Western chimpanzee
| Western chimpanzee | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Primates |
| Family: | Hominidae |
| Genus: | Pan |
| Species: | P. troglodytes |
| Subspecies: | P. t. verus |
| Trinomial name | |
|
Pan troglodytes verus Schwarz, 1934 |
|
 |
|
The western chimpanzee, or West African chimpanzee, (Pan troglodytes verus) is a subspecies of the common chimpanzee. It inhabits western Africa, mainly in Côte d'Ivoire and Guinea but with populations in surrounding countries.
Pan is derived from the Greek god of fields, groves, and wooded glens, Pan. Troglodytes is Greek for 'cave-dweller', and was coined by Johann Friedrich Blumenbach in his Handbuch der Naturgeschichte (Handbook of Natural History) published in 1779. Verus is Latin for 'true', and was given to this subspecies in 1934 by Ernst Schwarz. Originally Schwarz classified it as Pan satyrus verus.
The western chimpanzee is a subspecies of the common chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes), along with the central chimpanzee (P. t. troglodytes), the Nigeria-Cameroon chimpanzee (P. t. ellioti), and the eastern chimpanzee (P. t. schweinfurthii). They became genetically different from other chimpanzee subspecies approximately 500,000 years ago.
The IUCN lists the western chimpanzee as a critically endangered species on their Red List of Threatened Species. There are an estimated 21,300 to 55,600 individuals in the wild. The primary threat to the western chimpanzee is habitat loss, although it is also killed for bushmeat.
The population of the western chimpanzee once spanned from southern Senegal all the way east to the Niger River. Today, the largest populations are found in Côte d'Ivoire and in Guinea. Other populations survive in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea-Bissau. Relict populations live in Ghana, Senegal, and Mali. The subspecies is extinct in the wild in the Gambia, and possibly Benin, Burkina Faso, and Togo.
...
Wikipedia