Chimps consume equivalent of a beer a day in alcohol from fermented fruit

Chimpanzees have been seen to bond over fermented African breadfruit. Photograph: Minden Pictures/Alamy

Someone have a word with the chimps? Observations of the apes in the wild show them imbibing the alcoholic equivalent of a half pint of beer a day through the vast amount of fermented fruit in their diet.

Researchers arrived at the first estimates of wild chimp daily alcohol intake after measuring ethanol levels in fallen fruit that the apes gather from the forest floor in Kibale national park in Uganda and in Taï national park in Ivory Coast.