Just like humans, chimpanzees sometimes lose their heads when they are in love. Being the alpha male, Oscar has mating rights to all the females in the group - any female that is on estrus is his! However, it seems Ndaronse is the ladies’ man and this led to a huge fight the other day over lunchtime.

Cheetah is on estrus and has been spending a lot of time with Ndaronse much to Oscar’s annoyance. So Oscar decided to punish Ndaronse for stealing his girl by denying him food. When feeding the chimps we make sure everyone gets a portion but Oscar was determined to grab everything thrown to Ndaronse. When I thought Oscar wasn’t watching I handed Ndaronse some bananas but Oscar came up and snatched the food out of his hand. It’s almost like he was sending Ndaronse a message: my kingdom, my food!!

Ndaronse had enough! He lunged at Oscar and started hitting and biting him. And just like that a mini war broke out. Ezo, Jojo, Zee and Ali Kaka jumped to Ndaronse’s rescue and started fighting Oscar. Seeing he was outnumbered, Oscar turned all his rage on Ali Kaka. These two have a history – Ali Kaka trying to dethrone Oscar and all that – so no one went to Ali Kaka’s rescue. After enduring Oscar’s wrath for a while, Ali Kaka fled the scene and hid in a bush.

The females took this opportunity while the males were fighting to grab food and hide it to be enjoyed later. Even Cheetah, who was the reason the fight started, didn’t let it disturb her and gathered enough fruit which she ate quietly with her back to everyone.