The Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men in the Ituri Forest, Zaire 9781949098860, 9780915703241

Table of contents :
Contents
List of figures
List of tables
List of plates
Foreword, by John Speth
Preface
Chapter 1: Introduction
Theory and Choice of Variables
The Influence of Previous Studies of Pygmies
Chapter 2: The Study Area and Its Inhabitants
The Physical Environment
The Effects of Human Occupation
Peoples Inhabiting the Ituri Forest
The Study Area Study Populations
Sample Populations
The Lese Dese
The Efe
The Annual Cycle
The Efe Annual Cycle
Chapter 3: Methods
Observations of Behavior
Choice of Observation Technique
Sampling Schedules
Recording Methods
All-Day Observations of Behavior
Observer Effect
The Problem of Independence
Ad Lib Observations
Observations of Hunts
Other Data Collection
Demography
Anthropometry
Food Procurement and Exchange
Questionnaires
Event Calendars
Quid Pro Quo
Data Analyses
Chapter 4: Activity Patterns and Food Acquisition
Subsistence and Maintenance Activities
Hunting
Food Gathering
Honey Gathering
Collecting Firewood and Water
Food Preparation
Camp Maintenance
Manufacture and Maintenance of Implements
Village-Related Work
Travel Between Camp and Village
Moving Camp
Total Subsistence-Related Work
Child Care
Self Care
Leisure
Recreation
Smoking
Locomotion
Distance Traveled
Comparisons with Non-human Primates
The Effect of Age on Distance Traveled
Health and Illness and Activity
The Kinds of Illness
Health and Activity
The Effects of Weather on Activity
Camp Location
Distance from the Village
Seasonal Location of Camps
Activity Patterns: Forest vs. Village
Hunting and Gathering
Work in the Village
Total Subsistence Work
Food Acquisition
Summary
Conclusion
Chapter 5: The Sociology of Efe Hunting
Hunting Methods and Prey Species
Monkey Hunts
Ambush Hunts
Group Hunts
Time Allocation During Hunts
Locomotor Patterns
Distance Traveled
Hunting Returns
Monkey Hunts
Ambush Hunts
Group Hunts
Group Hunts: Sharing
The Effect of Sharing on Individual Procurement Success
Age and Procurement Success
Limited Needs for Meat
Comparison of Hunting Returns: All Methods
The Advantages of Group Hunting
Summary
Chapter 6: Hunting Success and Marriage
Marriage Patterns of Efe and Lese
Efe Male Strategies of Competition
Overall Hunting Success
Marital Success and Hunting Success
Wealth, Hunting and Marriage
Chapter 7: Conclusion
The Pygmy-Villager Relationship
Sex Differences in Behavior
References Cited
Appendix 1: Questionnaire
Appendix 2: Checksheet
Appendix 3: Glossary of Codes and Definitions
Plates

Citation preview

Anthropological Papers Museum of Anthropology, University of Michigan No. 86

The Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men in the Ituri Forest, Zaire

by Robert C. Bailey

with a foreword by John D. Speth

Ann Arbor, Michigan 1991

© 1991 by the Regents of the University of Michigan The Museum of Anthropology All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America ISBN 978-0-915703-24-1 (paper) ISBN 978-1-949098-86-0 (ebook) Cover design by Marty Somberg Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Bailey, Robert Converse. The behavioral ecology of Efe pygmy men in the lturi Forest, Zaire / by Robert C. Bailey ; with a foreword by John D. Speth. p. cm. - (Anthropological papers/ Museum of Anthropology, University of Michigan) ; no. 86) Revised version of author's doctoral dissertation which was completed in 1985. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 0-915703-24-6 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Efe (African people}--Hunting. 2. Efe (African people}--Agriculture. 3. Lese (African people}--Hunting. 4. Lese (African people}--Agriculture. 5. Hunting and gathering societies-Zaire--Ituri Forest. 6. Subsistence economy-Zaire--Ituri Forest. 7. Forest ecology-Zaire--lturi Forest. 8. Shifting cultivation-Zaire--lturi Forest. 9. Human behavior. I. Title. II. Series: Anthropological papers (University of Michigan. Museum of Anthropology); no. 86. GN2. MS no. 86 [DT6SO.E34] 306 s-dc20 91-10954 (306'.096751] CIP The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the ANSI Standard 239.48-1984 (Permanence of Paper)

Contents

List of figures List of tables List of plates Foreword, by John Speth Preface

VL VL VLL LX XLLL

1 INTRODUCTION Theory and Choice of Variables The Influence of Previous Studies of Pygmies

CHAPTER

CHAPTER

2

THE STUDY AREA AND

ITs

INHABITANTS

The Physical Environment The Effects of Human Occupation Peoples Inhabiting the Ituri Forest The Study Area Study Populations Sample Populations The Lese Dese The Efe The Annual Cycle The Efe Annual Cycle CHAPTER

3

METHODS

Observations of Behavior Choice of Observation Technique Sampling Schedules Recording Methods All-Day Observations of Behavior Observer Effect The Problem of Independence Ad Lib Observations Observations of Hunts Other Data Collection Demography UL

1 3 5

9 9 10

12 14 15 16 19 20 21

25 25 25

26 28

29 30 31

32 32 33 33

Anthropometry Food Procurement and Exchange Questionnaires Event Calendars Quid Pro Quo Data Analyses CHAPTER

4

ACTIVITY PATTERNS AND FOOD ACQUISITION

Subsistence and Maintenance Activities Hunting Food Gathering Honey Gathering Collecting Firewood and Water Food Preparation Camp Maintenance Manufacture and Maintenance of Implements Village-Related Work Travel Between Camp and Village Moving Camp Total Subsistence-Related Work Child Care Self Care Leisure Recreation Smoking Locomotion Distance Traveled Comparisons with Non-human Primates The Effect of Age on Distance Traveled Health and Illness and Activity The Kinds of Illness Health and Activity The Effects of Weather on Activity Camp Location Distance from the Village Seasonal Location of Camps Activity Patterns: Forest vs. Village Hunting and Gathering Work in the Village Total Subsistence Work Food Acquisition Summary Conclusion tv

35 36 37 37 37 39

41 42 42 44 45 47 48 48 49 50 51 52 52 53 55 55 55 56 57 57

59 59 60 60 62 64

65 66 66 67 68 68 68 70 73 74

CHAPTER

5

THE SOCIOECOLOGY OF EFE HUNTING

Hunting Methods and Prey Species Monkey Hunts Ambush Hunts Group Hunts Time Allocation During Hunts Locomotor Patterns Distance Traveled Hunting Returns Monkey Hunts Ambush Hunts Group Hunts Group Hunts: Sharing The Effect of Sharing on Individual Procurement Success Age and Procurement Success Limited Needs for Meat Comparison of Hunting Returns: All Methods The Advantages of Group Hunting Summary CHAPTER

6

7

ApPENDIX

1: 2: 3:

97 98 101

121

REFERENCES CITED

ApPENDIX

90 93 94

111 112 114

CONCLUSION

The Pygmy-Villager Relationship Sex Differences in Behavior

ApPENDIX

81 83 83 84 84 84 85 86 90

103 104 105 106 107 108

HUNTING SUCCESS AND MARRIAGE

Marriage Patterns of Efe and Lese Efe Male Strategies of Competition Overall Hunting Success Marital Success and Hunting Success Wealth, Hunting and Marriage CHAPTER

77 79 79 80

QUESTIONNAIRE CHECKSHEET GLOSSARY OF CODES AND DEFINITIONS

135 136 137

beginning on page 145

PLATES

v

List of Figures 2.1 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 6.1 7.1

Map of the Ituri Forest region, 10 Frequency distribution of group hunts by number of hunters, 87 Mean hunting returns, 88 Meat returns for group hunts, 91 Meat procurement efficiency against mean time, 96 Length of hunts by number of hunters, 97 Procurement success and material wealth, 109 Fitness as a function of time, 117

List of Tables 3.1 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 4.8 4.9 4.10 4.11 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 6.1 6.2

Number of observations, 27 Time allocation of Efe men, 43 Time devoted to subsistence and maintenance, 53 Smoking and material wealth, 58 Illnesses recorded, 61 Expected and observed time allocations of sick vs. non-sick, 63 Rain data, 65 Observation frequency related to camp location, 67 Mean distance of camp from village, 67 Time allocation as a function of distance from village, 69 Caloric contribution to Efe diet, by gender, 71 Caloric contribution of cultivated and foraged food, by gender, 71 Returns of 46 monkey hunts, 85 Returns of 45 ambush hunts, 86 Partial summary of 71 group hunts, 89 Ranking of hunters before and after distribution, 92 Summary of all hunting returns, 98 Marriage patterns of Efe and Lese, 106 Overall hunting success, 107

Vl

Plates

(beginning on page 145) 1. 2. 3. 4. S. 6. 7. 8. 9.

An Efe camp. Two young men. Man making poison-tipped arrows. Butchering a duiker. Butchering an elephant. Harvesting honey. Efe and Lese women processing peanuts. Efe woman moving camp. Lese and Efe girls in ima celebration.

vu

Foreword

John D. Speth University of Michigan

I think it is fair to say that the Man the Hunter symposium was one of the most significant landmarks in the study of hunters and gatherers, one that quickly captured the imagination of the entire anthropological discipline. Almost overnight the long-standing, rigid, patrilineal-patrilocal model of band societies was swept away and replaced by a new one which emphasized their fluidity, flexibility, and ecological adaptedness. Perhaps more than anything else, it was the quantitative "input-output" analysis and time-allocation data gathered by Richard Lee among the !Kung San, or Bushmen of the Kalahari desert, elegantly molded into a portrait of "original affluence" by the literary eloquence of Marshall Sahlins, that transformed the prevailing view of foragers from one of marginal "hangers-on," struggling to survive in the world's most inhospitable environments, into one of resilient, healthy, and highly successful societies, living in ecological harmony with their surroundings, perhaps not unlike their forebears who dominated the globe for countless millennia prior to the advent of food production. The decade following the Man the Hunter symposium was one in which anthropologists came to see the world's foragers largely through Bushman eyes. The San, and particularly the !Kung, became the standard-the quintessential foragers-upon which new models were built and against which older ones were evaluated. The tremendous influence of the Kalahari Project is hardly surprising, as the San at that time provided the only hard, quantitative data on what hunters and gatherers actually did for a living. Every freshman anthropology student learned about the !Kung, that their diet was energetically and nutritionally adequate, despite their harsh desert environment, that hunting and gathering societies should more properly be called gathering and hunting LX

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Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

societies, since plant foods, not meat, overwhelmingly predominated in their diet, that their daily work schedule was unexpectedly light and leisurely, leaving them far more time for socializing and other activities than one found among supposedly "more advanced" farming societies, and that they had remarkably low levels of fertility without the aid of contraceptives, which somehow managed to keep their populations marvelously in balance with their resources. The Man the Hunter symposium conveyed a real sense of excitement that we had at last begun to understand what foraging societies were all about and how they worked. At the same time, however, the paucity of quantitative data from foraging groups other than the !Kung hindered rigorous comparisons, and underscored the urgent need for fieldwork among band societies in other environments before they had all vanished. In response to this sense of urgency, the 1970s and 1980s witnessed the birth of an entire new generation of long-term, often interdisciplinary field studies, providing us with a wealth of new information and insight into the nature of these fascinating societies. Scholars from all four of anthropology's traditional subfields-ethnology, archaeology, biological anthropology, and linguistics-armed with a diverse array of intellectual and theoretical perspectives-e. g., symbolic, cognitive, Marxist, ecological-have actively participated in this upsurge in research. The result has been a veritable explosion in the literature on hunters and gatherers, and perhaps not unexpectedly a growing recognition that not all foragers are like the Bushmen. To the contrary, one of the most striking contributions of forager research in the post-Man the Hunter era has been the demonstration of just how variable these societies can be in virtually any dimension one chooses to look at. Thus, some foragers in tropical and subtropical latitudes consume far more meat than the !Kung, some have higher fertility levels and shorter birth intervals, many work harder, some are taller, others not as lean, and so forth. The field is maturing and in the process the focus of research has shifted from an emphasis on producing "normative portraits" of band societies to the search for the nature and underlying causes of this variability. One of the most exciting of these new long-term research efforts-the Ituri Forest Project-was launched by Robert Bailey more than a decade ago among the Efe Pygmies in the northern Ituri Forest of Zaire. Since the inception of the project, Bailey and his associates have maintained an almost continuous presence among the Efe (and among nearby Lese horticultural communities), conducting research on a broad spectrum of anthropological, demographic, biophysical, and medical issues. This project has vastly improved our knowledge of these fascinating hunters and gatherers, providing detailed quantitative data on their diet, health,

Foreword

XL

social, political and economic organization, and the degree to which their livelihood is influenced by, and ultimately dependent upon, their close ties with farmers. One of the most important studies to emerge thus far from the Ituri Project is Robert Bailey's own detailed look at the behavioral ecology of Pygmy men, an in-depth analysis of the range of activities in which men participate, differences among these men in the way each allocates time to these activities, and the differential costs and payoffs that accrue from their individual choices. Some readers may immediately become apprehensive at encountering a work that labels itself "behavioral ecology," fearing that such an approach of necessity holds that human behavior is genetically programmed. As Bailey himself is quick to point out, however, behavioral ecology in no way assumes or implies any sort of genetic determinism. Quite the contrary, behavioral ecology simply shifts the focus from organizations or institutions to individuals, and employs models that hold health, survival, and reproductive fitness as useful ways of assessing the degree to which particular individual choices and behaviors are successful or beneficial. As the reader will quickly discover, the kinds of insights that emerge from Bailey's study actually complement and dovetail beautifully with those from other intellectual traditions in anthropology. Clearly, what is ultimately needed is not a vote to decide which approach is the right one, but a means for integrating the insights from these differing perspectives into a single coherent framework. In this volume Bailey explores in detail what a focal sample of 16 Pygmy men in two different bands did with their time. He looks in depth at their hunting activities, documenting the amount of time each individual spent in the chase, the techniques each chose, variability in the number of individuals that hunted together, and the payoffs of these different options and strategies. He then looks at the way meat was shared among individuals, and the extent to which the share each received corresponded with his success as a hunter, his age, marital status, or wealth as measured by the number of his material possessions. Bailey also addresses the fascinating issue of "hypergyny," the upward marriage of Pygmy women to wealthy farmer men. His data show that hypergamous marriages significantly reduce the number of potential mates available to Pygmy men, forcing them to devote more time to hunting and other forest activities in order to compete more effectively for marriage partners. These and many other issues are explored with great clarity and perceptiveness by Bailey in this interesting and important contribution. The Museum of Anthropology of the University of Michigan takes great pride in publishing this volume, a substantially revised and expanded

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Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

version of his doctoral dissertation, making it widely available for the first time to the anthropological community. Bailey's study sheds important new light on one of the world's most fascinating and least known hunter-gatherer groups-the Ituri Forest Pygmies-and it will no doubt provide an invaluable resource for comparative studies, one that can be tapped by anthropologists for many years to come.

Preface

This book is a revised version of my doctoral dissertation, which was completed in 1985. It is principally about sixteen Efe Pygmy men and their families who lived in the northern Ituri Forest of northeastern Zaire. I lived and worked with them between March, 1980, and January, 1982, while conducting research for my doctoral dissertation. That research, and my subsequent work studying the biology and ecology of peoples living the Ituri Forest, was conducted as part of a long term multidisciplinary project, called the Ituri Project. The Efe are semi-nomadic, bow-and-arrow hunting people who hunt and gather forest resources for their own consumption and for trade to village-living, slash-and-burn horticulturalists. The villagers with whom the Efe trade, work, and sometimes live are the Sudanic-speaking Lese. The Lese are variously referred to, using the Kiswahili prefix, as the Walese, or, using the Bantu prefix, as the Balese. Most Lese refer to themselves in the plural as Balese, while the official governmental designation for the tribe is Walese. For the sake of simplicity only, I refer to them as Lese throughout this book. This research has its roots in behavioral ecology and stems from my previous studies of nonhuman primates. Having studied squirrel monkeys for two years in the Colombian Amazon and anubis baboons for several weeks in southern Kenya, I was committed to a career in the study of primate behavior and ecology. My goal was to understand the evolution of human behavior by making inferences from the behavioral ecology of our closest living relatives, nonhuman primates. In 1976 in southeastern Cameroon, having been previously overwhelmed by the broad diversity of peoples living in east and central Africa, I decided to xu£

XLV

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

take a more direct approach to the study of our own species. Why not study humans to try to understand the evolution of human behavior? If we could discover the factors that contributed to the variation in subsistence patterns and social organization that I had seen in Africa and the Amazon, we might ultimately derive principles that could allow us to infer processes at work for generations in the past. I became excited about applying some of the models and methods that I had learned as a primatologist to the study of the behavioral ecology of people. Coincidentally, at the time of this contemplated shift from nonhuman primates to humans, I was observing talapoin monkeys in the Dja Reserve in southeastern Cameroon with two families of Biaka Pygmies. Deep in the forest, far from any village or source of cultivated foods, the Biaka guided me and fed me foraged foods for ten days. Because they seemed so well integrated into their forest environment with a relatively simple technology, I decided then that Pygmies in central Africa would be the best people with whom to begin my studies of human behavioral ecology. In 1978 I returned to Africa to survey eight different Pygmy populations in six countries across central Africa and to find a suitable site to establish a long-term research project. After that difficult but immensely useful expedition, I began the Ituri Project in early 1980. This book consists of seven chapters. The first is an introduction that places the research in the context of anthropology and explains why the study focuses on time allocation and subsistence. The second chapter provides background information about the physical environment, the peoples of the Ituri region, and what is known about the history of the region and its people. The methods used in my research are described in Chapter 3 to permit readers to properly assess the reliability of the quantitative information presented in subsequent chapters. Chapters 4 and 5 are the meat of the book. Chapter 4 presents the results of quantitative observations of Efe men's activities and food production, and it discusses the differences between Efe men and women in subsistence behaviors. Chapter 5 focuses on hunting by Efe men. It provides data on the efficiency of different hunting techniques and tries to answer the question, "Why do men hunt in groups?" Chapter 6 examines individual differences between Efe men with respect to hunting success and how those differences relate to marital success and wealth. The last chapter discusses results of the research in light of previous views of the relationship between central African Pygmies and village-living horticulturalists. The last chapter also extends the discussion in Chapter 4 concerning sex differences in subsistence behavior by examining men's activities in the context of behaviors that maximize biological fitness. Very few names appear in this book. I refer to people using a threedigit identification number. If this seems depersonalizing, that is the

Acknowledgments

xv

intent. While it is extremely unlikely that the lives of the Efe and Lese will be much affected by what I write here, I would prefer to err on the side of anonymity rather than risk a person's suffering as a consequence of my research. Considering the persecution suffered by many Zairois during the Simba Rebellion in the mid-1960s for having associated with Europeans, I would like to minimize the means by which anyone can trace the people with whom I lived and worked so closely. Moreover, confidentiality was, in many cases, one of the preconditions of my working with the people. Plus, there is more than one case of an anthropologist's informant becoming such a celebrity that he and his family can find no peace among the travelers and publicists that hunt him to extract his version of the ethnography. For these reasons, people appear here mostly as numbers and few place names are provided. In the few cases where I have used names, they are pseudonyms. I will gladly supply the true names of people and a key to names and identification numbers to any serious scientist requiring them for his or her research.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS It is a pleasure to be able to acknowledge the generosity extended to me by so many people during the process of preparing for, undertaking, and reporting this work. The research was generously supported by the National Science Foundation through grants awarded to Irven DeVore. A grant to me from the National Geographic Society was instrumental in getting the Ituri Project started in 1980, and funds from the Leakey Foundation helped to support data entry and analyses. Research grants from the UCLA Academic Senate have been helpful during the revision process. The people who have helped me so much in Africa are too numerous to mention. The names of many I have forgotten, or never knew, but I shall never forget their generosity. The kindness of many missionaries in Zaire has been unfailing. I am especially grateful to the members of the Protestant missions at Nyankunde, Bunia, Lolwa, Mambasa, Akokora, and Isiro; to the Sisters and Fathers of the Catholic mission at Nduye; and to the pilots of the Mission Aviation Fellowship. Their generous assistance with transportation, communication, and medical support has been critical to the success of the project, and their hospitality and good company make fieldwork more pleasurable. I am especially grateful to the Barneses, Peg Cochran, Ruth and Richard Dix, the Etienne-Pfisters, Bill and Ella Spees, Pere Testa, and Bob Watt. Many others in Zaire offered hospitality, services, friendship, and information that facilitated our research and added to our enjoyment in the country.

