriend works at a chimp sanctuary and she tells me all kinds of wild stories. The wild shit usually happens when a new chimp is introduced for example one chimp that had been a pet its whole life and never socialized with its kind was brought in he also had his teeth removed so he couldnt effectively defend himself and there are 10 established groups on property numbering between 10 - 30 per group. The group this chimp was eventually introduced to had a female that would encourage the other males to attack the new chimp and since all the males wanted to mate with her she basically had gang of simps at her beck and call . New chimp ended up loosing a few toes after being jumped by the gang but what really stuck to me was that the alphas in these groups were like bouncers for the facility if shit got too rough and bloody they would funnel the alpha of said group wherever he was at during the scuffle to said scuffle and let him break it up... keep in mind a healthy alpha standing on two legs reached almost 6 feet in height well over 200 pounds .

Informative and comedic, im here for it. Keep up the awesome content.

This channel is one of the more interesting ones. Glad I stumbled upon it!

I was a child in CT when this happened and everyone had the same “why have that as a pet?” Reaction. She is the reason why legislation was passed shortly after to make exotic pets illegal in Connecticut

The experiment reminds me of studies on feral children - grew up with no human interaction, usually in the woods. Since abandoning kids in the woods isn't as common these days, modern feral kids is pretty rare. I remember one modern case of a girl kept in a room away from the family (she was eventually rescued and recovered)

I love your videos dude don't stop making them I love learning about cool stories and awesome facts about animals

remember Jane Goodall witnessed and documented a literal war between two chimpanzee tribes in Gombe, the Kasakela and the Kahama, the Kahama were actually seperatists of the Kasakelas. this resulted in the entire male population of the Kahama getting torn to shreds and the females kidnapped by the Kasakela. the result was what land the loser tribe did have, got annexed by a bigger chimpanzee tribe called "The Kalande Empire" which made the entire war pointless, fun fact the Kahama were technically at peace and even traded with the Kalande. so Kasakela got their shit pushed in by the Kalande.

I remember the Travis story. The survivor was on national news and she also appeared a few times on Oprah. The story was very sad and it gets more sad when you know that Travis's adopted dad was dying and told his wife to put Travis in a chimpanzee sanctuary cause he felt that his wife couldn't raise Travis alone. He died and she refused to do that and then the attack happened like a year later.

One day my friends talked about animals and they asked around about the others opinion on 'dangerous animals'. Without any time to think or decided which animal, I just blurted out "hippos and I fear the chimpanzees too". They might be laughing that day, but your/this guy's videos already made up my mind. Edit: Just noticed a typo, I don't 'dear' the chimps.

This man is unrivaled in his respective profession! Thank you 🙏.

10:06 that picture of the jaguar gave me chills bro.

I've never seen Charlotte's face after the attack but before multiple facial reconstruction surgeries (she looked unrecognizable and you could tell she had lost almost all of her face but it wasn't bad or horrifying, just... malformed), but I have heard the 911 call where you can hear Travis mauling her as she screams and his foster mother shouting "he's killing her!" while begging for help. It is nightmare fuel. Poor Charlotte, and poor Travis. A horrible way to live and a horrible way to die.

“You can say ‘size matters’ all you want, but 4 inches made a difference that day” I swear this man never misses with his narration

Thank you for the information I really appreciate you

Your videos are some of the best on the Internet! Keep up the good work. 😊😊😊😊😊😊

while eating , i heard that the doctor that transformed his own kid into a chimp had little tolerance of people who are unjust or unethical . i almost choked on my food gagging ... saw the white light and everything . why would you do that to me ? love the vids btw , keep up the good work mamadou

I'm genuinely shocked I haven't suffered the repercussions from being around chiggers. I remember watching them crawl across my feet as a kid when I would walk barefoot in the grass. 😳

You always have awesome content I like that that you always give me some information that I've never heard before and I appreciate you must do a lot of homework my friend keep going I love it

This video is styled like a compilation of TikTok’s but it’s one long video, I like that

The rhino is the okay choice. Yes they are very paranoid, however, rhinos raised in captivity often act more like giant Labradors. It depends on where the rhino was raised. Gorilla is still best choice by far.

I've always had this fear of monkeys and primates; chimps especially. I'd always thought it was an irrational fear, then I saw a NatGeo documentary about chimps. It also featured Travis' story, among other things. Yeah, let's just say, I was glad I didn't live anywhere remotely near them. Strangely though, despite being around 7 or 8 at the time, I felt a sense of relief knowing my fears were rational.

