The Kasekela chimpanzee community (formerly spelled Kasakela) is a habituated community of wild eastern chimpanzees that lives in Gombe National Park near Lake Tanganyika in Tanzania. The community was the subject of Jane Goodall's pioneering study that began in 1960, and studies have continued ever since, becoming the longest continuous study of any animals in their natural habitat. As a result, the community has been instrumental in the study of chimpanzees and has been popularized in several books and documentaries. The community's popularity was enhanced by Goodall's practice of giving names to the chimpanzees she was observing, in contrast to the typical scientific practice of identifying the subjects by number. Goodall generally used a naming convention in which infants were given names starting with the same letter as their mother, allowing the recognition of matrilineal lines. One of the most important discoveries that was learned by observing the Kasekela chimpanzee community was the use of tools. On 4 November 1960, Goodall observed a chimpanzee that she had named David Greybeard using a grass stalk as a tool to extract termites from a termite hill. Later, she observed David Greybeard and another chimpanzee named Goliath stripping leaves off twigs to create termite fishing tools. Previously, tool use in chimpanzees was only rarely observed, and tool creation by non-human animals had never been observed. Until then, tool making was considered one of the defining characteristics of being human. Another important observation occurred a few days earlier, on 30 October 1960. On that day Goodall observed the community's chimpanzees eating meat, dispelling the notion that chimpanzees are vegetarians. A third observation by Goodall in the early 1960s was that male chimpanzees perform a "rain dance," charging, calling, slapping the ground and trees and dragging branches in the rain. In the early 1970s the chimpanzees of the community were observed to engage in ongoing coordinated attacks against the chimpanzees of the neighbouring Kahama Chimpanzee Community, ultimately wiping it out. According to historian Ian Morris, this "Four Year War" represented the first time scientists had observed chimpanzees "deliberately seek out, attack and leave for dead" chimps from another community, and it has been described as "the first record of lasting 'warfare' among [non-human] primates." Several families within the Kasekela chimpanzee community have been particularly prominent in books and documentaries. The F-family has produced five alpha males for the community, and the matriarch, Flo, played a particularly important role in acknowledging Goodall's acceptance as a human observer by the community. The G-family has produced at least one alpha male, and also the birth of several twins, which are rare among chimpanzees. There are other families as well which include the T-family and S-family (which has produced one alpha male).
F-family
Flo Flo (c. 1919 – 1972) was the matriarch of the F-family, so named because she and all her matrilineal descendants were given names beginning with the letter "F". In 1962, Flo was one of the first chimpanzees to approach Goodall's camp, along with her infant daughter Fifi. Video of Flo approaching Goodall and allowing Fifi to reach out to touch Goodall's forehead, letting Goodall know she had been accepted, is shown in the IMAX film Jane Goodall's Wild Chimpanzees. Later she brought her sons Figan and Faben, who would later become prominent members of the community to the camp, and when she came into estrus in 1963 she attracted the community's males to Goodall's camp. From the time Dr. Jane Goodall first observed her, Flo appeared to be the highest-ranking female in the whole Kasekela chimp community, who, although portrayed as an affectionate, playful and tolerant individual when interacting with her offspring, did not hesitate to aggressively dominate other females. She was a successful mother and fierce defender of her offspring, all of whom grew up with self-confidence because of her dominant status. Fifi, raised by her confident mother Flo, grew to be a popular female in Gombe, not only because of her high-ranking family but also from her close ties with the adult males. She inherited her mother's superior status and because her older brothers Faben and Figan were among the top big males, she grew up with enormous confidence. Flo had at least five known offspring, three sons (Faben, Figan and Flint) and two daughters (Fifi and Flame). Flo was 28 years old when she gave birth to Faben. Most female chimpanzees have their first infant when 12–14 years of age, so it is possible that Flo had at least one infant prior to Faben that either died or, if it was a female, would have transferred to one of the other communities prior to Goodall's arrival to Gombe in 1960. When Flo died in 1972, she was given an obituary in Britain's Sunday Times. Flo's descendants make up a third of the Kasekela chimpanzee community, with individuals that have risen to power over the years. Her daughter Fifi reigned supreme after her and produced more offspring than any other female in Gombe history until 2004. Her grandsons, Freud, Frodo and Ferdinand were alpha males in the community, which as of 2025, is headed by her great-grandson, Fudge.
Faben Faben (c.1947 – 1975) was Flo's oldest known offspring. He was a powerful male, but lost the use of one arm in a polio epidemic that ravaged the community in 1966. Despite his disability, he learned to create spectacular bipedal charging displays, which allowed him to regain a high rank within the community. His support was critical to Humphrey's ascension to alpha male rank in 1969, and to his brother Figan's ascension to alpha male in 1972. Faben also participated in the conflicts with the rival Kahama community (which was formed by former Kasekela members) that occurred between 1973 and 1975, and was a leader in the killing of several Kahama males, including former Kasekela alpha male Goliath. Faben himself died in 1975, possibly as a result of further conflicts with the Kahama community. Following Faben's death, Figan had difficulty maintaining his alpha male position for several months and eventually lost his alpha status to Goblin.
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