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Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

I am grateful to them all, particularly Kurtz and Francesca von Wild, whose home has become Ngodingodi North, and Gisenya Bagire. I am grateful to the Government of Zaire for permission to conduct the research and to Dr. Kabamba Nkamany and his staff at the Nutrition Planning Center (CEPLANUT) in Kinshasa for their interest in the Ituri Project and their assistance in obtaining research clearance. I also thank Dr. Robert Franklin for bringing CEPLANUT and the Ituri Project together. Very special thanks go to the colleagues and friends with whom I shared the experience of fieldwork at Ngodingodi. I cannot imagine two better people to be in the field with than Richard Wrangham and Elizabeth Ross. I will always be grateful for their energy, good humor, intelligence, and friendship during our months together in Zaire. Richard helped to design parts of my research and he gave me many insights, some of which are imbedded in this dissertation. His creative ideas and constant enthusiasm have been truly inspiring. Without the support of Nadine Peacock I could never have undertaken nor completed this project. She helped to plan the research from the beginning; her intelligence and energy added new dimensions to the work; and her support gave me the courage and stamina to get through the most difficult periods. Working and learning together at Ngodingodi with Gilda Morelli, David Wilkie, and Steven Winn was always productive and fun. I also thank Bill Dietz, Ed Tronick, Nancy DeVore, and Barbara deZalduondo for assistance and friendship in the field. Other members of the Ituri Project deserve acknowledgement for sharing information and providing assistance, especially Peter Ellison, Jack Fisher, Helen Strickland, Hans Bode, and Mark Jenike. John Hart and Terese Hart have been informative and engaging colleagues always ready to share their refreshing ideas. Many colleagues and friends at Harvard and elsewhere provided advice, friendship, and support. Among them were: Stephen Bartz, Michael Billig, Nancy Black, Terrence Deacon, Nancy DeVore, Marjorie Ellias, Mart Fujita, Miriam Goheen, Andrew Hill, Glynn Isaac, Doona Leighton, David Marks, David Pilbeam, Anna Roosevelt, Fran Rudegeair, Thomas Rudegeair, Barbara Smuts, Charles Steele, Eric Trinkaus, John Tooby, John Watanabe, Susan Weld, and William Weld. For discussion of ideas and help with statistics, I especially thank Peter Ellison, Mark Leighton, Jim Moore, and John Noss. For invaluable help with data analyses I am very grateful to Marta Wenger, Victor Hoffman, and Robert Aunger. For her cheerfulness and accuracy during many hours of tedious data entry I am very grateful to Kristen Nygren. For helpful references and discussions during the process of revision

Acknowledgments

XVLl

I am grateful to Jared Diamond. Conversations with Kim Hill, Kristen Hawkes, Nick Blurton-Jones, Robert Boyd, Allen Johnson, Michael Raleigh, Joan Silk, Dwight Read, and Robert Aunger have also resulted in improvements. I am also indebted to Sally Horvath for her careful and expert attention to the details of editing the manuscript. Melvin Konner and John Whiting did much more than simply serve on my dissertation committee. Through example, as well as direct instruction, Mel helped me acquire the tools and the confidence to pursue human behavioral biology. John Whiting's reading of earlier drafts helped to improve the dissertation. However, his contribution goes far beyond that. I am very grateful to him and to Beatrice Whiting for their interest and support. There will never be two better role models for people starting their professional careers. To Irven DeVore I am grateful for so much. He took a chance back in 1976 and I have been reaping the rewards ever since. Thanks to his energy and vision, the facilities, funds, the human resources, and the perfect mix of sage advice and unfettered freedom were always there. Working with him closely was without doubt the greatest priveledge of my graduate career. I am grateful to my parents, Charles and Katharine Bailey who, despite certain doubt, ma.de numerous sacrifices to support my addiction for the remote and bizarre. Thanks to my brother, Charles Bailey Jr., for his constant interest, and to my sister, Katherine Bailey, who was really the one to entice me down a different path. Finally, I wish to thank the people in Zaire with whom I lived and worked. Thanks to Chief Endite Sukali and his family for their interest and enthusiastic cooperation, and to the many Lese and Efe who made the research possible. I am especially grateful to the sixteen Efe men who allowed me to shadow them for one year, and to their families for allowing me into their lives. To them I wish to express my very deepest gratitude. It would hardly be fair to acknowledge the help all these people without absolving them of all responsibility for what finally appears here. The flaws and errors are all my own and remain despite the good efforts of all those mentioned above.

1 Introduction

Each of the three principal branches of anthropology has focused considerable attention on hunting and gathering, primarily because it was the mode of existence throughout human evolution until just 10,000 years ago. Archaeologists have studied the behavior of contemporary hunter-gatherers in order to analyze how the archaeological record might have been generated by humans and their closest precursors in the distant past. They use contemporary patterns of behavior as models that are then tested in the fossil and archaeological record (Binford 1978, 1983; Gould 1978; Yellen 1977). Biological anthropologists, using the framework of natural selection theory, have attempted to discover ecological and social constraints acting on contemporary hunter-gatherers and to infer the variables that may have been working during much of human evolution (Hill 1982; Lee and DeVore 1968; Lovejoy 1981; Tanner 1981). Social anthropologists have used hunter-gatherer studies primarily to examine patterns of associations between subsistence systems, social organizations, economies, and technologies (Steward 1936, 1955; Forde 1934; Sahlins 1972; Woodburn 1980; Meillassoux 1973). The nature and goals of the research by the three major branches of anthropology have overlapped to some extent. Certainly, for example, archaeologists, biological anthropologists, and cultural ecologists alike have concerned themselves with the demographic aspects (population

1

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Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

densities, settlement patterns, fertility and mortality rates) of huntergatherers, and the basic principles of ecology, even if applied differently, have provided much common ground. Archaeologists, particularly, have shared with sociocultural anthropologists an interest in ethnography and with biological investigators an appreciation for the process of evolution by natural selection. Despite the convergence of these lines of inquiry into the nature and significance of contemporary hunting and gathering peoples, such studies are, as Barnard (1983:210) points out, "in a state of disequilibrium." We now find ourselves with a collection of studies mostly lacking in theory, tending to be uncoordinated, and remaining at a relatively low descriptive level (Gross 1976). A large number of studies have been conducted, yet we have been able to discern very few regularities among them; the results of the studies are simply not comparable. Yet as anthropologists we are engaged in an endeavor which, possibly more than any other discipline within the human sciences, is committed to the comparative perspective. Anthropology seeks to uncover regularities among the diversity of human biological and cultural features. It examines variation to develop generalizations, and, ultimately, its highest goal is to find general principles underlying variation in human behavIOr. In the case of hunter-gatherer studies we have so far developed numerous typologies and normative portraits of band societies (e.g., Steward 1936, 1955; Service 1962; Williams 1974; Jochim 1976; Watanabe 1978; Woodburn 1980; Testart 1981). Such typological approaches ignore or attempt to explain away diversity rather than grapple with variation and the causes of it. Instead, we should be trying to develop and test models of ecological causation and adaptive change using variation to advantage. By seeking the predictors of variation among contemporary hunter-gatherers, we may discover the prevalence of those predictors and their effects in the past (Ember 1978; Smith and Winterhalder 1981). In order to accomplish this we must design our studies to arrive at closely comparable results. As they stand, the cross-cultural data available for comparative purposes are mostly inadequate. George Murdock lamented the serious lack of agreed-upon standards among researchers in their ethnographic reporting (Murdock 1972), and others have expressed how this lack has caused cross-cultural theory to suffer (Johnson 1978). There have been advances in controlled and theoretically oriented cross-cultural research (e.g., White, Burton, and Dow 1981) that have uncovered a number of relationships between subsistence systems and socialization techniques (Whiting and Whiting 1975), fertility (Ember 1984), polygyny (Ember 1974; White, Burton, and Dow 1981), female status (Whyte 1978), and

Introduction

3

infant care (Nerlove 1974). However, lack of confidence still remains over the validity of comparing ethnographic reports that include scant explanation of methodological procedure. Theoretical advances are possible only if reliability exists (Pelto 1970; Goodenough 1970; Johnson 1978). This study is rooted in the conviction that convincing theory cannot be generated without reliable facts. In order to uncover regularities among various human societies and to discover underlying causes of variation, it is necessary to have reliable measures of significant socioecological features within the full variety of societies. To be reliable our measures must be quantitative whenever possible and collected using methods that are broadly applicable, precisely described, and repeatable. This is not to say that there is no room in anthropology for humanistic studies and traditional ethnographic description. Indeed, these and quantitative observational studies are essential complements to one another, because the former provide valuable insights into the motivations that drive the observed behaviors. However, traditional ethnographic description tends not to be good for cross-cultural comparison since there are few controls on data collection and the data are even more subject to alternative interpretations than quantitative research. Throughout, then, this study was guided by a commitment to the comparative perspective in anthropology through a conviction that human societies are amenable to quantitative research that aims to test hypotheses and measure socioecological variables of importance for cross-cultural research.

THEORY AND CHOICE OF VARIABLES Of course, the variables one chooses to measure cannot be determined in a theoretical vacuum. As Lewontin (1974:8) states: "We cannot go out and describe the world in any old way we please and then sit back and demand that an explanatory and predictive theory be built on that description." What facts we pay attention to must be dictated by our preconceptions of what variables are essential for making meaningful generalities. In choosing the variables measured in this study I was guided by both previous studies of hunting and gathering societies and by the theoretical perspective of behavioral ecology. Behavioral ecology is not a unified body of theory but rather an orientation to a suite of behavioral studies and theoretical models that have the organic processes of evolution as their underlying framework (Krebs and Davies 1984). It has drawn extensively on field studies in animal behavior and been strongly influenced by evolutionary ecology

4

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

and classical ethnology. Only recently have the principles and methods of behavioral ecology been explicitly applied to the study of contemporary human societies (e.g., Bailey 1983; Bailey and Aunger 1989a; Betzig, Borgerhoff Mulder and Turke 1988; Chagnon and Irons 1979; Hawkes et al. 1985; Hill 1983; Kaplan 1983; Smith 1984; Smith and Winterhalder 1981; Turke and Betzig 1985). One very significant contribution that the perspective of behavioral ecology can bring to anthropology is an overriding emphasis on differences between individuals. Often in the past anthropologists have used the household, the village, or the society as a whole as the study unit, and they have attempted to show how a complex of behaviors creates or maintains the unit under study-often assuming a priori that the unit itself, and thus the behavior, is "adaptive." This approach, which often leads to tautologies, is in part a product of an emphasis upon viewing human social structures as the products of organizations and institutions constraining individuals. Through the perspective of behavioral ecology we view organizations and institutions as the products of the behavior of individuals managing relationships and taking a strong hand in creating the social environment about them. The approach of behavioral ecology is to recognize that the interests and abilities of individuals vary, and that those interests may be different from, or indeed in conflict with, those of other individuals and with the efficient functioning of the group or society as a whole. It also recognizes that there may be a variety of means or strategies to attain similar ends and that different strategies may have a variety of outcomes (Daly and Wilson 1983). Variation, then, becomes the focus of analysis; variation in the behavioral and physical characteristics of individuals is analyzed as a function of critical socioecological variables. The variables that are of concernthose that relate to peoples' health, survival, and reproductive successare the same that have traditionally concerned ecological anthropologists and cultural ecologists. They include such features as work effort, food production and consumption, morbidity, marital history, and fertility. These, among others, become the foci for studies because they are either direct or indirect measures of reproductive fitness. Since there has been some confusion in the past about certain aspects of behavioral ecology and the application of evolutionary theory to humans, it is prudent to make a disclaimer: ecological models and the assumptions on which they are based need not assume direct genetic causation of behavioral variation. If there is anyone feature that best characterizes the human species it is the capacity to respond to a broad range of environmental (including sociocultural) circumstances. The behavior of humans is extremely labile, capable of fine gradations and multifarious complexities. This capability arises from the use of behav-

Introduction

5

ior-generating mechanisms (e.g., our central nervous system, body physiology, etc.) that are the products of evolution by natural selection. These physical features are what give individuals the ability to respond to a great variety of complex environments and situations. It is this human capacity for making complex decisions that has a genetic basis; the specific behaviors themselves are not, nor are they assumed to be, under specific genetic control. (For more complete discussion of the genetic basis of human behavior see Ehrman and Parsons 1976; Seger 1976; Konner 1982; Plomin, DeFries and McClearn 1990.) Besides its emphasis on variation, behavioral ecology contributes to anthropology by insisting upon the scientific method. Behavioral ecology compels attention to the formulation of testable hypotheses, to the consideration of alternative hypotheses, and to careful testing procedures. Often behavioral ecology assumes some goal or maximization-as do functionalism and other theoretical perspectives in anthropology-but it makes these explicit aspects of the research. This permits the investigation of a broad diversity of specific topics which, through neo-Darwinian theory, are coherently related to each other. Ultimately, even those anthropologists who cannot accept the application of evolutionary theory to contemporary human societies will nevertheless appreciate the efficacy of an approach that provides the reliable, quantitative observational data that are indispensable for making meaningful comparisons between societies.

THE INFLUENCE OF PREVIOUS STUDIES OF PYGMIES Because Pygmies have held the fascination of Europeans since before the time of Homer, it is not surprising that there are literally hundreds of references to Pygmies in anthropological literature (see Plisnier-Ladame 1965). There have been several dozen anthropological studies of the various Pygmy populations across central Africa, but only a few have been ecologically oriented (e.g., Bahuchet 1972, 1975, 1978, 1979; Bailey and Aunger 1989b; Wilkie 1989a, b). Of the approximately twelve Pygmy populations across central Africa, there is no Pymgy population living in the forests of central Africa subsisting independently of village-living horticulturalists (Cavalli-Sforza 1986). Today, of the approximately 170,000 Pygmies distributed across the Congo (CavalliSforza 1986; Murdock 1968), none are known to live more than a few weeks without relying on agricultural food. All known Pygmy groups have close ties with at least one group of horticulturalists with whom they exchange forest products-mostly meat and honey-and labor for cultivated foods and iron implements. In most areas many groups have

6

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

turned to cultivating their own crops for part of the year and many Pygmies earn some wages on plantations or logging operations. Those Pygmies who still subsist independently of market economies and their own cultivated plots, however, are all involved with villagers in a relationship that provides them with a significant amount of cultivated foods and which extends beyond economic exchange to most other aspects of their lives (Bailey 1982; Peacock 1984). Therefore, to fully understand Efe subsistence patterns and the relationship of these patterns to the social and ecological environment, the Efe cannot be considered an isolated population of forest hunter-gatherers. Virtually every aspect of Efe existence is affected by, and has effects on, Lese villager life. Therefore, the Efe and other Pygmy groups must be studied not only within the context of their ecological setting-the seasonal tropical forest-but also in the context of their close and longstanding social and economic relationships with their village-living neighbors. In order to fully understand the current socioecology of Efe groups and to come to hypotheses concerning preagricultural hunting and gathering peoples in the tropical forest, it is important to assess the Efe-Lese relationship and to identify the constraints that interactions with villagers place upon Efe subsistence patterns and social relations. Ever since the German botanist-explorer Georg Schweinfurth arrived in the Ituri region in 1870, the Pygmy-villager relationship has been the object of much attention and controversy. Schweinfurth himself saw Pygmies as "the remnants of a declining race," the original forest huntergatherers who were no longer able to subsist in the forest without the assistance of the domestic foods and iron implements of the Bantu (Schweinfurth 1874:146). The first anthropologist to work in the Ituri, Paul Schebesta, recognized that villagers derived some benefits from their association with Pygmies; however, like Schweinfurth, he felt Pygmies were so dependent upon villagers that he often referred to the Efe as "vassals" and to the villagers as their "negro overlords." To Schebesta, the Efe, whom he studied in 1930 and again in 1934, were unable to subsist without supplemental agricultural foods: " ... the pygmies have long since arrived at such a stage that they cannot depend on themselves alone for their daily needs" (Schebesta 1936: lOS). Schebesta's accounts (1936, 1937) emphasized that the dependence of the Efe on the agriculturalists extended beyond trade in iron and cultivated foods to political and ritual life as well. The anthropologist who has written the most concerning the Mbuti of the Ituri and their relationships with villagers is Colin Turnbull (Turnbull 1961, 1965a, b, 1968, 1972). Turnbull has emphasized ideological and social differences between two separate cultures; the Mbuti are

Introduction

7

primarily forest people while the Bantu are village farmers. While acknowledging exchanges of wild and domestic foods between the two cultures, Turnbull feels these were neither regular nor necessary for either side. Since the forest is capable of supplying all their needs and wants, the Mbuti are not dependent upon village products for their subsistence. The truth of the matter is simply that the village offers, for a brief while, an agreeable change of pace, an opportunity for a relaxation that is not always possible in the forest, and, one might say, better hunting, on occasion .... [T]he dependence that follows is as voluntary as it is temporary. [Tumbull196Sb:37)

It is only fair to point out that Turnbull conducted most of his research in Epulu in the central part of the Ituri among the net-hunting Mbutinot the Efe in the northern Ituri, where this study is based. He did spend an unspecified amount of time in some fifteen Efe camps (1965a:317) and agreed with Patrick Putnam (Putnam 1948:333) that the Mbuti net-hunters depend more on the forest for their subsistence, and the Efe are more dependent upon the garden produce they receive from villagers in exchange for protecting the gardens from the ravages of game animals (Turnbull 1965b:301). lohn Hart, working with Mbuti net-hunters in the southern Ituri, expressed yet a different view. He saw the relationship there as one of balanced mutual dependency whereby the Mbuti supplied villagers with protein in the form of hunted meat in return for carbohydrates in the form of agricultural produce. In Hart's view, neither side derived an advantage over the other; Mbuti and villager were locked into a mutual interdependence with neither group gaining to the detriment of the other (Hart, 1979). Faced with these conflicting views of the relationship between the BaMbuti and their village neighbors, one of the aims of this study was to quantify the degree to which the Efe rely upon the Lese villagers for their subsistence. Ideally we would like to be able to test the hypothesis that the Efe are able to subsist in the forest independently of villager food and other material goods. This is not practicable, however, since it could be done only by asking a population of Efe to live in the forest with no contact with other peoples for several generations. Whether or not Efe could survive alone in the forest today is a different issue from whether or not any population has ever existed independently of agriculture in the Ituri Forest. This latter possibility has been discussed elsewhere (Bailey and Peacock 1988; Bailey et al. 1989). If Efe could survive today purely by hunting and gathering forest resources without the use of iron implements and without supplementing their diet with

8

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

domesticated food plants is a question that might be answerable using an experimental, ecological and behavioral research design. However, the fact is that today the Efe do not live such an independent life. Consequently, it was one of the objects of this study to measure the agricultural contribution to the Efe diet versus the contribution of hunted and gathered foods, and to measure what proportion of each is garnered through exchange with Lese and what proportion is acquired by the Efe directly. These were important variables to measure not only because they would finally provide quantitative information on the economic relations between a Pygmy population and their associated agriculturalists, but also they would give us per capita estimates of food intake by food type and by season. Related to the question of Efe dependence upon the presence of agriculturalists are measures of time allocation. To what extent are Efe subsistence activities directed toward agriculture and the village as opposed to hunting and gathering in the forest? Is the labor necessary to garner calories and protein from the forest more or less than to get them from the village gardens? Are some individuals better than others at subsistence tasks and, if so, what consequences might this have for other aspects of their lives? In designing behavioral observations I was guided by both a commitment to detecting differences between individuals, and a need to answer these questions concerning Efe's orientation toward the forest and the village.

