Editing Primate (section)

===Diet and feeding===
{{Multiple image |align= right |direction=vertical |image1=Colubusmonkey.JPG|caption1=Leaf eating [[mantled guereza]]|image2=Microcebus murinus -Artis Zoo, Amsterdam, Netherlands-8c.jpg|thumb|caption2=A [[mouse lemur]] eating fruit}}
Primates exploit a variety of food sources. It has been said that many characteristics of modern primates, including humans, derive from an early ancestor's practice of taking most of its food from the tropical canopy.<ref>{{cite magazine |last1 = Milton |first1 = K. |year=1993 |title = Diet and Primate Evolution |url=http://nature.berkeley.edu/miltonlab/pdfs/diet_primate_evolution.pdf |magazine=Scientific American |volume=269 |issue=2 |pages=86–93 |pmid=8351513 |doi=10.1038/scientificamerican0893-86|bibcode=1993SciAm.269b..86M}}</ref> Most primates include fruit in their diets to obtain easily digested nutrients including [[carbohydrate]]s and [[lipid]]s for energy.<ref name="Strier2007" /> Primates in the suborder [[Strepsirrhini]] (non-tarsier prosimians) are able to synthesize [[vitamin C]], like most other mammals, while primates of the suborder [[Haplorhini]] (tarsiers, monkeys and apes) have lost this ability, and require the vitamin in their diet.<ref>{{cite journal | title = Vitamin C biosynthesis in prosimians: Evidence for the anthropoid affinity of Tarsius | last1 = Pollock | first1 = J. I. | last2 = Mullin | first2 = R. J. | journal = American Journal of Physical Anthropology | year = 1986 | volume = 73 | issue = 1 | pages = 65–70 | doi = 10.1002/ajpa.1330730106 | url = http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/110488482/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0 | archive-url = https://archive.today/20120628232930/http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/110488482/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0 | url-status = dead | archive-date = 2012-06-28 | pmid = 3113259 | accessdate = 2010-03-16 }}</ref>

Many primates have anatomical specializations that enable them to exploit particular foods, such as fruit, leaves, gum or [[insect]]s.<ref name="Strier2007" /> For example, leaf eaters such as howler monkeys, [[black-and-white colobus]]es and [[sportive lemur]]s have extended digestive tracts which enable them to absorb nutrients from leaves that can be difficult to digest.<ref name="Strier2007" /> [[Marmoset]]s, which are gum eaters, have strong [[incisor]] teeth, enabling them to open tree bark to get to the gum, and claws rather than nails, enabling them to cling to trees while feeding.<ref name="Strier2007" /> The [[aye-aye]] combines rodent-like teeth with a long, thin middle finger to fill the same ecological niche as a woodpecker. It taps on trees to find insect larvae, then gnaws holes in the wood and inserts its elongated middle finger to pull the larvae out.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Milliken |first1=G. W. |last2=Ward |first2=J. P. |last3=Erickson |first3=C. J. |year=1991 |title=Independent digit control in foraging by the aye-aye (''Daubentonia madagascariensis'') |journal=Folia Primatologica |volume=56 |issue=4 |pages=219–224 |doi=10.1159/000156551 |pmid=1937286}}</ref> Some species have additional specializations. For example, the [[grey-cheeked mangabey]] has thick [[tooth enamel|enamel]] on its teeth, enabling it to open hard fruits and seeds that other monkeys cannot.<ref name="Strier2007" /> The [[gelada]] is the only primate species that feeds primarily on grass.<ref name="Hiller">{{cite web |last=Hiller|first=C.|year=2000|url=http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/accounts/information/Theropithecus_gelada.html|title = ''Theropithecus gelada''|access-date=2008-08-08|work=Animal Diversity Web}}</ref>

====Hunting====
[[File:COLLECTIE TROPENMUSEUM Portret van een Dajak jager op Borneo met een gevangen zwijn over de schouder TMnr 60043389.jpg|thumb|upright|alt=Portrait of a Dayak hunter in Borneo with a boar over his shoulder|Humans have traditionally hunted prey for subsistence.]]
[[Tarsier]]s are the only [[Extant taxon|extant]] [[obligate carnivore|obligate carnivorous]] primates, exclusively eating insects, crustaceans, small vertebrates and snakes (including [[Venomous snake|venomous]] species).<ref>{{cite book|title=Tarsiers Past, Present and Future|chapter=Introduction|last1=Wright |first1=P. |last2=Simmons |first2=E. |last3=Gursky |first3=S.|editor=Wright, P. |editor2=Simmons, E. |editor3=Gursky, S.|year=2003|publisher=Rutgers University Press|isbn=0-8135-3236-1|pages=1}}</ref> [[Capuchin monkey]]s can exploit many different types of plant matter, including fruit, leaves, flowers, buds, nectar and seeds, but also eat insects and other [[invertebrate]]s, bird eggs, and small vertebrates such as birds, [[lizard]]s, [[squirrel]]s and [[bat]]s.<ref name="Sussman2003" />

