Chimpanzees are most active during the day. Depending on the season, they will spend somewhere between a third and a half of their time foraging. Activity budgets also show that chimpanzees spend about 25% of their time socializing, 12% traveling, and 20% resting.

Eastern chimpanzees live in large groups of 50 to 100 individuals. However, the main group is not always together and they may break off into smaller groupings for months at a time. Depending on their habitat, a healthy group may control anywhere between 2.5 and 10 square miles of territory. Although chimpanzees are mostly peaceful, they can be fiercely territorial and will engage in violent battles to gain control of a group or land rich in resources.

This became evident in the 1970s in Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania, where Jane Goodall observed what would be known as the “Gombe Chimpanzee War.” The war, the only known chimpanzee war to have occurred, revealed just how complex politics can be in chimpanzee society. The war began after the death of an alpha male divided the group into a northern and southern faction. Between 1974 and 1978, the northern faction killed off the majority of the southern group and conquered territory. The victorious group, however, weakened by the civil war, quickly lost much of their territory to a separate group.

It is not uncommon for chimpanzee societies to mirror human societies. A chimpanzee leader must play politics just as a human one would. With groups sometimes reaching over a hundred individuals, no chimp can rule without help. Alpha males must solidify their power either by intimidating rivals through brute strength, or by winning support from useful but subordinate allies. A truly successful alpha male may rule for several years.

The Kasakela chimpanzee community (the victors of the Gombe War) is the most well-studied chimpanzee society in the world. The history and lineages of the group have been documented since 1961. In addition to the war, several of their stories have garnered world-wide attention, with one example being the rivalry between two brothers—Freud, a calm and clever ape who ruled from 1993 to 1997, and Frodo, a brutal and powerful chimp who usurped Freud and ruled from 1997 to 2002. Both of their reigns were ended by diseases that did not kill them, but weakened them enough for others to take advantage.

Freud and Frodo’s youngest brother, Ferdinand (born in 1992), would eventually fill the power vacuum left by his two brothers and become the longest-reigning ruler in the group’s history, ruling for 8 years from 2008 to 2016. Ferdinand himself was eventually overtaken by his nephew Fudge, who currently rules the group as of the writing of this profile. To add more drama to the story, one of Fudge’s top allies in overthrowing Ferdinand was Faustino, Ferdinand’s older brother.

All of these chimps have names beginning with “F” because they come from the F-family, a lineage that goes back to a female chimp named Flo. Other families in the Kasakela group include the G-, P-, T-, and S-families.