2 The Study Area and Its Inhabitants

THE PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT The Efe inhabit the !turi Forest which lies on the northeastern lip of the Zaire River Basin at an altitude between 700 and 1,000 meters. This area contains the largest number and greatest biomass of faunal species of any forested area of comparable size in Africa, and 15 percent of the species are endemic (Rahm 1966; Bigalke 1968). The Ituri is bounded in the north and northeast by open savanna, in the east by the rich highlands formed by the uplifting and vulcanization associated with the Western Rift Valley, and it is contiguous with the lowland forest to the south and west where its rivers drain into the Zaire River. The southern portions of the Ituri Forest, which extend to the equator, are gently undulating, but to the north, in the area of our studies, there are frequent outcroppings of smooth, basal granite rising several hundred feet above the forest. The climax forest vegetation of the Ituri is characterized by three dominant species of tall, hardwood legumes in the subfamily Caesalpineaceae. In the south and west, Gilbertiodendron deweverei dominates to such an extent that it can constitute 90 percent of the standing vegetation. In the area of our studies, mixed-species stands of Cynometra alexandrii and Brachystegia laurentii dominate the climax forest

9

10

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

.......

·'··r'·"·;;;;)j. Y~~::-::-..:.: __ ....

"";'" Isiro j~\

fturl Project research station

".:

'·

..._....

6

roads .................. . 0°

Forest savannah ecotone / / / / / / /

---

o

Kilometers 50

Figure 2.1. The Ituri Forest region in northeast Zaire showing the location of the Ituri Project research station, Ngodingodi. The forest savanna ecotone lies just north of the study site within a day's walk.

vegetation with a number of other tall species interspersed between these codominants (e.g., Albizia zygia, Celtis mildibraedii, and Ficus spp.). The upper canopy reaches 40-50 meters in height and is discontinuous. This allows considerable light to penetrate the interior of the forest and in many places Marantaceae herbs (particularly stands of Ataenidia conferta and Thaumatococcus danielli, known locally as mongongo) cover the forest floor. Along the moist bottoms and in swampy headwater regions tall trees are few; palms, woody vines and dense stands of marantaceous herbs predominate making these difficult areas to traverse.

The Effects of Human Occupation It is unknown how long humans have inhabited the Ituri and what patterns of subsistence they may have used to exploit the environment.

The Study Area

11

Largely based upon their small stature and obvious skills at exploiting the forest, it has become the conventional wisdom that Pygmies were living by hunting and gathering in this area for many generations prior to the introduction of agriculture by Bantu some two thousand years ago (Cavalli-Sforza 1977, 1986; Hart 1979; Hiernaux 1977; Murdock 1959; 1968; Tanno 1981; Turnbull 1965a, 1968). We do know that there were humans living in the Ituri region at least as far back as 40,700 B. P., but the ecology of the area was different from what it is today. Excavations by Van Noten at Matupi Cave, which is presently situated within the rain forest, strongly indicate that the area was savanna from before 40,000 until at least 2900 B.P., and possibly as recently as 720 B.P. (Van Noten 1977). Given this evidence, we know that people were living in the geographical region of the Ituri prior to the domestication of plants and animals, but the habitat at the time appears to have been woodland and savanna-not the moist tropical forest of today. Conventional wisdom to the contrary, there exists no convincing evidence that Pygmies or any other people have ever lived entirely by gathering and hunting in an African rain forest environment (Bailey et al. 1989; Bailey and Peacock 1988). As for the antiquity of occupation of the Ituri by agriculturalists, we have no clear date. The upper level at Matupi, dated at 790 B.P., contained Iron Age artifacts which would suggest the presence of agriculturalists by the twelfth century, but we have no evidence of agriculture before that time. However, given what is known about the spread of Bantu and Sudanic languages, iron-working, and pottery, it is very probable that people practicing some form of agriculture have been present in the Ituri region two thousand years or more (David 1980; Ehret 1982; Phillipson 1977). No matter what is the antiquity of occupation, the mixed CynometraBrachystegia forest that is the current mature vegetation type of the northern Ituri has been much disturbed by human occupation over the last few hundred years at least. The presence of agriculturalists practicing long-fallow, shifting, slash-and-burn horticulture has resulted in a present patchwork of climax vegetation mixed with all stages of successional growth. Walking long distances through the forest one realizes the extent to which the forest is variegated by old village sites and their adjacent gardens. Some were apparently cleared so long ago that they are barely distinguishable from the contiguous climax vegetation; others were cleared within the memories of the oldest living people; and some patches of secondary forest were cleared as recently as 1964-{iS when the villagers fled into the forest far from the road and the perilous turmoil of the Simba Rebellion. While some of the old settlement and garden sites are in the advanced stages of succeeding to the mature vegetation

12

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

type, others, for as yet unknown reasons, are devoid of emergent trees and have generated dense stands of herbaceous growth (these are considered by the Efe to be the habitats favored by the largest game animals, forest buffalo and elephant). Areas cleared more recently are a tangle of lianas and shrubs beneath emerging hardwood trees; and still others are in less advanced stages of succession with large stands of the initial fast-growing emergent known as the parasol tree (Musanga cecropioides). These various seral patches combined with river valleys, swampy headwaters, rock outcroppings, and the most recent village and garden sites near the road, produce a mosaic of diverse habitats that provide cover and food for the greatest biomass of mammalian species in forested Africa (Wilkie 1989). As long as human population densities have remained low and the traditional pattern of shifting horticulture has been sustained, there has been a continuous creation and regeneration of habitats more productive than the climax vegetation type. In secondary habitats, such as those created by shifting agriculture, more of the energy available to the plants is channeled into growth and reproductive parts and less into defensive mechanisms or the maintenance of structural parts (Ricklefs 1973; Odum 1969). Since the reproductive parts-flowers, fruits, and seedsare just those parts that are most edible to insects, birds, and mammals, a greater biomass of faunal species is created. The present patchwork of different successional stages intermixed with climax habitats is a more productive environment, with a greater abundance of animals for human exploitation than the pristine primary tropical rain forest ( e. g., Peterson 1981).

PEOPLES INHABITING THE ITURI FOREST There are currently four populations of Pygmies, collectively called the BaMbuti, living in the Ituri Forest. They are not separate populations in a demographic sense as they are continuously distributed geographically, and they intermarry, but they are differentiated by language and, in many respects, by custom and technology. Many of the differences between the four BaMbuti are attributable to the long-term association each has had with a different tribe of Sudanic- or Bantu-speaking horticulturalist. Each BaMbuti tribe speaks the same language and has many of the same cultural practices as the tribe of village-living horticulturalists with whom it associates. The most-studied BaMbuti by far are those living in the central and southern portions of the Ituri associated with the Bantu-speaking Babila (Harako 1976; Hart 1978, 1979; Ichikawa 1978, 1981; Putnam 1948;

The Study Area

13

Tanno 1976, 1981; Turnbull 1961, 1965a,b, 1968, 1972). The Babila are relatively recent immigrants to the forest, having expanded (or been pushed) from the savanna in the east perhaps as recently as the last two hundred years. The Mbuti have traditional exchange relationships with the Babila (Turnbull 1965b), but in most areas there is also an extensive commercial meat trade whereby outsiders coming from more populated areas walk long distances into the forest to trade food, salt, soap, and cloth for wild game killed by the net-hunting Mbuti (Hart 1978). The Sua (or Tswa) are a population of BaMbuti associated with the Babudu and Bandaka on the western edge of the Ituri (Schebesta 1937). Like the Mbuti, Sua are net-hunters, and they engage in extensive barter with meat traders who come from Wamba. A third population of BaMbuti, called the Aka (but also Tswa), live in association with the Mangbetu and the Azande in the northwest in what is now mostly savanna (Schebesta 1937). There are few Aka left. Many may have fled to the south and east to become Sua and Efe in the late nineteenth century when the Azande and the Arabs took control of the Isiro area (Heim 1979); others may have migrated to other areas as the forest became badly degraded during this century. Of the few Aka that remain, most are now living as settled agriculturalists and wage laborers on the many plantations in the area. A fourth population of BaMbuti, the Efe, have the broadest distribution extending over most of the northern Ituri down to the southeast near Beni. The Efe are associated with the many subtribes of the Sudanicspeaking Mamvu and Lese. They have been described in greatest detail previously by Schebesta (1936, 1937). The subjects of our studies are the Efe living in association with a subtribe of the Lese called the Walese Dese, in the northern Ituri near the forest-savanna ecotone. The Walese, also called the Balese or the Lese by ethnographers and by local people, are referred to throughout this work as Lese. In addition to these four populations of BaMbuti and the tribes of horticulturalists with whom they associate, there are other peoples who in recent years have been immigrating in increasing numbers from the highly populated areas around the forest. While much of the Ituri still has fewer than four inhabitants per square kilometer, it is surrounded by districts that support the highest population densities in all of Zaire outside of the capital, Kinshasa. Running along the southeastern boundary of the Ituri are the rich slopes of the Ruwenzori and the Virungas. This is the most agriculturally productive area in all of Zaire providing large quantities of food that are transported westward through the Ituri to Kisangani and sometimes beyond to Kinshasa. Population growth in these highland districts has been rapid, and competition for land has induced increasing numbers of people (particularly the Banande) to spill

14

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

down the western slopes into the forest in search of unclaimed land and opportunity. Similarly, competition for land along the northeastern and northern edge of the Ituri-the forest-savanna ecotone--is nearly as intense. Consequently population densities are increasing rapidly along the edges of the forest and along the main road to Kisangani that bisects the Ituri into its northern and southern halves. Large portions of the forest are being cleared for small-scale settlements and cultivation, and meathungry populations are reaching deep into the forest to exploit the animal populations that are now declining measurably (Hart 1978, 1979). Already in some areas, a once-healthy meat trade has collapsed because the forest has been so depleted of animals. In other areas (in the northwest near Wamba and Isiro and in the southeast near Beni) the forest has been degraded to such an extent that the BaMbuti and their shifting agricultural partners have been forced to concede their traditional lands or to live in permanent settlements and work as wage laborers (Bailey 1982). The processes of change that are concomitant with population pressure and commercialization are underway to varying degrees throughout the Ituri. No BaMbuti or villager population has been isolated from these forces nor will they be in the future. We should make every attempt not to ignore or minimize the impact of these factors upon the economic and social relationships of the people. This is particularly important if the results of our research are to have value for making cross-cultural comparisons and for testing hypotheses generated from ecological and evolutionary theory.

THE STUDY AREA AND STUDY POPULATIONS I conducted my research among the Lese and Efe living in the most northern section of the chiefdom (collectivite) of the Walese Dese. The area is sometimes referred to by local residents as Malembi after a small river by the same name. I chose it as a suitable long-term study site in 1978 after surveying eight different Pygmy populations in six countries across central Africa. There are many reasons why Malembi was determined the most desirable site for a long-term project, but most of them relate to the very poor condition of the road that runs through the center of the area and serves as the main means of trade and communication with the rest of Zaire. The road was built by the Belgian administration using primarily local labor in 1943 and it was widened and improved in 1957. Since the Simba Rebellion in 1964--D5 the road has fallen into such a state of disrepair that passage by commercial trucking is prohibi-

The Study Area

15

tively risky. Because of the very poor condition of the road, this area has been largely abandoned by Zairian, Greek or Belgian entrepreneurs interested in establishing or maintaining a commercial enterprise. Several coffee plantations that existed south of Malembi were abandoned in the mid-1960s and have since been reclaimed by the forest. The population densities within and surrounding the study area have remained low in comparison to other areas within the Ituri region. A commercial meat trade has not developed within the Malembi area as it has to the south among the Mbuti and to the west among the Sua and the Efe who live in the area of forest near Wamba. This means that one disrupting influence on the traditional relationship between village farmer and BaMbuti is not operating in the study area. Another potential disrupting influence, coffee plantations, does exist on the edge of the study area to the north. Several Lese and Efe who live within the area, but who were not part of the behavioral samples, periodically work as casual laborers on the plantations. For the most part, however, the traditional economic system, whereby Lese practice slash-and-burn horticulture to raise subsistence crops to trade with the Efe for forest products and labor, continues to be the mode of subsistence for the people within our study area. This will continue to be true as long as the road remains in its present deteriorated state and as long as large areas of forest to the east and west remain inaccessible to commercial exploitation.

Sample Populations The total number of village-living horticulturalists within the overall chiefdom of the Lese Dese is approximately 2,300; of these about 1,900 are Lese Dese and the rest are from other Bantu- and Sudanic-speaking tribes. The total number of Efe in the chiefdom varies widely, but approximately 1,000 Efe live in association with the 1,900 Lese at any one time. Our studies concentrate on 14 Lese villages stretched along 18 kilometers of road from Malembi to Dingbo. These villages range in size from 15 to 100 people and the total number of horticulturalists living in them is approximately 550. At anyone time, up to 470 Efe may be living in association with these 14 villages. The demographic data presented in this study come from reproductive and marital histories collected mainly from these 550 and 470 people. Most of my research other than demography and anthropometry focuses on a subsample of villages that are within walking distance of the research station, called Ngodingodi. This station was established by myself (with a great deal of help from all the local people) in April, 1980. Within three kilometers of Ngodingodi there are five Lese villages with

16

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

140 to 190 residents. These were the foci of studies of the behavioral ecology of the Lese conducted by Ross and Wrangham from November, 1980, through August, 1981. During the course of my research, from March, 1980, through January, 1982, the number of Efe living in association with the five villages that comprised the target study area varied from 70 to 140 people. They were distributed among three to seven temporary living sites that were placed in or near the villages or in the forest up to an eight-hour walk from the road. This amount of variation in the number of Efe living in an area is not unusual; entire bands frequently move several days' walking distance to another area to establish, or more usually reestablish, an affiliation with another village (Bailey and Peacock 1988). My most intensive studies focused upon the Efe men who were members of two different but affiliated bands, the Andikodi and the Andikeke, who had long-term traditional exchange relationships with four of the five villages studied by Ross and Wrangham. When I started behavioral observations there were 14 men in the two bands. I included all of these men in the sample for purposes of behavioral observations. During the course of the study, most of these men migrated in and out of the area, as did other men who were not in the original sample but who were added later. In the end, 16 Efe men became the principal subjects of my focal behavioral observations (see Chapter 2 for methods). The Lese Dese The first mention of the Lese by early European explorers is by Henry Morton Stanley, who describes the Lese settlements he raided during his expedition across the Congo to "rescue" Emin Pasha (Stanley 1890). There are several brief reports on the history and cultivation practices of the Lese by early Belgian administrators (see Geluwe 1957), the most complete and reliable by far being that of Baltus (1949). One brief ethnography has been published by Joset (1949). Grinker's (1989) dissertation is the most complete ethnographic account of the Lese Dese. He studied the Lese who are the trading partners of the Efe bands I worked with, and his research focused on seeing the Efe-Lese relationship from the villager point of view. Schebesta's extensive accounts of the Efe contain some information concerning their "patrons," the Lese (Schebesta 1936, 1937). According to several sources, the Lese were originally pastoralists who were pushed into the forest some two hundred years ago as a result of the Zande expansion (Joset 1949; Geluwe 1957). There is actually little information to support such a notion, especially since the Azande did not appreciably disturb the Mangbetu and other peoples to the

The Study Area

17

immediate north of the Lese until after 1870, and the Lese were well established in the forest long before that time (Keirn 1979). Indeed, there is considerable circumstantial evidence to indicate that the Lese have inhabited the Ituri longer than the other horticultural groups residing there now. The current distribution of all the Lese subtribes covers most of the Ituri Forest, but it is discontinuous where other groups (e.g., the Banande in the south and the Babila in the center) have more recently made incursions along the main tracks and trade routes. All of these recent immigrants maintain many more of the vestiges of their savanna and highland origins than do the Lese, such as round house structures, more intensive cropping techniques and more elaborate food processing (Geluwe 1960). Given the current distribution of the different linguistic and tribal groups in the Ituri, it makes most sense that for several hundred years peoples speaking Sudanic languages belonging to the Mamvu-Lese group were living in small, shifting settlements that were sparsely, but continuously distributed from the Bomakande River on the forest-savanna edge south to a latitude as far as Beni. These people probably differentiated themselves from others mainly on the basis of language, since they had no tribal organization, no centralized authority, and probably no tribal identity beyond that which came from forming loose alliances based upon kinship and marriage between neighboring villages. Hard evidence for this view of the distribution and social organization of horticulturalists in the northern !turi is lacking. We can be quite confident that until 1924-1927 when the Belgians imposed a system of petty chieftainships, the Lese and Mamvu lived in small, shifting settlements dispersed throughout the forest and organized on the basis of segmented patrilineages (Baltus 1949; Geluwe 1957). The people who are today called the Lese Dese, for example, are an amalgamation of some fourteen lineages that were spread across the northern Ituri until 1943 when they were forced together along the Mambasa-Mungbere road by the Belgians. Most of the Lese Dese were brought by the Belgians from the area of forest to the west of the current road. After Zaire obtained independence in 1960, approximately 25 percent of these Lese Dese returned to their traditional lands several days' walk west from the road to live in small shifting forest villages. During the 1980s, but after my study was completed, most of these "forest Lese" were forced by the authorities to move back to the road again. Throughout my study and still today Lese who reside along the road make periodic and sometimes extended trips to the forest villages to visit relatives, hide from the police, hunt elephant and other game, trade with the Babudu near Wamba, or just relax and get away from the whirligig of the road.

18

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

Some other people who are also now called Lese Dese were originally settled in the area of forest that is now traversed by the road and to the east. Some of the lineages with whom these people were closely tied were forced out of the forest to another road some two days' walk to the northeast near Baitebe, and others were taken south to what is now the chiefdom of the Lese Karo. Therefore, these Lese Dese make periodic and extended visits to Baitebe in the north and to Nduye in the south, and their traditional lands comprise the forest and patches of savanna to the northeast of the road. Their identities and allegiances, as well as those of the people living within other Belgian-formed subtribes of the Mamvu and Lese, are based less upon their affiliation to the Lese Dese than upon their particular segmented lineage and the land that the lineage has traditionally exploited. The Lese along the road within my study area still live in small villages of 15 to 100 people. Residence is mainly virilocal, and settlements are composed of patriclans segmented into shallow lineages. Wives were once obtained principally through "sister exchange," but now payment of bridewealth is the preferred method of marriage. Within the study area 21 percent of Lese men are married polygynously, and the maximum number of wives married to one man is four. Except for the chieftainship which tends to remain within the same lineage, there are neither inherited offices nor sources of inherited wealth. Gardens are cleared by men within several hundred yards of the village and cultivated for one to two years before a new patch of climax or late successional forest is cleared. Each year each household clears an average of 0.35 hectares of land. They cultivate primarily cassava and bananas for subsistence and peanuts and rice as cash crops. These cash crops and small amounts of coffee are sold to the few merchants who are willing to expose their vehicles to the treacherous conditions of the road. Average annual income per Lese household is less than $50 (u. s.). Once gardens are cleared, most, but by no means all, of the labor put into planting, weeding, harvesting, and processing the crops is done by women. In addition to cassava, bananas, peanuts, and rice, the Lese also cultivate sweet potato, corn, squash, beans, sesame, and occasionally taro and yams. Their primary source of fat is oil from the palm, Elaeis guineensis, which is cooked with the leaves of cassava to produce a staple called sombe. Meat and fish are also cooked with palm oil. Although fishing in the small streams around the village is a frequent and favorite activity of Lese women, fish do not account for a significant proportion of their diet. Most Lese own a few chickens, but only four households out of approximately two hundred own goats and none own pigs. Domestic animals are not slaughtered except on rare ritual occasions and are thus not a regular source of meat. Meat is acquired by a

The Study Area

19

few Lese by using snares which are set in the forest within ten kilometers of the village. During my study, over half of the meat eaten by Lese came from Efe to whom Lese give cultivated food or other material goods in return.