The [[common chimpanzee]] eats an [[omnivorous]] [[frugivorous]] diet. It prefers fruit above all other food items and even seeks out and eats them when they are not abundant. It also eats leaves and leaf buds, seeds, blossoms, stems, pith, bark and resin. Insects and meat make up a small proportion of their diet, estimated as 2%.<ref name=Goodall1986>{{cite book | last = Goodall | first = Jane | author-link = Jane Goodall | year = 1986 | title = The Chimpanzees of Gombe: Patterns of Behavior | publisher = Belknap Press of Harvard University Press | isbn = 0-674-11649-6 | url = https://archive.org/details/chimpanzeesofgom00good}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Guernsey|first=Paul|title=WHAT DO CHIMPS EAT?|url=http://www.allaboutwildlife.com/what-do-chimps-eat|work=All About Wildlife|access-date=2013-04-22|archive-date=2019-11-18|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191118084847/http://www.allaboutwildlife.com/what-do-chimps-eat|url-status=dead}}</ref> The meat consumption includes predation on other primate species, such as the [[western red colobus]] monkey.<ref name="tai2007"/> The [[bonobo]] is an [[omnivorous]] [[frugivore]] – the majority of its diet is fruit, but it supplements this with leaves, meat from small [[vertebrate]]s, such as [[anomalure]]s, [[flying squirrel]]s and [[duiker]]s,<ref>{{cite journal |author=Ihobe H |title=Observations on the meat-eating behavior of wild bonobos (''Pan paniscus'') at Wamba, Republic of Zaire |journal=Primates |volume=33 |issue=2 |pages=247–250|year=1992 |doi=10.1007/BF02382754|s2cid=10063791 }}</ref> and [[invertebrate]]s.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Rafert |first1=J. |first2=E.O. |last2=Vineberg |year=1997 |chapter=Bonobo Nutrition – relation of captive diet to wild diet |chapter-url=http://www.nagonline.net/HUSBANDRY/Diets%20pdf/Bonobo%20Nutrition.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120425232556/http://www.nagonline.net/HUSBANDRY/Diets%20pdf/Bonobo%20Nutrition.pdf |archive-date=2012-04-25 |title=Bonobo Husbandry Manual |publisher=American Association of Zoos and Aquariums}}</ref> In some instances, bonobos have been shown to consume lower-order primates.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Surbeck |first1=M |last2=Fowler |first2=A |last3=Deimel |first3=C |last4=Hohmann |first4=G |title=Evidence for the consumption of arboreal, diurnal primates by bonobos (''Pan paniscus'') |journal=American Journal of Primatology |volume=71 |issue=2 |pages=171–4 |year=2008 |doi=10.1002/ajp.20634 |pmid=19058132|s2cid=32622605 }}</ref><ref name=Surbeck>{{cite journal |author=Surbeck M, Hohmann G |title=Primate hunting by bonobos at LuiKotale, Salonga National Park |journal=Current Biology |volume=18 |issue=19 |pages=R906–7 |date=14 October 2008 |doi=10.1016/j.cub.2008.08.040 |pmid=18957233 |last2=Hohmann|s2cid=6708310 |doi-access=free |bibcode=2008CBio...18.R906S }}</ref>

Until the development of agriculture approximately 10,000 years ago, ''Homo sapiens'' employed a hunter-gatherer method as their sole means of food collection. This involved combining stationary food sources (such as fruits, grains, tubers, and mushrooms, insect larvae and aquatic mollusks) with [[Game (food)|wild game]], which must be hunted and killed in order to be consumed.<ref>{{cite journal |author=Cordain L |title=Origins and evolution of the Western diet: health implications for the 21st century |journal=Am. J. Clin. Nutr. |volume=81 |issue=2 |pages=341–54 |date=February 2005 |pmid=15699220 |name-list-style=vanc |author2=Eaton SB |author3=Sebastian A |display-authors=3 |last4=Mann |first4=N |last5=Lindeberg |first5=S |last6=Watkins |first6=BA |last7=O'Keefe |first7=JH |last8=Brand-Miller |first8=J |doi=10.1093/ajcn.81.2.341|doi-access=free }}</ref> It has been proposed that humans have used fire to prepare and [[cooking|cook]] food since the time of ''[[Homo erectus]]''.<ref>{{cite journal |author=Ulijaszek SJ |title=Human eating behaviour in an evolutionary ecological context |journal=Proc Nutr Soc |volume=61 |issue=4 |pages=517–26 |date=November 2002 |pmid=12691181 |doi=10.1079/PNS2002180|doi-access=free }}</ref> Around ten thousand years ago, [[History of agriculture|humans developed agriculture]],<ref>[http://www.archaeology.org/9707/newsbriefs/squash.html Earliest agriculture in the Americas] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100603232246/http://www.archaeology.org/9707/newsbriefs/squash.html |date=3 June 2010 }}
[http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2007/213/2 Earliest cultivation of barley]  {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070216093200/http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2007/213/2 |date=16 February 2007 }}
[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5038116.stm Earliest cultivation of figs] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060602081110/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5038116.stm |date=2 June 2006 }}, retrieved 19 February 2007</ref> which substantially altered their diet. This change in diet may also have altered human biology; with the spread of [[dairy farming]] providing a new and rich source of food, leading to the evolution of the ability to digest [[lactose]] in some adults.<ref>{{cite journal |author=Krebs JR |title=The gourmet ape: evolution and human food preferences |journal=Am. J. Clin. Nutr. |volume=90 |issue=3 |pages=707S–11S |date=September 2009 |pmid=19656837 |doi=10.3945/ajcn.2009.27462B|doi-access=free }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |vauthors=Holden C, Mace R |title=Phylogenetic analysis of the evolution of lactose digestion in adults |url=https://archive.org/details/sim_human-biology_1997-10_69_5/page/605 |journal=Hum. Biol. |volume=69 |issue=5 |pages=605–28 |date=October 1997 |pmid=9299882}}</ref>