There’s something very British about the commentary, makes an already interesting commentary witty and engaging. I love these docs, this is just further proof that nothing in nature stays pretty when it gets hungry.

Your commentary is awesome. You've got yourself a sub, bruh.

There is a woman named Aya Katz who has a pet chimpanzee named Bow. We in what I like to call the chimp community have been trying to talk her into letting him go to a sanctuary. He literally lives on a back porch. Even though she swears he will never hurt her mark my words, this won't end well.

Fun Fact: Chimps actually can't throw spears, well, not enough to do real damage anyway. Thanks to longer arms and shorter legs, Chimps center of balance is alot higher than humans. Which makes it impossible to throw a javelin with any degree of force and accuracy.

0:59 “You don’t seem to understand. I’m not locked in here with you. You’re locked in here with me!”

Great video very well thought out nice work

The fact that Travis’s owner still advocated chimp ownership after Charlotte’s mauling pisses me off to no end. She took away a newborn chimp away from its mother and raised it in such bizarre circumstances. These circumstances led a testosterone-ridden, extremely strong chimp to have aggression issues to become so aggressive that it attacked people twice and needed Xanax to calm it down. Yet that medication only upped its anxiety and lead to his death and the near death of Nash. Travis was not the exception to the rule. He was a warning against chimp ownership!

When I was a very small child of around 5years old, I watched a David Attenborough show on chimps and it scared the utter crap out of me. I had always been taught how nice and cute and funny chimps were, yet here was little me witnessing a group of them hunting and ripping apart other monkeys. Absolutley shattered me and I've never wanted to really look at a chimpanzee again. I've studied them a bit since, but I would never ever trust one if I had to go near it.

Just found your channel, subscribed! You have a great way of putting this out I love it. One thing you kinda missed about Chiggers is being from the South, the places they like to dig in is sweaty areas like around your belt line and most importantly....they make you scratch like to have a bad case of the crabs (if ya know what I mean). They love that spot the most!

Thank you for uploading, I hope you find the same lvl of happiness we get from absorbing knowledge off your vids ✨ Best Occasional Geographic RU-vidr 🥳

i still remember that story in 09 of the chimp ripping the woman's face off, and seeing the images on the news made me burst out into tears. i was so young and it terrified me, had multiple nightmares on end

THere had been at least one documented case of a chimpanzee (born in a zoo in captivity) who was able to drive a motorbike _in everyday town traffic._ He was a male chimp named Henry who lived in a zoo in France, in the 1960s/70s. David Taylor, a British veterinarian who specialized exclusively in the treatment of semi-wild animals living in captivity in zoos, circuses and marinelands, related a meeting with Henry in his autobiographical book _Zoo Vet: Adventures Of A Wild Animal Doctor_ (published 1976). Taylor wrote how he had been called to France to treat a dolphin who was suffering from an unknown illness, and when he arrived at the airport, he was told "Henry will take you there"... only to see a big male chimp on a bike, wearing shorts and a cap, who regarded him with indifference. He was told to ride shotgun behind Henry, then Henry took off... perfectly balancing the bike, stopping at traffic lights with idling engine, and all traffic cops in town (that was in the 1960s) knew Henry and greeted him and directed traffic to make way for him. Taylor wrote that was the weirdest ride he ever had. He was nervous because he had never ridding a motokbike before, so he did all the thinks terrified newbies do like leaning into the wrong direction in curves... but Henry balanced that bike perfectly, he worked the clutch, he navigated calmly through traffic and clearly understood traffic rules; unclear if he could read signs or if he just knew the route, but he had clearly understood the verbal order to take the human to the dolphinarium, so he knew where places were and what they were called. (Much like sheep dogs and seeig-eye dogs for the blind.) [quote] David Conrad Taylor, BVMS, FRCVS, FZS, was a British veterinary surgeon. He was the first veterinary surgeon to specialise in zoo and wildlife medicine. Taylor worked with zoo and wild animals from 1957, acting as a consultant on the treatment of some of the rarest species on Earth. He was world-renowned as an expert in marine mammal medicine. In the mid-1970s and early 1980s, Taylor wrote a popular series of autobiographical books that charted his life and experiences as a "Zoo Vet". [/quote]

this channel does a good job spreading awareness of how Chimps are wild animals and not pets

This host needs his own late night talk show! his presentation skills and wit are outstanding!

chigger nymphs actually can carry diseases! We just don't know if they can spread them! My dad is an ecologist and he's studying that right now! just thought it would be a cool (not very cool) fun fact.