The Efe The Efe are mentioned by the earliest Europeans to reach the northern Ituri area (Schweinfurth 1874; Pasha 1888; Stanley 1890; Casati 1891; Junkers 1892). Before the lturi Project began, they were most studied by Schebesta (1936, 1937), who spent several weeks in 1930 at, among other places, Nduye, just 65 km south of our study site. Harako's (1976) study at Lolwa compared the hunting patterns of a band of net-hunting Mbuti with a band of Efe archers. Tereshima (1983) studied several bands of Efe east of Nduye near Andili in 1978-1979. Like Harako, he concentrated his research on hunting, and his results suggest that Efe archers are as efficient as Mbuti net-hunters. Turnbull (1965a, b) included observations of Efe settlement patterns and social organization which served as comparisons to similar information on Mbuti. The Efe live in small temporary encampments of three to fifty residents. The size and composition of camps are very flexible, divisions occuring at the level of the household; however, residence is primarily viripatrilocal and most camps are composed of loose patriclans. For example, censuses from 18 Efe camps show 83 percent of men residing in their patriclan and 87 percent of married women residing with their husband's patriclan. In another study (Terashima 1985), 33 of 39 (85%) Efe households were found to reside with the husband's patriclan. Murdock coded Mbuti as without "any patrilineal kin groups and also (without) patrilineal exogamy" (Murdock 1967:157). The Efe identify themselves by patriclan and can trace their ancestry back two to four generations, identifying each forebearer, male or female, by patriclan. Marriage is forbidden within the patriclans of either the mother or father. Ideally, marriage is by sister exchange, but only 40 percent of Efe men are able to achieve this ideal, which makes disputes over marriage and children frequent and, in many cases, they endure for generations. Bridewealth is absent, and bride service is very brief when it occurs at all. For approximately seven months during the year, temporary camps are situated near the Lese villages often on the edge of the forest near an active or recently abandoned garden. During the other five months Efe camp deeper in the forest, but never in my experience more than an eight-hour walk from a village. When they are living in the forest, Efe move camp approximately every two weeks. Actual camp sites are

20

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

changed less frequently when they are near the villages, but the number and composition of individuals at anyone site is more variable because individual households tend to change residence more often. Throughout the year Efe gain their subsistence from both forest resources and cultivated foods. The great majority of Efe do not cultivate crops themselves and none that I studied had gardens at any time during my research. The Efe hunt and gather forest resources for their own consumption and for exchange with villagers. Meat, honey, a few gathered fruits and nuts, and building materials are brought from the forest to the villages to exchange for cultivated foods, tobacco, cannabis, and material goods-primarily cloth and iron implements. Efe also provide labor to Lese and receive food and goods in return usually the same day. Most of the labor is supplied by Efe women who assist villager women in their many tasks relating to food production and processing. On a typical day in an Efe village camp, the majority of the Efe women will spend at least a portion of the day in the villagers' gardens, and in a forest camp at least a few of the women will go to the village; those that remain behind might fish or gather some forest foods. Efe men, on the other hand, work for villagers infrequently-primarily to help Lese men clear their gardens-and spend most of their subsistence-related activities in the forest. Unlike the net-hunters to the south where Mbuti women serve as beaters during the hunt, Efe women do not take part in the hunt except on extremely rare occasions. Hunting and honey collection are almost exclusively male activities, while gathering is done by both sexes. Men hunt alone or in cooperative groups ranging in size from 4 to 27 men. Their most frequent prey are the six species of duikers (Cephalophus spp.), the water chevrotain (Hyemoschus aquaticus), and monkeys. Men most often find beehives when they are alone in the forest, but they generally wait until a later time to extract the honey with a small number of other men. (For accurate descriptions of detecting and extracting honey see Ichikawa 1981.)

THE ANNUAL CYCLE In the area where our studies are conducted, at approximately 2°15' N. latitude, there is a dry season lasting roughly three months, December through February. During each of these three months rainfall is generally less than 1/30 of the annual total. However, there is variation from one year to the next in the onset and duration of the dry season. In some years, this variation disrupts the annual cycle of many biological systems within the environment. Of greatest concern to the Lese and Efe, and about which they have considerable anxiety, are the effects of this irregular variation upon domestic and forest food production.

The Study Area

21

The cultivation cycle of the Lese is superimposed on the annual rainfall cycle. Lese clear their gardens early in the dry season so that felled vegetation can dry and be burned prior to the onset of rains. They plant bananas and cassava as they clear the gardens in December, but most crops are planted in late March and April (after the fields have been burned) in order to take advantage of the early rains, which facilitate the germination and growth of seeds. The harvest begins in late June and is more or less continuous, depending on the particular crop, through December. There are two periods during which this annual cycle is especially vulnerable to the irregular variation in rainfall. If the rains come earlier than expected, the felled vegetation cannot be burned and must be cut and cleared by hand. This method not only results in smaller gardens, but it also reduces the amount of ash that is added to the soil. If the rains come later than expected, germination and growth of the seeds planted in March and April are inhibited. In either case-early or late onset of the rainy season-the crop yield can be precariously reduced. A reduction in the crop yield generally does not have serious effects on food availability until April, May and early June of the following year-just prior to the harvest of the next year's crops. By that time the peanuts, rice, corn, and other crops that were stored at the previous harvest have been depleted. The people are forced to subsist on the cassava and bananas that remain in their gardens. However, if the area planted the previous year was small, then even these staples become in short supply and the resources available cannot satisfy nutritional requirements. This pattern is by no means unique to the Lese; many agriculturalists undergo a period of seasonal food shortage that is generally most pronounced just prior to harvest (Miracle 1967). For the Lese, a shortage does not occur every year, but only during those unpredictable years when the rains do not follow their normal pattern. During such years, however, the shortage can be severe resulting in caloric deprivation and weight loss for most people in the area (Bailey and Peacock 1988; Ellison, Peacock and Lager 1986; Jenike 1988).

The Efe Annual Cycle To the extent that they are independent of agricultural subsistence and reliant upon forest food resources, the Efe might be insulated from the effects of unpredictable shortages of domestic food. If, for example, the forest had a different seasonal pattern of food production, then the effects of fluctuations in agricultural food availability could be mitigated by exploitation of the forest resources. Since they could supplement their diet with forest fruits, nuts and tubers, the Efe would be at an advantage

22

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

during a period of agricultural food shortage. To some extent the Efe are able to do this. Unfortunately, however, the annual cycle offood production in the forest coincides closely with that of the Lese gardens. Food in the forest is most abundant just when it is most plentiful in the villages-from late June until mid-September (Hart and Hart 1986). This is not only the honey season, anticipated with great enthusiasm by all Efe, but also a period when most edible fruits and nuts (n.b., Canarium schweinfurthii) are available. To take advantage of the plentiful resources, the Efe move their camps into the forest while continuing to make frequent day trips to the Lese villages to trade honey and meat and to assist in harvesting and processing peanuts. By late September, the honey from most of the beehives within a band's range has been extracted, many of the rivers have overflowed their banks, and the forest has become uncomfortably wet. Since there is also plenty of food available near the villages, the Efe move their camps back to the edge of the village gardens. While Efe women assist the villagers in the gardens, Efe men spend most days hunting from the village camps. During the dry season, Efe men may assist the Lese in clearing next year's garden while the women help in the rice harvest. By February, the forest has become very dry, the rice harvest is nearly completed, and Efe begin moving back into the forest for the hunting season. The hunting is good from January to March because the rivers are low and the water chevrotain (Hyemoschus aquatic us) cannot hide up under the banks effectively; also, duikers (Cephalophus spp.) will come to feed under the few fruiting trees, where hunters can perch and wait in ambush. By the time the Efe emerge from the forest to settle near the village again in April, food in the gardens may already be in short supply. If so, the Lese may not be as generous as they once were when it comes to trading meat for starch or paying Efe women with food for work in the gardens. Efe women may be forced to forage in old gardens for the remnants of long-abandoned cassava and sweet potato plants. Although the Efe are not above stealing at any time during the year, the frequency of theft from the Lese gardens is greater in April and May, and villagers are more motivated to ferret out thieves at this time. Conflicts between Efe and Lese may become frequent and it is during this period of the year that the Efe are most likely to change their affiliation with a particular village, often citing the lack of food as the reason for their abandonment of one village for another. It is also during the April-June period that the Lese and Efe are most likely to be nutritionally stressed. In 1980 and again in 1983 and 1985 widespread hunger became apparent. The people were noticeably thinner and lost significant amounts of weight (Jenike 1988); their skin was

The Study Area

23

dull; overt symptoms of infectious diseases (especially malaria) were more prevalent; conflicts over food were more frequent; and the Kiswahili word for hunger, "njala," was often spoken. All of these phenomena were remarked upon by the people themselves during and after these periods. In our experience, Efe have been less susceptible than the Lese to variable seasonal food shortages. This is because the Efe are able to take advantage of the variation between areas in food production by remaining mobile and maintaining affiliations with several widespread Lese and Mamvu villages. When there is a chance shortfall in food production in one area in one year, Efe are able to move several days across the forest to villages where food is more plentiful. Lese, on the other hand, by nature of their sedentary subsistence system, are obliged to remain close to their gardens to endure periods of low food supply in their villages. Consequently, they have experienced greater proportional weight loss during these difficult times (Bailey and Peacock 1988). From our experience we know that seasonal food shortages occurring from April to June during occasional unpredictable years have widespread consequences for many aspects of Efe and Lese life including their activity patterns, social relationships, reproductive physiology, and demography. We are just now beginning to discover precisely what the effects are and their magnitude (e. g., Bailey 1989b; Ellison and Peacock 1989; Jenike and Bailey 1989). Our studies in the Ituri continue with these sources of longitudinal variability very much in mind. With reference to the work reported here, the reader should keep in mind that such long-term variation exists and that, with the possible exception of the demographic compositions of the populations, my results represent less than two years in a socioecological setting that is ever-changing.

3 Methods

OBSERVATIONS OF BEHAVIOR Choice of Observation Technique There are numerous anthropological studies that have attempted to quantify human activities and social relationships. Most of them have used what have come to be called spot or scan sampling techniques (e.g., Whiting and Whiting 1975; Johnson 1975; Hames 1978; Gross et al. 1979; Flinn 1983; Wrangham and Ross 1983; Borgerhoff-Mulder and Caro 1985). By this method the observer records the activities and states of all the individuals present at a location at one instant in time. Spot and scan sampling can be a very efficient means of collecting a large sample of behavioral data on a large sample of individuals. It is an appropriate method for quantifying activities and spatial relationships in the sort of setting where it has been used most: primarily in small villages where people tend to be distributed in groups in relatively accessible and predictable places. Using the scan sampling technique in the case of Efe would not have been an efficient use of our time, nor would we have been able to collect a representative sample of Efe behaviors. Efe, except in the early morning or evening when they are apt to be in their camps, do not distribute

25

26

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

themselves in either predictable or accessible places. Even late in the study, when I was most familiar with how Efe men spend their days, I could never accurately predict how or where a man would spend the next day. (Indeed, I believe an Efe man himself could not predict how he would spend the next day.) Since Efe men and women travel over very wide distances, in the forest or among several Lese villages, alone or in small groups, scan sampling was not an appropriate means of collecting behavioral data on a number of indi viduals. Under such conditions I could make a much more efficient use of time by remaining with one focal subject for a considerable period of time recording numerous observations before moving on to the next subject. This method could increase the amount of observation time per unit of total study time, since the relative amount of time between subjects would be reduced. Instead of observing just one short moment in a subject's day and then moving on to the next subject, these focal observation periods had the added advantage of allowing me to witness a sequence of behaviors and have a better knowledge of the context of any one event. Ultimately, I chose one hour as the duration of one focal observation period as a compromise between several considerations: the logistics of contacting subjects; the number of independent observation periods necessary to discover behavioral differences between individuals; my own attention span under sometimes arduous physical conditions; and the amount of time I felt the subjects could tolerate being closely observed without significantly altering their behavior.

Sampling Schedules I followed each subject for a one-hour sampling period. Subjects for the observational study were determined by the presence at the beginning of the study of 16 men in each of two bands close to the research station. During the course of the study the composition of the two bands changed as men moved in or out of the area, so that some men were dropped from the sample and in some cases picked up again and others were added. I attempted to obtain eight one-hour focal follows on each man during each of four "seasons" between January, 1981, and January, 1982. A "season" was determined by the movements and activities of the Efe and did not have a strict correspondence to the calendar year. Seasons I and III were, respectively, the "hunting" and "honey" seasons when the Efe were settled predominantly in forest camps more than 50 minutes' walk from a village. Seasons II and IV were periods when the Efe settled in camps near a village ("village camps"), often on the edge of old or current gardens. The eight one-hour focal follows on each

27

Methods

subject during each season were evenly distributed over four three-hour time blocks beginning at 6:00 a.m. and ending at 6:00 p.m. See Table 3.1 for a breakdown of the numbers of observations during each season on each man. Although I made a strong effort to obtain an equal number of observations during each season, this proved impossible due to the movements of the men into and out of the area. TABLE 3.1 The Number of One-Hour Behavioral Observations Collected During Each of Four Seasons on Each Efe Man

I.D.# 530 531 532 533 534 538 630 631 632 633 634 635 636 650 656 670 Totals

Forest Season I

Village Season I

Forest Season II

Village Season II

8 8 8 8 0 0 8

8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 0 8 8 8 8 8 8 0

8 8 8 0 0 8 8

0 8

8 8 0 0 8 0 0 0 8 8 0 8 0 0 8 0

0 8 8 8 8 8 8 8

104

56

112

104

8 8 8 8 8 8 8

8

In order to eliminate possible bias in the selection of subjects during certain observation periods, a random order of unique identification numbers was generated at the beginning of each season for each time block. Men were observed in that random order unless the observation would be a violation of the following rules, designed to increase the independence of observations of the same subject:

1. A subject could not be observed twice within the same time block. 2. A subject could not be observed during two consecutive time blocks. A natural corollary of these rules is that no subject could be observed during more than two observation periods in the same day. If a subject

28

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

came up in the random order and one of these rules was violated, that subject was replaced at the end of the order and the next subject was chosen. If a subject was not present when it was suitable to begin an observation period and I could not reach him before the end of the time block, then that subject was replaced at the end of the random order, and the next subject in the random order was chosen. If two subjects were placed at the end of the order in this way, then no observations could be made during that period. To be able to later check for possible biases in the observations that were "missed" in this way, I noted the probable location and gross activity of the subject and cross-checked this information with informants and the subject himself. The number of missed observations were minimized by anticipating who was coming up in the random order and determining where they were likely to be at the start of the observation period. Nevertheless, the Efe did not always conform to my best-laid plans, and, particularly when men went into the forest alone for many hours at a time, not being able to reach them by the end of the time block was unavoidable. The days when I recorded behavioral observations were determined predominantly by factors independent of my knowledge of what the Efe were doing that day. Except when I was sick or performing other research activities, I performed focal observations whenever possible within the constraints of the sampling schedule. There was a temptation to sample particular Efe men during particular activities or in particular settings either because the results would then conform to my own subjective notion of what Efe men do, or because I would enjoy the observation period more; but I made every effort not to bias what was designed to be a random, and thereby representative, sample of the behavior of a group of Efe men during 1981.

Recording Methods The one-hour focal observations combined both continuous and point (instantaneous) sampling techniques (Altmann 1974). A digital watch with stopwatch and time-interval functions was used. Every minute on the minute (one-minute point sampling) I recorded the focal subject's following states or behaviors (headers appearing on the checksheet shown in Appendix 2 are in parentheses; for a complete list of codes used in recording observations, see Appendix 3): (1) The type of food being eaten (FOOD CON); (2) posture (po) including both stationary and mobile states; (3) habitat or location type (HA); (4) the weight category of the load (LO) carried; (5) the activity (ACT) engaged in consisting of a grammatical sequence of verb-object codes; (6) responsibility for a cook-

Methods

29

ing pot (CK) on a fire; (7) social interactions (soc INT) including the interactant and the type of interaction; (8) nearest neighbor (NN) if within 10 meters; (9) speaking or listening to another person (TALK) including the identification number of the person, if known; (10) type of child care and the child involved (CHILD); (11) the type of weapon (w) carried. Among the many advantages to this recording system was that I was not restricted to recording just one activity on an interval; rather it was possible to record several simultaneously occurring activities. For example, if a man were sitting in camp sharpening an arrow while at the same time holding an infant, roasting some manioc on the fire, smoking a cigarette, and talking to his brother, all of these behaviors could be recorded easily. In this example under po I would enter s to designate sitting; under ACT I would enter RPAR to designate repairing an arrow; under CHILD I would enter 1 for engaged in child care; under CK I would enter 1 to designate food on the fire; under CON I would enter FU for smoking tobacco; and under TALK I would enter A631 to designate his talking to his brother whose identification number was 631The system was designed to provide data on the frequencies and, in some cases, the rates of occurrence of specific behaviors and to allow estimation of the proportions of time men spent in various activities. I recorded all the observations that did not occur in a camp into a microcassette tape recorder and later (within 48 hours) transcribed them onto the checksheets. Observations in camps were recorded directly onto the checksheets. In order to study patterns of food sharing and to quantify food consumption, I recorded continuous observations of food exchange (FOOD EX), including the name of the food and the person giving or receiving the food. The amount and name of food being consumed was recorded under the category FOOD CON. At the start of each focal observation hour I recorded the health status (HE) of the subject. Every 30 minutes-at the beginning, middle, and end of each observation hour-I recorded the weather (WE) (raining or not raining), and all the individuals within ten meters of the focal subject (CR). At the end of each half-hour the distance traveled by the focal subject was recorded. To increase the accuracy of the distance estimates I practiced estimating and later measuring various distances, and I measured and mapped many of the well-traveled paths within the study area.

All-Day Observations of Behavior From one-hour focal observations it is possible to extrapolate daily frequencies of activities by multiplying hourly occurrences by the appro-

30

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

priate number of hours in an active day. However, I wished to be able to make direct comparisons of certain diurnal patterns of Efe behavior with the sparse data existing on other human groups and the relatively rich data from primate studies. Also, while following men for an hour each and switching to the next subject was very tiring for me, it did not give me an accurate sense of how strenuous a full day in the life of an Efe was. Therefore, during the later part of my study, after I had become confident that the Efe were completely accepting of my presence and would at least tolerate my accompanying them individually for a full day, I performed all-day observations on a selected subsample of five men. Each man was observed only twice: for one day at the end of the honey season (Season III) and for one day at the end of Season IV when Efe were settled in their village camps. During these ten all-day follows I used the exact same recording system as for the one-hour observations except point samples were recorded every five minutes instead of every minute. I also recorded continuous observations of several gross behaviors including (1) moving, standing or sitting; (2) searching, pursuing, or handling food or prey; (3) manufacture and repair of nonhousehold objects; (4) household maintenance; (6) child care; and (7) location.

Observer Effect With spot or scan observation techniques observations are ideally made before the subject is aware of the observer's approach. This is not possible with focal observation techniques. In this study the subject was always aware of the my presence, and he was usually (but not always) aware of being observed. Since I had been living with the people for many months and I had collected some 45 hours of focal observations as practice before I began "real" behavioral observations, the Efe were very accustomed to my constant presence and companionship. I had informed them many times of the exact nature and purpose of my research. They were very aware of how I was recording their every move, even if they did not know which of them I was following at any given moment. I had explained my procedures to them and obtained what I felt was well-informed consent. I tried to arrive at some objective measure of my effect on the focal person. I settled on a combination of measures that reflect the extent to which I served as a "distraction" to the subject during an observation period. I recorded the total number of times the subject spoke to me during the one-hour follow. Also, I included myself as well as any other investigator in the records kept of the social interactions of the subject. This included records of food exchanges, verbal interactions and physical contact. These are far from ideal measures, since they give no

Methods

31

information on what the subject would likely do were the observer not present. It was, however, the best data that could be collected reliably. In a few cases, when the subject actually avoided me or obviously changed his or her activity due to my presence, I terminated the observation and omitted it from the sample. This happened a few times at the beginning of the study, particularly when a man wanted to go to the forest alone (usually to hunt monkeys), but after we worked out a suitable way for each of us to accomplish our respective aims, such occasions became very infrequent. A total of 11 observation periods were discarded from the sample because of such obvious biases.

The Problem of Independence One shortcoming of using a sampling technique that records behaviors every minute is that a behavioral state recorded at one minute may not be independent of an event recorded the previous or the following minute. So, for example, if a subject is making a bow at this moment, there is a high probability that one minute from now he will still be making a bow rather than be engaged in some other activity. One danger of such a lack of independence of observations within each focal follow is that events that are rare, yet of moderate to long duration, may be overrepresented in the sample. For example, if each Efe man makes only one bow in his life and it takes only three hours for a man to make a bow, Efe time allocation to bow-making is trivial. Yet, should I happen by chance to conduct a one-hour focal follow just as a subject begins to make his lifelong bow, bow-making will appear 60 times in the sample and receive undue weight in the overall estimation of how Efe in general, and that Efe man in particular, allocate their time. This is one extreme example of the problem of temporal autocorrelation due to lack of independence of observations. This problem of lack of independence is not to be belittled; it may have a significant effect on the results of this study. How large is the effect is an empirical question that I have not attempted to answer here. I will mention here some factors that mitigate against the effect being large, at least in the case of the results reported here. The degree of dependence between observations is contingent upon the duration of the behavioral states being recorded. The shorter the behavioral state lasts, the less likely it can be observed from one minute to the next and the more it appears as an event rather than as a state. The activities recorded and analyzed in this study are mostly precise physical descriptions of behaviors and not judgments of the general purpose or function of the behavior. This makes it more likely that discrete behavioral events are recorded, rather than long-duration be-

32

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

havioral states. For example, a man is recorded as "adjusting pot," rather than "engaged in food preparation." Because behavioral categories are narrowly defined and lumped only later for purposes of analysis, they tend to be behaviors that occur for less than one minute and so are more likely to be independent. Although I am interested in focusing on differences between individuals for many variables in this study, the data collected during the focal follows are used primarily for representing the proportion of time Efe males in general spend in certain activities. For purposes of analysis, the 16 subjects have been lumped for most of the variables studied. Since 376 hours of observations totaling 22,560 records were recorded across all the men, the problem of overrepresentation of a particular activity due to lack of independence is likely to be small. Ad Libitum Observations In addition to systematic behavioral observations I also kept extensive field notes and wrote a daily journal. Other information I recorded on an ad libitum basis included all exchanges and the circumstances and identity of individuals present during all fights and major arguments. Also, to complement our studies of health, growth and development, I made notes on each person's physical appearance and behavioral development. Such descriptions focused particularly on developmental milestones and unusual events.

Observations of Hunts Hunting being a major activity of Efe men and a major focus of my research, I kept careful records of events during hunts. Seventy percent of the hunts in my sample were followed during the course of the onehour and all-day focal observations; the rest I followed specifically to increase the sample of hunts. For group hunts I recorded the following: when man left camp to start the hunt and when he returned to camp at the end of the hunt; the individuals present during the hunt; the species, sex, weight, and general appearance of prey killed; who shot the first arrow into the prey, who shot the second arrow, and who owned the dog that chased the prey; the weight of each person's share of each prey; the location of the center of the hunt every half-hour; and, every ten minutes, the type of habitat being hunted. Since the production of noise and movement are desirable elements to flush duikers and other prey, Efe never objected to my accompanying them during group hunts. Following them as they hunted alone, however, was another matter, since success depended in great part upon stealth. This was particularly true for solitary hunts for monkeys. It took

Methods

33

maintain contact with the hunter and still not disturb him or the potential prey during the hunt. Briefly, I would stay with the hunter until he (or occasionally I) heard or spied a group of monkeys. The hunter would signal to me when to remain still, and he would slowly proceed toward the monkeys or to a position along their anticipated foraging route. Sometimes I could stay within sight of the hunter, but even when he was out of sight, I was in auditory contact at all times. After witnessing just a few hunts, I was confident that, between the whistled signals given me by the hunter, the sounds made by the hunter during the course of his stalking and shooting, and the reactions of the monkeys, I knew precisely the location and activities of the hunter at all times even while he was not actually in visual contact. Similarly, when an Efe hunted alone by perching in a fruiting tree to wait for feeding duikers (what I refer to as the "ambush method"), I would accompany him to the tree, wait until he had climbed and positioned himself in the perch, and then I would retire quietly to a location we had both agreed upon as being unobtrusive yet close enough for communication. If the hunter shot at or hit an animal, I could reach the tree within 15 seconds or join the hunter in the chase almost immediately. Mter only a few hunts by each method, both the hunters and I were satisfied that I had no significant influence on their hunting success, and they were even pleased to have me along as company and as a witness to their infrequent triumphs. During the solitary hunts, I recorded the following: when the hunter left camp and when he returned; the number of arrows of each type he shot; the species, sex, and weight of all prey shot; the distance traveled; time walking, stationary, or perched; the location of the hunter every half hour; and the type of habitat every ten minutes.

OTHER DATA COLLECTION Demography Every individual Efe and Lese whom I encountered in the study area and who was apparently not just a casual visitor was given a unique alphanumeric identification number and a card was created that included the following information: names(s); clan and subclan; mother; mother's clan; father; father's clan; siblings; spouse(s); marital history; reproductive history; and age estimate. Many people in the sample entered and left the area by migration or through birth or death (or sometimes, in the case of migration, reentered) during the course of the study,

34

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

so the number of people in the sample fluctuated over time. At the end of my study in late January, 1982, there were 399 Efe and 414 Lese whom I considered to be residents. A resident Lese was defined as a person who had been in the study area for at least one month and who expressed every intention of living there indefinitely. Because Efe are more mobile and are apt to have affiliations with villages far out of the study area, the definition of a resident Efe was somewhat different: A resident Efe was a person who was living with a band that had a recognized long-term affiliation with a Lese village within the study area. Because they form the basis for calculating the important life processes acting in the present and recent past, much care was taken during the collection of the reproductive histories of people who had reached reproductive maturity. Every woman was interviewed at least twice, often once alone and then at least once with a husband or close relative present to collaborate her report. The interviews that I conducted early in the study contained some inaccuracies, but as my language and interviewing skills improved and as peoples' trepidations turned to curiosity and amusement the quality of the data improved. The interviews were cross-checked by asking independent informants, and discrepancies between accounts were resolved by repeated cross-checking until I was more than satisfied that the reproductive history was accurate. Included in the samples of reproductive histories of Efe and Lese postmenopausal women are some women who live outside the study area to the south. Although they are not "residents" as I have defined them, they are members of the same continuous tribal populations, and their fertility and mortality profiles are the same as those of the resident women. They have not been included in the sample of people who have been age-ranked as described below. The ages and dates of birth of the Efe are unknown to themselves and to the Lese and government officials. The same is true of all but a very few Lese born before 1971 when the Zaire government began to impose fines upon citizens (Efe not included) who did not register the births of their children. Accurate demographic analyses and the determination of significant life history events related to growth and maturity hinge upon accurate determinations of age. The age estimates included in this report were generated using a variety of complementary techniques. First, during anthropometry sessions, maxillary and mandibular dentition were recorded and compared with a dental eruption schedule based on standards from Western populations (Weiner and Lourie 1969). Second, an event calendar was compiled from government records, missionary accounts, and documented historical events producing approximately one widely known, datable event every four years (with longer intervals prior to 1946); several persons older than the subject were

Methods

35

asked to relate his or her birth to the datable events. Third, separate age ranks were generated for the Efe and Lese populations by asking each person to rank him or herself by age relative to every other individual; in many cases Lese and Efe men knew each others' relative ages just as Lese and Efe mothers knew the relative ages of their children, and this helped to resolve the few inconsistencies within either population. Fourth, the birth dates of approximately 60 percent of Lese children born after 1971 were registered on the identity cards of their parents and were therefore known. Using all of these sources yielded a set of age estimates of high internal consistency; dental ages, event calendar ages, known ages, and relative ages were all in good agreement, especially for individuals born since 1964. The aging techniques are less reliable for older people, but they are adequate for the purposes of the analyses presented here where only rank-orders are used for adults. In order to determine the variation in the number and composition of people in the study area over time, we conducted nine monthly censuses of the five villages and associated Efe camps that constituted the focal study area. Census days were chosen at the convenience of the researchers; but the selection of census days was independent of the number and composition of the population present in the study area. Before beginning the monthly censuses, Wrangham drew maps of each Lese village including all houses and major structures. Each structure was given a unique identification number. A census was performed by recording who slept the night before iOn each structure in every village and Efe camp in the focal study area. The number of Efe camps fluctuated from three to six during the nine censuses. Anthropometry To obtain weights, each subject was weighed to the nearest quarter of a kilogram on a portable floor scale placed on a firm, level surface and set to zero before each measurement. Heights were measured to the nearest one-half millimeter using a GPM Gneupel portable statiometer and precisely following the methods in Cameron, 1980. Inter-observer reliability checks were made prior to, and in the middle of, each anthropometry session. Every effort was made to measure all the residents of a village or Efe camp. During the first session in December, 1980, nothing was given to participating subjects; thereafter, a handful of salt was given to each subject. Several old people and a few children between the ages of two and five were too fearful to be measured, but we had no reason to believe that their noncompliance was related to their height or weight except possibly in the few cases of illness.

36

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

Food Procurement and Exchange The amount of food acquired by Efe men was recorded on an ad libitum basis during focal observation periods and food consumption was continuously recorded as well. Food procurement and consumption by all members present in a camp were measured by a different method: we weighed all foods entering and leaving Efe camps between dawn and dark on pre-selected days. We attempted to obtain a sample of six such "weigh days" each month, but other demands on our time prevented us from reaching this goal. The 33 weigh days that we did obtain were selected by randomly choosing six days prior to the beginning of each month and sampling on whichever of those days we could, given the demands of our other research. For the dates of the the 33 weigh days see Bailey and Peacock 1988:103. On days when food was to be weighed ("weigh days") an observer (myself or N. Peacock) would remain in the Efe camp from 6:00 a.m. until the last person returned to camp in the evening, usually by 6:30 p. m. All food items entering and leaving the camp were weighed using four grades of hanging scales capable of weighing items from 2 grams to 50 kilograms. Gross weight for each food type was later converted to edible weight based on the mean of a large sample of each food type, which had been weighed at each stage of preparation. For each food item we noted the origin, destination and person transporting it. At the end of each weigh day, a census was taken of all individuals who were to sleep in the camp that night. Since most food came into camp after 3:00 p.m. and was eaten later, this was the best means of calculating the people eating the incoming food. For purposes of calculating the number of calories and grams of protein consumed per kilogram of people in camp, the weights of people present in each camp census were calculated for adults by using the mean weights for Efe adult females and males (38 kg and 45 kg respectively) and for nonadults by using the individual weights recorded during the most recent anthropometry session. The reason we calculated the calories and grams of protein consumed per kilogram of weight rather than per person is that cross-culturally people vary considerably in size and, therefore, in their energy requirements. Similarly, the Efe themselves also vary in their energy requirements according to size. Converting people to kilograms seemed to be the most accurate method of calculating requirements and the best means for cross-cultural comparability. For further details concerning these data, including the date of each weigh day, the kinds of foods brought into camp, the calories garnered, the weights of people in camp, and the methods used for converting foods into calories and protein, see Bailey and Peacock (1988).

Metlwds

37

Questionnaires I designed a questionnaire to obtain information about various aspects of Efe life that I could never observe during two years of field work (see Appendix 1). The questions focused primarily on the following: the subject's relationships with Lese; the total value of all his material possessions; his history of hunting large game; his marital history; and his history of illness.

Event Calendars A large calendar was kept in a central place at the research camp, and all members of the project contributed their own special notes to it. Certain events were deemed of general importance, both as time markers and because of their impact on the community or the researchers. Such events included births, deaths, major illnesses, fights and arguments, dances, funerals, weddings, clearing of new gardens, planting and harvesting of cash crops, large animal kills, movements of some individuals, movements of Efe camps, major environmental events such as storms, floods and fallen trees, and vehicles passing on the road. The event calendar, along with daily records of rainfall and temperature, provided a valuable socioecological backdrop for all the other data collected by individual researchers.

QUID PRO QUO Efe and Lese relationships being so delicately bound by lifelong patterns of sharing and exchange, the anthropologist as a newcomer with seemingly endless material resources is often faced with extremely difficult decisions concerning how to reward people for the information and pleasure that he or she derives from living and working with people who can be exceedingly generous and at the same time irrepressibly demanding. Being concerned with properly rewarding people, while attempting to have minimal impact on their social and economic relations, at the same time, hoping to profit from impassioned observation while wanting to find a place within the community-these are the conflicting concerns that have to be constantly juggled and weighed. For me, making the countless ethical decisions every day about compensating, rewarding, sharing, cooperating with Efe and Lese and pondering what the unforeseen consequences of my actions might be was the most difficult and demanding aspect of field research. In order to maintain the field station which included four houses, a kitchen, and two storehouses-all made with local materials of wood,

38

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

mud, and thatched roofing--one to three workers were paid on a regular weekly basis and others were hired sporadically on a per diem basis. With rare exceptions paid workers were local Lese villagers; Efe worked only rarely for one day at a time. Pay was equal to or slightly better than the pay offered for the same number of hours by the commercial coffee plantation 15 kilometers to the north. Labor at the research station was the only service for which Efe and Lese were paid currency. People were given direct quid pro quo under three additional circumstances. First, during all but the first two periods of anthropometry all subjects were given a small handful of salt as a reward for allowing us to measure them. Second, all subjects were given a Polaroid picture of him or herself after giving their marital and reproductive history. Third, a young Efe woman was given one and one-half meters of cloth in return for performing some household duties (cutting and carrying wood, repairing the hut, supplying a bed of mongongo leaves every evening, and minimal cooking) for approximately 20 days; this was done four separate times with three different women. As a way of thanking them for their cooperation and friendship at the end of the study, the day before I left, I gave to each of the Efe men with whom I worked intensively the following items: a pair of shorts, a belt, a shirt or a pair of underpants, a film canister, and a handful of tobacco. I gave to their wives, mothers, or sisters a pair of earrings or a bracelet. When living in an Efe camp, I gave tobacco leaf or occasionally cannabis to people who asked for it, but seldom more than the equivalent of one smoke per person per day, and then usually in the evening as we all sat around talking or singing. Also, small pinches of salt were given to women when they asked for it, usually in the late afternoon or evening as they cooked the evening meal. Occasionally we gave small amounts of cooked or uncooked food to people, either because they asked for it or because we wanted to make a present to them. In turn, we were given food frequently-most often meat and honey. Although over the course of the study we were surely given more food (measured in calories) than we ever gave, the net difference was not great enough at any time to have any effect upon the food consumption of any Efe. Like most Westerners living in remote areas, we expended considerable time and effort giving medical assistance to the local people. During the first year of the study, fewer people came to us looking for assistance than during the second year as we became more knowledgeable about tropical diseases and medicine and as people came to rely upon us more. We treated mostly minor illnesses-sores, cuts, colds, diarrhea, malaria, lice, fungus, etc.-but we did give antibiotics in a few cases in which the "patient" might have otherwise died. We may have prevented some other deaths that might otherwise have occurred due to dehydra-

Methods

39

tion. Lese were treated much more often than Efe because they were much more likely to request treatment. There were other forms of casual quid pro quo that may have had a significant but indeterminable impact on the people of the area. For example, whenever we went anywhere in our Toyota Highlux pick-up and there was room, we gave a ride to anyone who seemed to have an errand in the place where we were going. Whenever we went to a large town to buy supplies for ourselves, we would buy items for anyone who paid us in advance. This meant that people could acquire possessions at 20-50 percent less than the local traders' prices.

DATA ANALYSES Data from the focal behavioral observations were transcribed onto computer code sheets, along with information on the subject's marital status at the time of the follow, and the location of the subject's residence (in decimal hours of travel time from the nearest village). Each on-theminute observation was assigned one of 23 "setting" codes that designated the general sort of task in which the subject was engaged. The data were entered into an Apple II Plus onto floppy disks using a Pascal editor and then transmitted to an IBM 4381 mainframe computer over telephone lines. SAS (Statistical Analysis System) was used to cross-tabulate and otherwise manipulate the data. Most statistical tests were nonparametric. Siegel (1956) and Sokol and Rohlf (1969) were the primary references. Results of statistical tests were considered significant if p values were. 05 or less. Details on the criteria used to define and measure each of the Efe activities are given in conjunction with the results reported in Chapter 4. Proportions of time rather than absolute time or frequencies of observations are reported and were used for statistical tests since numbers of observations on each focal subject were not always equal. Additional methods for collecting the hunting data and ways of analyzing the data are described in conjunction with the results in Chapter S.

4 Activity Patterns and Food Acquisition

Many authors have attempted to determine the amount of time that people spend working or resting or engaged in some arbitrarily defined activity. Estimates of time spent in various activities across studies are often not comparable either because investigators have measured behavior differently, or because they have defined activities differently. For example, one investigator may include child care under the category of work, while another may not; or cooking may be considered as "maintenance" by some, but "subsistence work" by others. Johnson (1975) illustrates this point by showing that Machiguenga males spend less than 2.5 or more than 8 hours a day in subsistence activities, depending upon which of several definitions of work one cares to adopt. The studies of Efe and Lese activities were designed to avoid problems of comparison as nearly as possible. The results of the 376 hours of focal individual observations (22,560 on-the-minute records) I collected on Efe men are presented here as a representative sample of how 16 Efe men spent their daylight hours between January, 1981, and December, 1981. The results are presented in a manner that permits most readers to manipulate the data to fit their own definition of most activities. To do this effectively, I have tried to break Efe men's activities into categories useful for making cross-cultural comparisons. The categories are fine enough so that different behaviors can be shifted from one category

41

42

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

to another depending upon the perspective and tastes of the reader. At the same time, the data are not in such fine detail that the reader is lost in a morass of disjointed numbers. I have tried to describe what elements of the behavioral recording system are included in each category definition. By referring to Appendixes 2 and 3, and to the code definitions presented in Chapter 3, the reader can know exactly what codes are included in any category of behavior. Also, in the great majority of cases, the behavioral categories are similar to those presented by Peacock (1985), so that direct comparisons between Efe men and Efe women are possible. The results are summarized in Table 4.1.

SUBSISTENCE AND MAINTENANCE ACTIVITIES Subsistence activities are those behaviors that contribute to acquiring and preparing food. These include hunting and gathering forest foods, collecting firewood and water, processing and cooking food, working for villagers in village settlements or in gardens, and traveling between camps and villages. Maintenance activities include making and repairing huts, collecting construction materials, cleaning in camp, making or repairing tools, and moving camp. The proportion of total time devoted by Efe men to subsistence and maintenance activities is 47.7%, which translates into 5.7 hours per 12-hour day. Following is a breakdown of each subcategory of behavior included under subsistence and maintenance activities with a brief description of how each was calculated. Hunting Hunting for forest animals included the time spent in the forest searching for, pursuing, butchering, and carrying game. A small proportion of the observations coded as hunting included instances of gathering mushrooms. Men seldom, if ever, specifically searched for mushrooms, but if they came upon them, they spent one or two minutes picking and wrapping them in mongongo leaves. Such instances should properly be considered foraging, but they accounted for an insignificant amount of the total time that men spent in the forest. A man was considered hunting from the time that he left camp for the stated or obvious purpose of hunting until he returned to camp. If he aborted the hunt while in the forest in order to extract honey or to collect fruits or nuts, I considered him to be gathering, not hunting. The rest of that session in the forest was coded as gathering, unless he took up the hunt once again. An average of 21.1% of observations were of Efe men hunting. On average, then, men spent approximately 2.7 hours per 12-hour day in

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions

43

TABLE 4.1 Time Allocation of Efe Men Activity

% Time

Min/Day

21.1 .6 ILl

152 4 80

3.5 2.1

25 15

TOTAL SUBSISTENCE WORK

38.4

276

II. Maintenance A. Food preparation B. Make and repair implements C. Collect wood and water D. Camp maintenance E. Move camp

3.2 7.1 .5 1.6 1.5

23 51 4 12

13.9

101

52.3

377

.7

5

1.0

7

4.5 1.8 37.8

32 13 272

44.1

317

IV. All other A. Travel between camps B. Funerals

.8 1.1

6 8

TOTAL ALL OTHER

1.9

14

47.7

343

100.0

720

SUBSISTENCE AND MAINTENANCE ACTIVITIES I. Subsistence work A. Hunting B. Food gathering C. Honey gathering D. Village work 1. In village 2. Traveling

TOTAL MAINTENANCE TOTAL SUBSISTENCE AND MAINTENANCE

11

OTHER ACTIVITIES

I. Child care II. Self care III. Leisure A. Recreation B. Smoking C. Other leisure TOTAL LEISURE

TOTAL OTHER ACTIVITIES TOTAL ACTIVITIES

44

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

the forest hunting for game. There was considerable variance between the sixteen men in how much time they hunted, with a range of 8.3% to 32.4% of an individual's time (SD = 7.0%). Hunting is the focus of Chapter 5, which both describes hunting by Efe men and places hunting within the context of other aspects of the peoples lives. The reader should refer to that chapter for detailed descriptions of the methods employed by Efe men in hunting forest animals, how men allocate their time during hunts, and the significance of variation between men in the time they spend hunting and in their relative success acquiring meat.