There are 2 things that i like about this chanel, the knowledge and the creatinity in the explanations you do

The Thanos line did it for me. +sub.

This guy is my favorite youtuber of all time!

Komodo dragons are way faster than I imagined. That's genuinely terrifying to know something that big, strong, venomous and heavy is also capable of flashing across a room towards you.

"Chiggers, or Chiggas, which is somehow less offensive..." Someone give this man an award! Seriously, he teaches us so much while making us laugh, and somehow, he makes it look effortless! Some production company should seriously consider giving him a TV show, he's that good! I remember him saying that Steve Irwin was someone who he used to admire, so it'd almost be fitting if he was the one to be the next famous "animal guy".

That was an amazing video, thank you! I would love to see you do one of my biggest fears, bears. Regardless, I liked and subscribed. I can't wait to see what you come up with next.

i loved this one so much. did not know i had the same specific fears as Steve Irwin (plus chimpanzees). my parrot fear feels sooooo validated now!!!!

I live in Nigeria. I visited a zoo in Gusau when I was a kid - like 10 or younger. We were looking at hyenas in their enclosure, and one of the keepers went in to feed them. But this is Nigeria, so of course he left the door to the enclosure open. My mom yelled for all of us run. And that zoo keeper got an earful from her.

Seriously, someone give this man a show or something. He has a gift that he needs to share with the rest of the world.

thanks for the video

Great channel man

Nearly lost my left hand to a large aligator that was even named by the locals. Someone running "tours" on their hoverboat through the everglades. Used some meats to draw him in. Always consider where you go to view wildlife. You're literally trusting strangers with your lives.

Chimps have been scary to me ever since I heard the story of the pet chimp who tore off a neighbour’s face just for touching his toy (ah yep, Travis, I commented before I finished the video XD forgot some details)

Awesome video, well done bud

7:32 Oh god I just realized. I remember hearing about this. I was 6 or 7 when this happened, and lived in a small town in NY right next to the border with Connecticut. Heck, my mom went to work in Stamford.

The cruelty of those chimps you've mentioned is probably learned from other cruel chimps. I think back to the story of when all the aggressive male bonobos of a bonobo group ate bad fruit and died and the group of bonobos became much nicer as a result because the surviving females didn't let their kids grow up to be like the aggressive males. Edit: it was baboons

“Here’s why you should never give a chimpanzee Xanax” that sounds like the beginning to a bad joke

As someone with autism and an issue with showing empathy to humans, I show empathy to people that have my trust, animals, babies, and disabled people. I will never have empathy for wild/pet chimps because I know what they are capable of.

Never stop making your jokes, bro. 3:40 _"...in ways that would have CPS, PETA, and the Geneva Convention pulling up."_ LMAO

I had a chigger infestation when I was little and it was one of the most miserable times of my life. What isn't mentioned here is that they like to attack the sweaty, warm areas (such as the groin and armpits), that's where they like to reproduce, and a infection of chiggers can last for weeks. My sister and I were basically wearing nothing for almost two weeks and I still have scars from them and fire ants. I wouldnt say that "I hate chiggers" out-loud, but trust me when I say that they are nearly worse than fire ants, if fire ants weren't actually deadly.

4:16 just a correction, he didn’t call the experiment off because it was ruining his son, he called it off because the results were underwhelming.

Can I just say, Casual Geographic is the best channel name ever.

A chimps ability to throw things should never be underestimated. I once read a story about a vet who was task with tranquilizing a chimp so he could treat some kind of condition that made it go half-made with pain. The chimp was in a cage that has one wooden side. The vet used a blowpipe to shoot a tranq dart through a knothole in the wood. The chimp pulled out the tranq dart, turned around and threw it back through the knothole, hitting the vet in the face and coming only half an inch short of taking his eye out. Their hands may not be quite as dextrous as human hands, but their reflexes and hand-eye coordination are crazy good.

You always get me with that snow leopard pic. I always find it, then forget where it is, then tell myself, “no, seriously, you found it last time!” Every. Single. Time.

This Man does Great work and is entertaining while doing. holy fuck 3.2 million Subs i knew you would blow up. im Glad to see this. GOOD WORK MAN.... love from CCCC

That is just crazy! The fact us humans are related to these chimps makes it worse. And us humans unalive or almost unalive people to! I can't believe that.