Food Gathering Gathering of forest foods includes observations of men when they left camp for the specific purpose of collecting fruits, nuts, tubers, caterpillars, or termites. While hunting, men may stop to pick a fallen fruit from the ground or to pluck mushrooms from a rotting log or the forest floor. These activities should properly be included under food gathering, but, because of the difficulties in strictly defining the boundaries between categories, they are included under hunting for the purposes of these analyses. Such instances of gathering account for less than 2% of the total time that men hunt and less than .5% of men's total time. Most food gathering in the forest by men is done in cooperation with women. Two or three men leave camp with several women and walk to a specific tree that they spotted earlier during some other activity. The men climb the tree and shake its branches making fruits fall to the ground where the women gather them. This method of gathering was usually employed in August and September when Cannarium schweinfurthii was in fruit. The olive-sized, fat-rich fruits of these large trees constitute a high proportion of the calories that Efe acquire directly from forest foods. In most cases in the right season, women can acquire large quantities of Cannarium just by gathering naturally fallen fruits from under a tree, but occasionally they recruit men to assist them. Women also rely upon men to tell them about the location of exploitable forest foods sighted while covering the long distances necessary for effective hunting and searching for honey. That gathering of forest vegetable foods is not a significant male activity is illustrated by the small proportion of observations of this activity during the behavioral sampling (.6%). All such observations occurred during just four foraging trips by only three different men. In other words, unless they happen upon very readily exploitable foods like mushrooms during the course of other activities in the forest (mainly

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions

45

hunting and collecting honey), Efe men leave gathering of forest fruits, nuts, and tubers to women.

Honey Gathering Searching for and extracting honey is second only to hunting in importance as a subsistence activity by Efe men. The men spent an average of 11.1 % (n = 16 men; SD = 5.86) of their time searching specifically for hives or extracting honey. This figure does not include the time that men spent looking for hives while they were engaged in other activities in the forest. Whenever an Efe is in the forest for any purpose, he frequently looks upward, searching for holes in trees and looking for bees entering and leaving likely locations for hives. The availability of honey is extremely variable. There are small quantities of honey available throughout the year, but most of the time there are too few active hives to make it worth foraging specifically for honey. The two periods when honey is likely to be abundant are just after each of the two dominant tree species flowers: Cynometra alexandrii in February and March, and Brachystegia laurentii (from which comes the highly prized, clear raJo honey) from late June through September. Because there are more Brachystegia than Cynometra in the forest, and perhaps because each Brachystegia tree has more flowers or contains more nectar, the period of greatest abundance of honey is between July and September. This is considered the honey season by the Efe and all others in the area. If it is a particularly good honey season, it may last into November. In such years it takes the Efe several additional weeks to extract honey from the many active hives they discovered when the bees were most actively foraging. The availability of honey influences the Efe's relationship with the villagers, who look forward to the honey season as eagerly as the Efe. In late June, when Efe men start searching intensively for active beehives in hopes of finding large amounts of raja honey, villagers check with their Efe trading partner at every opportunity to hear how the current year's honey season is developing. If it is a good year when there will be more honey than the Efe themselves can possibly eat, villagers give large aluminum pots to their Efe trading partners to take to the forest camps. Individual Efe then apportion part of their daily yield of honey to their villager's pot, which they keep inside their hut for several days or weeks, until it is full. Most pots hold between 15 and 20 kilograms of honey, but some weigh as much as 35 kilograms when they are full. Full pots are carried to the village and given to their owners, who try to sell the honey to other villagers. Since honey is usually

46

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

abundant, however, the villagers seldom sell a large proportion of their honey; their families usually consume most of it themselves over several weeks. In return for the pot full of honey, an Efe traditionally receives a piece of new clothing: a pair of shorts, a shirt, or a meter of cloth. But there is considerable variation in this pattern and the exchange is often not completed to the full satisfaction of both. How well the exchange of honey for cloth is executed can have long term effects on the quality of the relationship between an Efe and his muto. The location and sizes of Efe camps are strongly influenced by the availability of honey. Efe almost invariably move into the forest in July to search for honey. How many move to the forest and how long they stay there depends on how good a honey season it is. If it is a poor year, many Efe may remain in camps near the village. Older women particularly may refuse to go to the forest. If it is a good season, virtually every Efe who is not married to a villager will move to a forest camp. During the best years, Efe camps may be large during the honey season; in the poor years, the camps have fewer people in them. Overall, however, average camp size during the honey season is consistently smaller than during the hunting season in January, February and March. Patriclans tend to merge during the hunting season in order to engage in cooperative hunts; during the honey season patriclans are more likely to remain apart within their own separate, but adjacent strips of forest. These observations are in contradiction to what Turnbull wrote about the Efe. While I observed that the Efe tended to be in smaller camps during the honey season, and largest camp sizes occurred during the dry season when Efe moved into the forest primarily to hunt, he stated that, because archery is a hunting technique requiring only two or three hunters, Efe remained in small groups for most of the year. During the honey season, he claimed, Efe congregated into larger camps (Turnbull 1965: 107). There are several characteristics of honey as a resource that may place limits on efficient camp size during the honey season. The average amount of honey extracted from a beehive is 3.154 kg (n = 46; SD = 3.602). It takes 1. 70 hours on average (n = 47; SD = .73) to extract the honey from the hive. Extraction is a process that can be exhausting because it can entail climbing to great heights (up to 170 feet; mean height = 62.6 feet, SD = 31.7; n = 34) several times, and it may include very elaborate construction of halters and bridges made from vines used to traverse from one tree to another. (For descriptions of honey extraction by the Mbuti see Ichikawa 1981; Bailey 1989a.) However, while extraction can be labor intensive, it seldom necessitates labor input from more than four men, and two men are usually quite sufficient. Yet the honey is customarily shared more or less equally by all men present at the tree during the extraction, with only slightly more

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions

47

honey going to the man who originally sighted the hive. The more men present, the less each man obtains either to eat on the spot, or to share with his family. It is in the interests of most Efe--the men finding and extracting the honey as well as the women and children waiting in camp for a share--to limit the number of men at a tree when the honey is extracted. During the 1981 honey season, the average number of men living in a camp was 7.38 (n = 13; SO = 3.4). Men often split into two foraging groups to search for hives and to extract honey. Even with these few men per camp, all the hives found within a two-hour walk of camp were usually exploited within a week and the group was forced to move camp to a new area. Moving camp is an energy intensive and time-consuming endeavor, especially for women who must carry the household belongings and build the new huts. If Efe camps were larger during the honey season, it would be necessary either to move camp even more often than once per week or to forage very long distances to supply a greater number of people with honey. Thus, during the honey season, Efe reside in smaller camps that are more or less evenly distributed throughout the forest.

Collect Firewood and Water The Efe consider collecting firewood and fetching water women's tasks. Only .5% of the focal observations showed men engaged in these activities. Peacock (1985) observed Efe women collecting wood or water 5% of the time, or nearly 40 minutes per day. When men left camp to collect wood or water, it was usually to escort their wives while they did the actual work of cutting the wood and carrying the wood or water. Women prefer to collect firewood and fetch water in the company of at least one other woman. When they are not able to recruit another female to accompany them they will settle for a young girl or even a young boy. Occasionally a woman will ask her husband to accompany her. The man will take up his bow and arrows and walk behind his wife to and from the source of wood or water, performing only the lightest of tasks during the trip. This escort service is most commonly performed early in a marriage and in many cases appears to be a display of devotion to a wife or lover. Such occasions may afford the couple moments of intimacy away from camp, out of sight and earshot of relatives and other camp inhabitants. (The few times that such incidences of "consortship" occurred during a focal follow, I accompanied the couple not without some embarrassment. The observation period often ended before the trip was over, however, and I was able to leave the couple in the forest to themselves as I returned to camp.)

48

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

Food Preparation Whereas food preparation is the most time-consuming activity for Efe women (accounting for 17% of women's time), men spend only 3.2% of their time cooking and otherwise preparing food for consumption. This preparation does not include any butchering of animals outside of camp during a hunt. Included under food preparation were all activities that took place in camp or in a village whose verb codes were "pick," "pound," or "prepare" and whose object code was any food type (refer to Chapter 3 for the definitions of codes). Men never prepared a major meal that entailed peeling, pounding, scraping and boiling of food. Most of the processing that men did was in preparation of a snack, either in the morning before leaving the camp or in the middle of the day when few women were around. Most of men's cooking consisted of roasting leftovers (usually a stick of boiled cassava) over the coals of a fire. During the peanut season, men did spend time shelling peanuts and roasting them for themselves. There was considerable variation among the 16 men in the proportion of time spent preparing food. While the mean proportion over all the men was 3.2% (SD = 2.4), one man spent as little as .6% of his time preparing food, and another as much as 9% of his time. My impression was that single men spent considerably more time in preparing food since they had no wives to do it for them. The data, however, show no significant difference between single and married men in the proportion of time they spent in food preparation (t = 1.32; df = 14; p = .21). Certainly the single men themselves complained of having no wife to cook for them during the day, just as the married men gloated over their own good fortune in this regard. As an aside, the care that a woman took cooking for a man seemed to be a strong index of her devotion to him.

Camp Maintenance Camp maintenance included constructing and repairing huts, collecting construction or bedding materials, and cleaning or sweeping around camp. These were considered women's tasks, and men spent only 1.6% of their time engaged in these activities. There was no significant difference between single and married men in the proportion of time spent on these household tasks (t = .911; df = 14; p = .39). Men only infrequently assisted women in household chores. The two tasks that men were most likely to perform were clearing the forest floor to provide space for a new hut upon arrival at a new campsite, and fetching bundles of mongongo leaves to be used as bedding. Married

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions

49

men were the ones most likely to help clear around a new hut site, and single men often collected their own bedding leaves because their own sleeping comfort was at stake.

Manufacture and Maintenance of Implements Manufacture and maintenance of implements consisted of all observations in camp when men were fashioning and maintaining tools. This included whittling bows and arrow shafts from saplings, making arrowheads from scrap metal, attaching arrow shafts and arrow heads, fletching arrows, making poison and applying poison to arrows, fashioning axe handles, and sharpening axes, knives, spears and arrow points. This category does not include occasions during a hunt when the men stopped to cut a sapling or vine useful for making an arrow or bowstring, but such occasions accounted for a very small proportion of the time that men were in the forest. Men were engaged in activities related to making and repairing their tools during 7.1 % of observations, which is equivalent to approximately 56 minutes per day. Men spent much of their time in the morning maintaining their tool kit. Before leaving for the forest, there was a flurry of activity as men prepared their bows, arrows, and axes for a hunt or a trip to collect honey. There was the rapid scraping of metal-tipped arrows against quartz sharpening stones and the occasional popping of bow strings as they were tested for strength and tautness. Men were looking down the shafts of arrows, bending and straightening them and passing them through the fire to dry and harden them. And there was constant chatter-stories of previous hunts and tales of what they would do with the meat or honey they were about to procure. There was enough variation among men in the proportion of time spent on manufacture and maintenance to make one suspect that there might be specialists in tool making. For example, one man spent 14% of his time making and repairing implements, while another spent less than 1% of his time. There were men who were more likely than others to be called upon to make, for example, poison for arrows or a handle for an axe. In many cases it was these men who initiated the activity and others joined them to help in the task. All the men, with the possible exception of the youngest, were able to perform any task, but a few were considered superior or were simply more conscientious in their performance. This, I thought, led to a tendency for certain men to concentrate on certain maintenance activities. The data, however, do not show that those men whom I subjectively considered "specialists" spent a greater proportion of their time on general manufacture and repair. Unfortunately, sample

50

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

sizes of observations of specific tasks done by each individual man are insufficient to detect significant individual differences between men. I did look to see if those men who had a larger tool kit spent more time maintaining their weapons and tools. However, there was no rank order correlation between time spent working on tools and either the value of tool kits (Spearman's rs = .05; n = 16) or the number of items in the tool kit (r. = .12; n = 16). It is not clear what accounted for the differences between men in the amount of time they spent on making and maintaining the weapons and tools that they used for hunting and collecting honey. While living with these 16 men, my impression was that at anyone time a few men were quite compulsive about keeping their bows and arrows in peak condition, while others spent minimal effort maintaining the tools of their trade. Several months later those same men who were once so compulsive seemed to let their tool kits deteriorate and others had become more conscientious about keeping their arrows straight and their bowstrings taut. As an Efe man's circumstances changed, his attention to his tool kit seemed to die as well. For example, if a man spent more time in the village working for a villager, or if he frequently visited another Efe camp to court a woman, or if he was sick-these and other interests led him to be perfunctory about maintaining his tool kit. If, on the other hand, he was concentrating his efforts on acquiring as much meat as he could, perhaps to earn himself or his wife a piece of cloth from a villager, or if he was visiting another camp during the hunting season-in such cases he made extraordinary efforts to fashion new implements and to keep his arrows in peak condition. In this way, the condition of a man's tool kit is a good indicator of his current priorities.

Village-Related Work Efe men worked for villagers during 3.5% of the observations. This category of activities included any time a man was working for a villager whether in the village, in a villager garden, or in the forest collecting building materials for a villager. Most of these activities took place in a villager garden where an Efe assisted in clearing a new garden, or helped to plant or harvest a crop. Compared to Efe women, men spend little time working for villagers. Peacock found that women worked for villagers during 9.6% of her observations-three times as much as men-and they spent another 5.8% of their time commuting between camp and village (Peacock 1985). The great majority of work that women do for villagers is related to the planting, harvesting and processing of cultivated food. In exchange for their labor, women normally receive food from the villager

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions

51

garden. Men's work in the village includes work in the garden, but seldom entails processing of food (e.g., shelling peanuts or pounding rice). They help their muto clear a new patch of forest for the next year's garden, and they assist during the planting and harvesting of peanuts and rice. In return for these tasks men usually receive a large portion of cooked food, part of which they eat immediately upon completion of the morning's work and the rest they take back to camp. As opposed to women, Efe men seldom receive raw food from villagers as payment for their work. In addition to food, men receive a ration of tobacco and marijuana. They often smoke a mixture of these while they work for the villager, and they return to camp with a portion as well. Tasks that Efe men perform for villagers outside the gardens are numerous. They climb oil palms to collect the nuts; they collect the building materials for villager houses; they help build and repair the leaf roofs and mud walls of villager houses; they dig latrines for the villagers; they carry messages between villages; they fetch and carry things for villagers; and they make and apply medicines for villagers. Most of the time that men spend in the villages cannot be counted as time working. All the observations of men in a village or in a village garden accounted for 10.1% of their time, yet they were working for villagers only 3.5% of total time. Men, probably more often than women, go to the village simply to visit with villagers and with other Efe. They may sit in the baraza with the villager men to hear and tell the latest news; or they may go to a libondo tree in the morning or late afternoon to drink some palm wine with villagers; or they may sleep in the village for the night to attend a dance or ceremony. Men spend considerable time in the villages ostensibly accomplishing very little. Sometimes they are just hanging around in hopes of receiving some food or marijuana or palm wine from a villager; at other times they may have a hidden agenda that becomes known only some days or even weeks afterward. In any case, while trips to the village can often be simply for diversion from the routine of the forest and the camp, Efe men attempt to attach as much importance as possible to their time in the village. I was informed by men more than once that spending time in the villages was a difficult but essential part of being an Efe man, much more taxing than anything an Efe woman ever has to do.

Travel Between Camp and Village Traveling between camp and village has been included as a subcategory of subsistence and maintenance work, but, because men can be engaged in so many non-work activities in the village, this is a problem-

52

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

atic category. Given the small amount of work that men do in the villages, to consider all travel time between camp and village as part of subsistence is questionable. However, since men do usually engage in some activity in the village that contributes to their ability to garner food in the long run, I have included it as subsistence work. Later we will see how the distance of a camp from the village affects the amount of time that men spend in the two locations and in commuting between them.

Moving Camp Abandoning one camp and moving to another is an additional form of travel that can be considered to contribute to subsistence. On average, the Efe move camp about every three weeks and they spend three to four hours walking and carrying their belongings between locations. These figures are consistent with the results of the behavioral observations, 1.5% of which were of men moving camp. Peacock arrived at the same figure for Efe women (Peacock 1985). Most of the work of moving camp is done by women. They collect and pack most of the household belongings, and they carry the heaviest loads. There is considerable chaos just prior to decamping as men and women alike search for all their belongings. Arguments may break out over who last used a certain lost article or who should carry a particular item, and there can be discussion of who is going to walk with whom, with particular concern for accompanying toddlers and the old and the sick. While the women carry most of the household belongings on their backs in a basket with a tumpline, men carry their weapons and sometimes small children and infants. Often, some of the men go ahead, carrying only their weapons; they hunt their way to the next camp, and usually arrive long after the rest of the group has completed most of the work setting up a new camp. On some occasions the entire group will walk to the new site together. When they arrive, the men spend 15 or 20 minutes clearing the new site of underbrush and small saplings, and then they leave camp to hunt, while the women spend the rest of the day building new huts, starting the fires and preparing the evening meal.

Total Subsistence-Related Work Men were engaged in subsistence-related work during a total of 51.3% of all observations. This is equivalent to 3.6 days per week. Table 4.2 shows a summary of the time allocation data for the 16 men sampled. The range of time men spent on subsistence-related tasks was from 32.8% to 64.4%, but most men were clustered around the mean (SD = 7.2%). There was no difference between married and single men in the mean proportions of time they spent on subsistence (t = .32; df

53

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions TABLE 4.2 The Percent of Time Devoted to Subsistence and Maintenance Activities by 16 Efe Men

1.0.# 630* 670 533* 530* 632 634 538* 631* 635 656 531* 650 532 633 534* 636*

Age Rank Old-Young

Total # of Observations

% Time in Subsistence & Maintenance

1

1,440 1,440 960 1,920 480 1,440 960 1,440 1,920 1,440 1,920 1,440 1,440 1,920 960 1,440

50.4 50.4 61.5 48.8 52.7 55.1 32.8 64.4 58.3 53.9 54.7 53.9 47.4 57.9 50.1 47.1

22,560

x = 52.3

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

11 12 13 14 15 16

* Co-habiting with an Efe woman during more than 65% of observations.

= 7), nor was there any relationship between the age of men and the proportion of their time they devoted to subsistence work (Spearman rs = .23; n = 12). CHILD CARE Child care was a difficult behavior to score. If a man was in physical contact with a child, scoring the subject as engaged in child care was not a problem, but if he was just responsible for watching a child and not engaging in any overt interactions with it, this was more problematic. Peacock differentiated between two types of child care: "active child care" and "child tending. " The former included carrying, holding, nursing, bathing, playing with, and any other behaviors that entailed physical contact with the child. "Child tending" was being responsible for the care of a child, where "responsible" was defined as being the only potential caretaker within ten meters of a child under the age of four (Peacock 1985). Unfortunately, I did not include under child care this

54

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

latter category. I confined child care to include only those observations when a man was in physical contact with a child under the age of four. Not surprisingly, men were actively engaged in child care a very small proportion of their time--only .7%, or the equivalent of five minutes per day. This figure is low for two reasons. First, there were very few children in the two bands that I studied-only one child under the age of four in each band. Peacock found that time devoted to child care by the women in these two bands (designated as Group A and Group B in her study) was significantly lower than in a third band (Group C) because of the differences in numbers of children. The second reason for the low proportion of time spent in child care is simply that men spend little time holding children. Of course we should keep in mind that the sampling regime only covers the daylight hours, and men may well spend more time in physical contact with their children at night. Most child caring done by Efe men during the day is of the "child tending" type. Men watch over children when mothers leave camp to collect firewood or water, and they divert the attention of children when mothers are busy with food preparation and household tasks. Men show considerable interest in children; they love to play word games with them as they begin to talk, or they make toys for them, or they teach them how to sing and dance. Most of these activities do not entail being in physical contact with children. Consequently, they do not show up in my data. It is worth noting that of the 157 observations of men in physical contact with children, only six were of a father in contact with his child. The two fathers of the two children in the camps that I studied showed less interest in their children than many of the other men. This may have been an artifact of the personalities of the two particular fathers, but my subjective impression was that Efe father-child attachments are not strong in comparison to other African populations. Winn (cited as a personal communication in Hewlett 1988:269) found that Efe infants are in contact with their fathers 4% of the time infants are in camp. Even considering that infants may be out of camp one-third of the day, Winn's data indicate that Efe fathers and infants are in contact more often than the two fathers that I studied. The difference between our results may be due to his having studied bands in which there were a greater number of infants and a smaller proportion of childless adolescents and adults eager to help mothers and fathers with caretaking chores. For more information concerning Efe child care practices see Tronick, Morelli and Winn (1987) and Winn, Morelli, and Tronick (1989). Hewlett (1988) compared the percentage of time Efe infants, Aka Pygmy infants, and !Kung infants were held by their fathers. Hewlett found that Efe infants are held about the same proportion of time as !Kung infants, but much less than Aka infants. Both !Kung and Efe men

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions

55

hunt and often gather separately from women, whereas Aka men and women hunt and gather together. This suggests that the amount of time fathers spend with their infants is increased when sexual division of subsistence labor is reduced.

SELF CARE Self care included observations of men bathing, dressing and undressing, urinating, defecating, grooming, applying body paint, and applying medicine. They accounted for about 1.0% of observations or the equivalent of seven minutes per day.

LEISURE The category leisure was created as an attempt to estimate how much time during daylight hours men spent not actively working toward subsistence, self maintenance, or reproduction. Leisure included recreation (see below), and all observations in a camp or a village when the focal person was sitting, lying, or sleeping and no activity was recorded. By this definition, observations of men standing but with nothing recorded in the activity column were not included in leisure, although certainly some proportion of such observations should be considered as time spent in leisure. Included under leisure, however, were occasions when an Efe may have been sitting in a village talking to villagers. Some proportion of these observations might be considered as work, since they may lead to the procurement of food or some useful item from a villager. Leisure, exclusive of recreation and smoking which are described below, accounted for 37.8% of all observations. Most of these took place in camp where men spent just over 50% of their time. When in camp, if a man was not making or repairing something, he was generally sitting inside or just at the entrance to his hut conversing with other members of the camp. Many tasks performed in the camp were interspersed with considerable periods of inactivity and leisurely socializing with other members of the camp. Occasionally, a man spent an entire day in camp just resting and joking with women and children who were not out working in the forest or village. Unless he was ill, it was seldom that a man remained in camp two full days in a row.

Recreation Recreation included singing, dancing, playing musical instruments, and playing with dogs, children, or other adults. Not included in the

56

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

calculation of time spent in recreation is one of the men's favorite pastimes, storytelling. Unfortunately, by our recording system, there is no way to discern between storytelling and just talking, unless I noted in a margin the subject about which the focal person was speaking. Since I did not do that consistently, I cannot reliably estimate this recreational activity, if that is indeed what it should be considered. Men were engaged in recreational activities during 4% of the observations. This figure would most certainly have been higher if observations had been conducted after dark. Most singing, dancing and playing of music took place around the fires after the evening meal. Many of my evening hours were spent listening to Efe's beautifully syncopated, cascading voices accompanied by fluid pluckings of a zoma. Sometimes those evenings spontaneously developed into full-fledged dances involving every person in camp from the oldest grandmother to the smallest infant. Efe also attended dances in the villages; these occurred both night and day and sometimes lasted for several days. Smoking Smoking tobacco and marijuana has widespread effects on many aspects of Efe's lives. That it affects their health is apparent to anyone that sleeps just one night in an Efe camp. There is a nearly constant symphony of coughing and spitting throughout the night, and people may awaken at any hour to prepare a pipeful for themselves. While the heavy smokers have an audible wheeze and catarrhal voice, we know of no deaths due to lung cancer. Approximately half of Efe men and about one-third of the women smoke (10 of the 16 focal men were smokers); those who do smoke sometimes go to extraordinary lengths to acquire a leaf of tobacco or a few buds of cannabis. While it may seem unlikely that an adult American male would actually, as the old advertisement jingle suggests, walk a mile for a Camel, such an effort is trivial compared to what an Efe man will do for a smoke. If a band is camped far from the village and there is no tobacco or cannibis left in camp, the men become irritable and accuse one another and the women of hoarding. The women receive verbal abuse for not bringing sufficient supplies from the village, and arguments break out between the men and women and between the smokers and nonsmokers. The most desperate men will resort to smoking leaves from various understory trees in the forest, but usually one or two of the younger and more compulsive men will eventually make a special trip to the village. I have known Efe to walk four and a half hours to a village, work for two hours, and make the return trip to camp all in the same day, just to acquire enough tobacco and cannabis to last for twelve hours.

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions

57

The lust for tobacco and cannabis produces a dependence upon the villagers beyond what would otherwise exist. Efe do not grow tobacco or cannabis themselves; they trade labor or meat or honey to a villager for these items just as for food. Often they give up an amount of meat or honey far beyond what an outside observer would consider prudent, especially considering the trade value of the meat or honey in food or material goods. That smoking may have a significant effect on a man's ability to acquire material goods is suggested by the data presented in Table 4.3 which shows a significant association between material wealth (calculated as the total currency value of all material posessions) and nonsmoking. It was certainly my impression that the men who were heavy smokers sacrificed many opportunities to earn large amounts of food and many material items in order to acquire just a periodic handful of cannabis from the villagers. It is not possible to calculate the amount of time Efe men devote to earning tobacco and cannabis. In the category of smoking, I have included only the observations of men preparing smoking materials. These include the drying of tobacco leaves over the fire, cutting the cannabis and mixing it with tobacco, cleaning and filling the pipe, making the long pipe stem from a banana frond, actually smoking the pipe, and passing the pipe to another person. These activities occurred during 1.8% of the observations.

LOCOMOTION Efe occasionally hitch rides on the few cars or trucks that pass on the road running through the study area. Such rides are very infrequent, so much so that many mature women experienced their first ride in a vehicle when I gave them a lift during my study. For all intents and purposes the only means of travel for Efe is walking, and this they do a great deal of, by Western standards at least. During focal observations, I recorded the focal subject's posture every minute (for the codes and their definitions, see Appendix 3). I therefore obtained an accurate record of the proportion of time Efe men spent walking, running, standing, sitting, lying, climbing, etc. Since I also recorded the distance that the focal subject traveled each half hour, I could also calculate the average distance Efe traveled in a day, and the average distance they traveled per hour.

Distance Traveled Efe men traveled an average of .393 kilometers per half hour (SO = .593; n = 752). This translates to a mean distance traveled per day of

58

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men TABLE 4.3 Smoking and Material Wealth MATERIAL WEALTH Richest

Poorest

Total

Smokers*

2

8

10

Non-smokers

6

o

6

TOTAL

8

8

16

* Smokers are significantly more likely to be poor than non-smokers. (Fisher's Exact Test; p = .(03)

9.44 kilometers, which is similar to the average of 8.95 kilometers traveled by Efe men during the 10 independent all-day focal follows that I conducted. To calculate how fast Efe walked when they were actually moving, as opposed to when they were stationary, we can divide the total distance traveled by all the men by the total time their posture was "amble," "walk," "hustle," or "run." By this procedure, it turns out that Efe men walked at a rate of 3.39 kilometers per hour. When they walk, Efe do not walk at a brisk pace. This is partly because much of their travel in the forest is off well traveled paths that provide easy passage through the vegatation, but it is also because Efe seldom put their mind to just getting from one place to another. As they travel, they are constantly searching for signs of animals, bees, plant foods or other humans. Consequently, they must walk slowly since they cannot concentrate on the ground immediately in front of them. As it is, their feet are prone to frequent injury by stepping on thorns or knocking against roots (see the data on health below). Also, Efe stop and start frequently as they progress through the forest. They might stop to check a possible duiker sleeping site or to examine the bole of a tree for a possible beehive, or they might wander off a path to look at a termite mound for emerging allates. Thus the distance they cover over the course of an hour is not far. However, on the rare occasions when they must travel long distances in the forest-say, to return from the village to a camp before nightfall or to get far from camp to begin an elephant hunt-Efe men can move rapidly for hours at a time with seemingly little effort. While I was often perspiring profusely to keep up during such sustained marches, Efe men showed few signs of strain or fatigue.

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions

59

Comparisons with Non-human Primates As far as I am able to determine, no other estimates of mean day range exist for any other human group, whereas such information is commonly collected as part of many non-human primate field studies. Considering the significance of bipedalism as a characteristic that separates hominids from other primates, it would be prudent to have comparative data on the locomotor patterns of human populations. By knowing the range of variation within humans and comparing it with other primates, we should be able to generate testable hypotheses concerning the functional significance of bipedalism. In comparison to other primate species, the mean day range of Efe men is large. The longest day ranges among non-human primates are in Pan troglodytes (3.9 km), Papio cynocephalus (5.5 km), and Papio ursinus (6.44 km), and most species average less than two kilometers of travel per day (Mitani and Rodman 1979:244). Efe, then, travel about 47% further per day than the non-human primate species with the longest day range. It is worth noting the large difference between the day ranges of Efe men and of chimpanzees. Chimpanzees are not only closely related to humans taxonomically, they live in the same forest as Efe. Moreover, male chimpanzees are approximately the same body size as Efe men: male chimps' mean weight is 48.9 kg (Napier and Napier 1967) and Efe adult males' mean weight is 42.3 kg (SD = 6.5; n = 115). Despite these similarities, the Efe average day range is 2.5 times as far as chimp average day range.

The Effect of Age on Distance Traveled The mean distance traveled per half hour by different Efe men ranged from .265 km to .556 km (mean = .394; SD = .084; n = 16). I expected that older men would not, on average, travel as far as younger men. My expectation came from several observations. The older men tended to be of higher status than the younger men-indeed, the three of the five oldest were fathers of younger men in the sample--and so could request the younger men to perform tasks for them. Also, younger men, I reasoned, tended to be ill less often than older men (see below for data concerning health). In addition, younger men just seemed more energetic than the older men. Contrary to my expectation, however, there was no significant relationship between age rank and average distance traveled per half hour of observation (Spearman's rs .23; n = 16; p = .19). Surprisingly, older men walked just as far as younger men.

60

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

HEALTH, ILLNESS AND ACTIVITY Health is the state of being free from physical disease or pain. It is really a relative concept since it is seldom possible to declare that a person is completely healthy. In the Ituri, health is probably a utopian state impossible to achieve since the prevalence of infectious and parasitic diseases is very high. For example, Mann et al. (1962) found among BaMbuti adults living some 200 kilometers east of our study area 80% prevalence of five varieties of nematode worms, 100% prevalence of filaroid parasites in blood and tissue fluids, and 20% prevalence of three species of malarial organisms. From this perspective, probably no Efe is ever free of illness. We considered it prudent to include in the observations of behavior some indication of the health status of the focal subjects so that we could assess the frequency of various illnesses among the people and investigate what effects morbidity had on behavior and activity patterns. For these purposes no man was ever dropped from the sample because of illness. Even if the subject was immobilized due to illness, we collected all scheduled one-hour samples on that subject, and all such observations were included in our analyses. Obviously I could not conduct a complete medical exam before the start of each observation period-I had neither the time nor the expertise for such a meticulous study. In many cases I asked the subject before the start of the observation if he was well or if he had any illness that bothered him. In most cases, however, this was not necessary. Because Peacock and I were their primary source of nontraditional medical care, the Efe kept us very well informed of any illness. Often we were informed of a person's ailment before any other Efe. Also, their first line of traditional treatment for nearly any illness was bloodletting; if we did not witness the attempted cure, we could usually notice the telltale lesions or rivelets of dried blood. All this taken into consideration, I am quite confident that we missed very few cases of the kinds of illnesses that we recorded, if any at all.

The Kinds of Illness Table 4.4 shows the kinds and frequencies of morbidity found among the Efe men. Efe men were sick with some recorded ailment 21.4% of the time--very close to the 22% found for Efe women by Peacock (1985). The most common class of illness observed was trauma, accounting for over 63% of all the half-hour observations. Of all the cases of trauma, by far the most common was sores on the soles of feet, caused either by yaws or by thorns and other sharp objects. Yaws is very

61

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions TABLE 4.4 The Frequency and Proportion of Each Type of Illness Recorded During 752 Half-Hour Observations of 16 Efe Men

Proportion of Sick Cases

Type of Illness

n

Foot trauma Other trauma Cold Abscess Diarrhea Malaria/fever Other

50 51 46 5 4 2 2

31.3% 31.9 28.8 3.1 2.5 1.3 1.3

160

100.2%*

None

592

Proportion of All Observations 6.6% 6.8 6.1 .7 .5 .3 .3 21.3% 78.7%

* Exceeds 100% due to rounding.

common in the study area, and it causes, among other things, very deep, painful sores of small diameter in the soles of feet. We treated numerous people with penicillin for yaws, and the sores and other symptoms disappeared in a matter of days. However, in a few people, including one of the sixteen focal men, the yaws could not be compktely eradicated despite repeated treatments. Other lesions were caused by thorns and other sharp objects puncturing and cutting the thickly calloused soles of Efe's feet. Sometimes such wounds could put a hunter out of commission for several days, forcing him to limit his activities or to remain in camp altogether. Besides sore feet, the other cases of trauma that appeared in the sample were hernias (common among both Efe and Lese men and not uncommon among women in the study area), a severe accidental cut on the palm of a hand by a knife, and an accidental puncture in the calf by a poisoned arrow that produced a moderate swelling for two days. Another common kind of illness among the men was a cold, accounting for nearly 29% of the recorded cases. Cold viruses seemed to sweep rapidly through the study area about twice per year attacking almost every person. They were often so severe that people were laid up for days or even weeks at a time and in some cases they lost considerable weight. Old people were hit especially hard; some would take months to resume normal activity, and a few seemed never to recover completely. Abscesses and infected swellings were also common, although they

62

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

accounted for only 30/0 of the sample here. Most abscesses were tropical ulcers, which seemed to occur when the skin was broken and the area was bruised. Such ulcers appeared more commonly among juveniles than among adults, perhaps because their activities made them more prone to bruising than the activities of adults. Cellulitis, probably caused by subcutaneous infection by Staphylococcus, was also prevalent. Swellings warm to the touch would develop usually on the medial side at mid-thigh. Eventually they would burst, emitting copious quantities of exudate from a very deep, narrow lesion. Such swellings could be exceedingly dangerous. In two cases (one a focal female subject of Peacock), we strongly suspected the infection became systemic killing the person overnight. Swellings of the lymph nodes at the armpit and, more commonly, at the groin were also common. Other forms of illness were malarial fever and diarrhea. It was not uncommon upon arrival in an Efe camp or in a Lese village to be taken to see at least one person in the midst of a malaria crisis. Malaria attacks were generally characterized by fever, uncontrollable shivering and chills, and intense aching lasting two or three days. When it came, recovery was very rapid--only a matter of a few hours. Diarrhea was an illness that we may not have detected as accurately as others. It seemed most prevalent among Efe during the honey season, when it was possible to see a man eat a full kilogram of honey in one half-hour, and among Lese in late June when the peanuts harvest began and peanuts were eaten undried. Most of the cases of sickness recorded for Efe men were not just minor, irritating illnesses. If a laborer or office worker in this country had an illness that resulted in a similar level of pain or suffering, he would not report to work that day and in some cases would be admitted to a hospital. If he were working in this country and had the same level of morbidity as found in this sample, an Efe man would call in sick approximately one day per week-roughly four times the rate of a factory worker in this country. From this perspective, let's now examine the effects that morbidity has on the activities of Efe men in the Ituri.

Health and Activity Table 4.5 shows the amount of time spent by Efe men in various activities and settings when they were recorded as sick and when they were recorded as not sick. Illness had a significant effect on men's behavior, producing the tendency to be less active and to remain in camp more than expected (expected being defined as the average proportion of time spent in that activity or setting by all men combined). When men were sick they spent significantly less time hunting. This

63

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions TABLE 4.5 Expected and Observed Time Allocations of Sick vs. Non-sick

Hunting

Collecting Honey

In Camp

In Village not Working

Distance Traveled per liz Hour

When sick

14.4*

13.6

54.2*

8.1

.283*

When not sick

22.9

10.4

49.3

3.5

.423

Expected

21.1

ILl

50.3

4.5

.393

Health Status

Expected values equal the mean calculated over all observations. * Significantly different from expected value using the binomial test (= .05).

is probably because hunting required walking long distances over several hours. The average hunt lasted 5.5 hours and required roughly 10 kilometers of walking as well as the ability to move rapidly for at least short distances. Men with sore feet or bad colds were not up to such sustained levels of activity; they often remained in camp, or opted for less strenuous tasks. Sometimes when a man was ill but wanted to take part in the hunt, he went out with the rest of the men but followed behind the beater and the dogs (see Chapter 5 for further description of group hunts). At first glance it is surprising that men tended to spend more time collecting honey when they were sick than when not sick. In most cases, however, a honey tree is not more than a one-half hour walk from camp and a sick man need not engage in the strenuous task of climbing the tree or chopping open the hive in order to partake of the elixir. He can walk to the tree at his own pace, and he can remain below the tree with the older men waiting for honey to be extracted and distributed amongst all the men present. Since honey is considered to have broad curative powers, both through internal ingestion and external application, Efe men may make extraordinary efforts to get to honey trees when they are ill. Also, sick men are more likely to be in camp when another man leaves to extract honey with his telltale axe and firebrand in hand, so the sick Efe may be more likely to be part of the extracting party. It is worth noting that when they were sick, Efe men spent more time in the Lese villages than when they were well. During those times of year when Efe were settled in their village camps, it was not a long walk to the village--usually less than two kilometers and in some cases only one hundred meters. Rather than sit around the Efe camp, which may well have been empty much of the day, a sick ma[' sometimes went to

64

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

the village to pass the hours where there was more company. Sometimes in cases of severe illness, when most Efe were in their forest camps, men slept for several days in the village and were cared for by Lese villagers. That Efe activities were affected by illness is perhaps best illustrated by the difference shown in Table 4.5 in the distance that men traveled per half-hour observation period when they were sick versus when they were not sick. This significant difference is consistent with the findings that the men tended to remain in camp or tended not to hunt but to walk the shorter distances to the village or to a honey tree. Even so, by Western standards Efe men still traveled on foot relatively far when they were ill-about 3.4 km per day.

THE EFFECTS OF WEATHER ON ACTIVITY Table 4.6 shows the proportion of observations when it rained in each of the four seasons of the year. Rain occurred at some point during 12.8% of the half-hour observations, but it rained throughout the halfhour only 6.7% of the time. It rained the most during the honey season when the Efe were in camps far from the village (see the section below on camp location), but it rained almost as frequently the season before when they were in village camps. Rain can put a true damper on Efe activities. Torrential downpours lasting five hours and amounting to 75 mm (three inches) of rainfall are not uncommon between April and November-especially in October and early November. After large storms, rivers may flood their banks, the forest floor is inundated, and travel becomes extremely uncomfortable or impossible due to excessively treacherous river crossings. Efe are very fearful of such storms. Not only does the rain lead to discomfort, but the high winds are potentially very dangerous, causing rotting vegetation to crash to the forest floor and large trees to be whipped about like wheat in an open field. Indeed, Efe say (as do Ticuna and Yagua Indians in the upper Amazon) that the greatest danger in the forest is not posed by snakes or animals, but by falling trees and branches (as well as evil spirits). During heavy rains, Efe seldom venture out from the cover of their huts; they remain inside huddled around the fire waiting for the storm to pass. Occasionally they emerge from their huts to hurriedly perform necessary tasks like fetching a forgotten item out of the rain or, very commonly, repairing the roof of the hut. To my mind, the Efe are not as diligent as they could be in keeping their huts in good repair. Between April and November one can be very

65

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions TABLE 4.6 The Proportion of Half-Hour Observations During Which It Rained

Feb-Mar Season I

May-July Season II

July-Sept Season III

Oct-Dec Season IV

4%

16%

18%

10%

No rain

96%

84%

82%

90%

Number of observations

208

96

240

208

Rain

sure that it will rain at least one day out of every three, and the labor involved in keeping the hut marginally rainproof is not burdensome---ten minutes per day would suffice. Yet Efe huts, almost as a rule, leak. The great majority leak to such an extent that during an average rain the floor becomes a maze of puddles that splatter mud with every additional drop of entering rain, and, if the fire is strong, the hut becomes a steambath. Also, because trenches are often not maintained around the hut, streams of water may pass through the hut from one side to the other and possibly through the adjoining hut as well. These conditions make it impossible to sleep during a heavy rain and often make everyone in camp cranky and irritable the next day. Nevertheless, the Efe seem more willing to sacrifice a night's sleep than to spend the time and effort keeping their huts in good repair. When Efe are out of camp in the forest, they try to anticipate rain storms, but with only limited success. When it begins to rain, the men usually halt the activity they are engaged in, and they make a beeline back to camp. If they are caught in a particularly heavy downpour with high winds that cause vegetation to fly, they will stop to take advantage of shelter afforded by a rock overhang or strong, tall, leaning tree. According to the data collected during the focal observations, it was raining only 3.9% of the time that men were on a hunt, and most of that time was spent traveling back to camp or standing in a sheltered spot waiting for the worst of the storm to blow over. An indication of how assiduous men were in returning to camp when it rained is the fact that they were in camp 78% of the time that it rained; this is compared to 50% of the time over all the observations.

CAMP LOCATION The geographic location of the camp where an individual is residing can significantly affect the pattern of his activities. To be able to test

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Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

this possibility, when I coded the behavioral data upon returning from the field, I entered a code designating the distance from the nearest village to the camp where the focal subject was residing. The distance was recorded not in meters, but rather in time necessary for an Efe to walk at a normal pace from the particular camp to the nearest village.

Distance from the Village Table 4.7 shows a breakdown of the proportion of observations conducted in camps of various distances from the nearest village. Most observations were conducted when the men were in camps between 5 and 20 minutes from the village. These were the village camps, which were placed on the edges of either the current or the previous year's Lese gardens. One and one-half percent of the observations were conducted when the focal man was actually living in a village. These were occasions when the focal subject was sick and being cared for by a villager, when the subject was staying in the village overnight before heading back to a distant forest camp, or on the rare occasions when the man's hut was actually in the village. Only 30% of the observations were conducted when the subjects were living in camps more than 90 minutes from a village. This is a fair representation of the Efe settlement patterns. During the 22 months that I was in the area, I knew of no Efe camp that was more than a seven-hour walk from a village. None of the camps where the focal subjects resided during the time that I collected the behavioral data were over four and a quarter hours from a village. This indicates the great extent to which the Efe were closely tied to the Lese villages. It was extremely rare that Efe camped so far from the road that they were not able to walk to the village and return to camp the same day. This generally limited their range from the road to roughly a four-hour walk, since they had to allow some time in the village to conduct business before heading back to their forest camp. If a camp was more than four hours from the road, the Efe would often sleep overnight in the Lese village or with Efe relatives if some were camped nearby.

Seasonal Location of Camps To some degree Efe change the location of their camps from near the Lese villages to far from the villages according to season. Sometime in January through March they camp in the forest in order to be in better locations for hunting. They again move to the forest from late June through September in order to concentrate on honey extraction. Although they may resettle in the forest at other times of the year, they generally debouch from the forest and locate their camps close to the village from March to late June and from October through December.

67

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions TABLE 4.7 Observation Frequency Related to Camp Location Distance from Village (in minutes)

Percent of Observations

in village

1.5 45.4

5-25 30-90 90-250

23.0 30.1

TABLE 4.8 The Mean Distance of Camp from the Nearest Village

Average distance from village (in minutes)

Feb-Mar Season I

May-July Season I

July-Sept Season III

Oct-Dec Season IV

48

11

169

11

These patterns of settlement were reflected in the average amount of time necessary to walk from camp to village in each season as shown in Table 4.8. In seasons II and IV when they were in their village camps, it took roughly 10 minutes to get to the village, but during the hunting season (season I) they averaged 48 minutes from the village, and in the honey season (season III) a one-way trip to the village averaged nearly three hours.

ACTIVITY PATIERNS: FOREST VERSUS VILLAGE As the Efe locate their camps deeper in the forest and further from the village can we expect them to allocate their time differently? If Efe live in two separate worlds-the forest and the village--as Turnbull has written (Turnbull1965b), how much difference is there in their behavior when they are residing in one world or the other? We can investigate these questions using the behavioral observations by analyzing the activities of Efe men as a function of the distance of their residence from the village. The activities that we will be interested in are hunting and gathering forest resources, working in the village, time spent traveling between camp and village, total subsistence work, and total distance traveled per day.

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Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

Hunting and Gathering The time that men spend hunting forest animals and gathering honey and other forest resources increases with the distance of their camps from the village (see Table 4.9). When they reside in their village camps, Efe men hunt and gather about 23% of the time; when they are in their forest camps, more than a 40-minute walk from the village, they spend 33% of their time in these forest subsistence activities. Most striking is when their camps are located far from the village; when camped more than a three-hour walk from the road, the men spend nearly 45% of their time hunting (29%) or foraging (16%). There is, then, almost a twofold difference in the amount of time they spend hunting and gathering when they are camped near the village versus when they are in camps most distant from the village (23% versus 45%).

Work in the Village As shown in Table 4.9 Efe men only perform work for villagers when camps are located near the village. Nearly 8% of their time when they are in their village camps is devoted to working for villagers; whereas when they are in forest camps, they do not work for villagers. They may walk to the village from their forest camps, but they do not travel the distance in order to trade labor to Lese; they have other activities in mind. Often they will come from the forest with an item for trade-usually either meat or honey, but sometimes with Cannarium or some other forest fruit. Other times they come to the village to meet or search for another Efe, or they may simply want to gossip a bit and hear the latest news around the villages. Usually, however, when Efe come to the village from a forest camp, they have an express purpose in mind, although they may go about their business in a deceptively casual way. The proportion of time spent by Efe men traveling between camp and village is also shown in Table 4.9. Most such time is spent when the Efe are camped near the villages on the edges of the Lese gardens. These camps are 5 to 25 minutes distant from the village, and a man usually makes at least one round trip to the village every day. When they are in the forest, however, men do not go to the village often, and so the time they devote to this activity is very little, even considering the increased distance they must travel when they do make such a trip.

Total Subsistence Work The total proportion of their time that Efe men spend on all subsistence activities increases as they move their camps from near the villages

69

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions TABLE 4.9 The Percent of Time Spent in Various Activities as a Function of the Distance to the Nearest Village Distance of Camp from Village # of (in hours) Observations in village .1- .4 .7-1.5 2.0--2.5 3.2-4.2

330 10230 5190 3300 3510

H&G

w

T

TS

D

14.8 23.4 39.0

0.0 7.8 0.0 0.0 0.0

2.1 4.0

17.3 47.9 55.4 52.1 64.2

6.11 9.57 6.34 8.74 15.04

40.6 44.6

.1 0.0 1.0

H&G = % time spent hunting and gathering. W = % time working in village. T = % time traveling between camp and village. TS = % time spent on all subsistence activities. D = Mean distance traveled per day (in kms).

further into the forest (see Table 4.9). Roughly 48% of their time is spent on subsistence activities when they are in their village camps, but about 64% is spent on subsistence when they are residing in the camps furthest from the villages. Much of the increase in time spent on subsistence activities in the forest versus near the village is accounted for by the much greater time men spend hunting and gathering. When they are in the forest, they take advantage of the access to forest resources. When they are closer to the villages, however, the men take greater advantage of the social and economic opportunities in the village. They work for Lese considerably more, and they, as it were, work for themselves in the villages more. For example, during the two seasons when they were in their village camps, the total proportion of their time that the men spent in the village, including working for Lese, working for themselves, doing nothing in particular, or attending dances and funerals-all of this time in the village amounted to 22.1 % of the men's time. That is roughly equal to the time the men spend hunting and gathering at the same times of year. In other words, the men divide their time equally between the forest and the village when they are camped near the village. When they are in their forest camps, on the other hand, they concentrate more on garnering forest products, and they spend almost no time in the villages. In seasons I and III the men were in villages only 2.9% of their time, and much of that was to attend the funeral of an Efe woman who was buried in the village--none was to work for villagers. When

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Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

they are in their forest camps, then, the activities of Efe men are almost entirely oriented toward the forest. They primarily hunt and gather forest resources, traveling considerable distances in the process, and on the rare occasions they go to the village, they do so not to work in the village, but primarily for social reasons.

FOOD ACQUISITION The results of the focal observations showed that 38.4% of men's time was spent hunting, gathering, and working for villagers, or what I call "total subsistence work." In order to answer the question how much food do Efe acquire from this time investment, we weighed all the foods entering and leaving Efe camps during 33 days (called "weigh days"). (For a complete description of the methods employed during the weigh days, refer to Chapter 2 and to Bailey and Peacock 1988.) Most of the weigh days occurred during the months that Peacock and I were performing the observations of behavior, so the results should be representative of the food that Efe were acquiring while their behavior was being quantified. The amount of variance in the sample and the chances of rare events having significant effects on the results are discussed in Bailey and Peacock (1988). During the 33 weigh days, the net amount of food acquired by Efe totaled 1,393,864 calories. By summing the weights of all the people present in the camps monitored during the 33 days, I determined that the Efe acquired 66.4 calories of foods per kilogram of body weight (SD = 33.2). There was high variance in the number of calories acquired per day, to the extent that the Efe must have been very uncertain as to how much food they would get on any given day. This conclusion was consistent with how Efe themselves acted: they frequently referred to themselves as hungry; they requested food from others whenever there was a reasonable expectation of receiving it; they concealed food from others; they tried to maintain small caches for times when food was unavailable from other sources; and they gorged themselves with any food made available to them. Much of their behavior indicated that they were apprehensive about where their next meal was coming from. Despite such anxiety about food on a day-to-day basis, over the year Efe acquired 26% more calories and 138% more protein than very active persons of their body size require according to WHO standards. Although there may be problems with applying WHO standards to a population of highly active, short-statured, forest-living people, the margins of surplus over the calculated requirements surely indicate that the study population was well nourished during the period March, 1981, and

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TABLE 4.10 Caloric Contribution to the Efe Diet by Gender PERCENT CONTRIBUTION TO DIET (by Calories) Men Women

Food Type Cassava Peanuts and rice Other cultivated foods Palm nuts Wild plants Fish Honey Meat

29.3% 10.7 11.2 7.4 9.8 .5 0.0 0.0

1.0% 2.4 .1 1.4 4.2 .1 13.5 8.5

TOTAL

68.9%

31.1%

ADJUSTED TOTAL*

66.1%

33.9%

* The total is adjusted for foods acquired by women in exchange for meat acquired by men. TABLE 4.11 Percent Calorie Contribution of Cultivated and Foraged Food in the Efe Diet by Gender* Men

Women

TOTAL

4.9%

58.6%

63.5%

Forest foods

26.2%

10.3%

36.5%

TOTAL

31.1%

68.9%

100.0%

Agricultural foods

* Based on 33 days of weighing all foods entering and leaving Efe camps. March, 1982. Thus, although the Efe food supply was irregular on a daily basis, food consumption over a year's time was more than adequate for maintenance of high activity levels and normal growth. What proportion of the foods that came into Efe camps was acquired by men? Table 4.10 shows a breakdown of the types of food acquired during the 33 weigh days by Efe men and women, and Table 4.11 shows what proportions of calories are in the form of agricultural food and foraged food. Of the total calories of food entering Efe camps, men brought 31.1%. An additional portion of food was meat that was exchanged to villagers for agricultural food. Since women were generally the ones to carry the exchanged food into camp but men were the ones who acquired the meat, the proportion of calories contributed by men

72

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

can be adjusted upward to reflect these exchanges. After adding the caloric value of meat traded to villagers, the contribution that men made to the total Efe diet was 33.9% of the calories. Examining the types of food acquired by men and women, it is apparent that men contributed very few of the calories that came in the form of agricultural food (4.9%). The small proportion of domesticated foods that men did acquire was largely earned by the men working for villagers, usually helping to clear forest for new garden sites. Some of the so-called agricultural food was in the form of fat-rich palm nuts, which the men acquired by climbing the thorny palm trees. The palms grew only along the road near the villages where they were either purposely planted by the Lese or where they germinated and grew spontaneously when secondary forest was recut. Each palm tree was considered as owned by a specific Lese patriclan. Sometimes an Efe man climbed a palm tree for a villager and gave most of the nuts gathered to the villager, but in most cases Efe men climbed the trees for themselves and kept all the nuts gathered. So this proportion of the so-called agricultural foods acquired by men was not gained by working for villagers, but rather foraged by the men for themselves. Approximately 85% of the calories acquired by Efe men came from foods hunted or gathered in the forest. Honey accounted for a large proportion of these calories; 13.5% of the calories consumed by Efe were from honey. Surprisingly, the percentage of calories provided by meat was only 8.5%, probably less than for any other hunting society studied to date (Hill 1982). Meat, however, was a more consistent resource than honey; it was brought into camp on 17 of the 33 weigh days, whereas honey was acquired on only 7 days, all but one of which were in August. Wild plants, mostly the fatty, protein-rich Cannarium schweinfurthii, accounted for 4.2% of the calories acquired by both Efe men and women. The results of the 33 weigh days show that women acquired about two-thirds of all the calories acquired by Efe, and that the great majority of these (85%) were in the form of cultivated foods acquired from the Lese gardens. Some of the cultivated foods acquired by women came not by contributing their labor to the villages and gardens, but by foraging in gardens abandoned by Lese but still containing a few banana trees and poor quality cassava and sweet potatoes. Women also acquired a small proportion of their food by stealing from current Lese gardens. However, the great majority of the cultivated foods that women brought into camp was earned by working in villager gardens assisting in the planting, harvesting, and processing of cultivated foods, and receiving some proportion of the garden foods in return. Efe women, then, largely specialized their subsistence activities

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions

73

around the Lese villages and gardens and they acquired approximately two-thirds of all the calories consumed by Efe, most of them from cultivated foods. Women spent approximately 15% of their time acquiring cultivated foods (Peacock 1985), but contributed twice as many calories to the total Efe diet as did men. Men, on the other hand, concentrated their subsistence activities more in the forest. They spent roughly 32% of their time hunting and gathering forest resources-mostly meat and honey, but some nuts and fruits as well-and they returned to camp with one-third of the total calories consumed by Efe.

SUMMARY Results of 376 hours of one minute time-interval behavioral observations have been presented in order to examine the activities and subsistence patterns of 16 focal Efe men. The study was designed and the results presented in a way useful for making cross-cultural comparisons and for detecting sex differences among Efe. Efe men devote 52.3% of their time to subsistence and maintenance activities. Some 32.8% of their time is spent hunting and gathering and another 7. 1% of their time is devoted to making and repairing the implements necessary for these forest activities. The rest of their subsistence and maintenance time is spend preparing food, collecting firewood or water, moving or maintaining camp, or working in the Lese villages. This last activity, along with traveling to and from the camps and villages, accounts for 5.6% of their time. Some non-subsistence activities are also analyzed. One of these is child care, which is defined as being in physical contact with any individual under four years of age. Efe men engage in very little child care during the hours that I observed behavior, in part because there are very few children in the population, and also because children are in contact with their mothers and with other Efe women such a large proportion of the time. Fathers are in contact with their children less often than most other adult males, which suggests a parental role different from fathers in Western societies. Efe men spend nearly 5% of their daylight hours in recreation-much more than women. For diversion, they enjoy dancing, playing music, singing, and telling stories, and they play virtually no competitive games. Many Efe seem severely addicted to smoking tobacco and cannabisoften a mixture of the two. Those men who are smokers have chronic cough, and they make extraordinary sacrifices to maintain their habit.

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Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

Efe men travel long distances during their subsistence activities. The average distance traveled is 9.4 kilometers per day-more than two and one-half times as far as chimpanzees, who inhabit the same forest and are approximately the same body weight as Efe. Morbidity has a significant effect on Efe activities. When they are ill, men hunt less, travel less, stay in camp more, and tend to be in the village more. Because honey is considered an elixir and because walking to honey trees is not a strenuous activity, men actually collect honey more often when they are sick than at other times. Rain influences the activities of Efe. They usually terminate forest activities when it begins to rain, which it did during 12.8% of the observations. They seem to have very few behavioral and technological mechanisms to ameliorate the costs that rain imposes in terms of interrupting subsistence activities and making life uncomfortable. Efe consider the high winds that often accompany heavy downpours as possibly the most dangerous natural phenomenon in their environment. The Efe locate their camps either close to villages in current and abandoned Lese gardens or in the forest. They seldom settle more than four hours from a village, a distance that allows them to make a round trip from camp to the village in one day. Men work in the villages only when they are camped within 20 minutes of the village, and they spend more time walking to and from the village when camps are close to the road. The time men spend hunting and gathering increases as a function of the distance of their camp from the village, and they travel longer distances per day when they are in their forest camps. The food acquired during 1981 was far above that necessary to satisfy the Efe's caloric and protein requirements according to WHO standards. Approximately two-thirds of the calories acquired by Efe were from cultivated foods, and most of these were acquired by women. Most of the remaining one-third of the calories was supplied by men in the form of forest resources. Women concentrate their subsistence activities around the village, acquiring mostly cultivated foods by supplying Lese villagers with labor. Men, on the other hand, specialize in forest subsistence activities. They do little work in the Lese villages; rather they concentrate on garnering forest resources which are both consumed by Efe and traded to villagers for food and material goods.

CONCLUSION To some extent the two worlds of the forest and the village in which Turnbull sees the Mbuti living are, for the Efe, the separate worlds of

Activity Patterns and Food Acquisitions

75

the two sexes. Women's subsistence activities are oriented toward the village. The resources women acquire come mostly from the village world and they take as strong a hand in producing cultivated foods as most Lese. Since most of their livelihood comes from the village, women are highly attuned to all aspects of village life. No telling what small tidbit of information from the village might be turned to an Efe's advantage! Even while they are in their forest camps, far from the village, Efe women are as likely to talk about village matters as they are to discuss those of the forest. In contrast, men are more oriented toward the forest world. Their activities take place mostly in the forest and most of the resources they acquire come from the forest. If the forest nurtures the Efe, if it is there that they gain their sustenance, it is through the men, who make it their business to learn and to teach as much as possible about its vagaries. An Efe man's identity and self esteem is very much tied to the forest and to his abilities to perform the activities necessary to exploit what the forest has to offer. While women trade information about the villages, men swap stories about the forest. To a certain extent, then, the two sexes are in conflict: women are drawn toward the village, while men are drawn deeper into the forest. A woman prefers to be close to the village world to be able to earn cultivated foods and to carry the fruits of her labors a short distance back to camp. A man more often prefers to be far from the village, closer to where the hunting and foraging are better and the social conflicts are diminished. Given this bilateral perspective, whatever view the anthropologist has of Efe life may well depend upon which of the two sexes slhe listens to and follows most closely during the course of fieldwork. Certainly, for a man associating mostly with Efe men, it is more likely, as well as more appealing, that he would see Efe as men and women who live in the forest independent of the village but who go to the village because it offers "for a brief while, an agreeable change of pace, an opportunity for a relaxation that is not always possible in the forest, and, one might say, better hunting on occasion" (Tumbull1965b:37). But the anthropologist may have a very different view of Efe life if he or she views it from the perspective of the Efe woman, who may well say the same thing about the forest as the men say about the village.

5 The Socioecology of Efe Hunting

This chapter focuses on the principal forest activity of Efe men: hunting. Men spend more time hunting in the forest than in any other subsistence activity, and the meat they acquire on hunts is a very significant food item, highly prized by all people in the area and highly nutritious in terms of calories and protein. Meat contributes approximately 9% of the calories and 48% of the protein eaten by Efe. At the same time meat acquired by Efe also contributes to the calorie and protein consumption of Lese. Thus hunting contributes to the nutritional status of Efe directly by supplying a highly nutritious food item and indirectly by providing a highly prized trade item with which agricultural food and material goods can be acquired from villagers. Moreover, hunting is an important activity for Efe men because it enhances their identity, distinct from women and villagers, as skilled specialists in acquiring forest resources. On a broader scale hunting has often been considered by students of evolution to be of central importance in the evolution of human morphological and social characteristics. Hunting by early humans and their immediate ancestors has at one time or another been stressed as the primary factor selecting for bipedalism, language, large brain size, aggression and warfare, sharing, tool making, the nuclear family, sex roles, and many other diverse real or putative human traits. The relative importance of meat as a food item during human evolution and among 77

78

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

contemporary hunter-gatherer groups has also been the subject of much debate (Lee and DeVore 1968; Lee 1979; Teleki and Harding 1981; Hawkes, Hill and O'Connell 1982; Hill 1982, 1983). Also the significance of hunting as a source of protein and as a factor limiting populations in lowland South America has occupied the attention of numerous authors (Meggers 1971; Harris 1974, 1977; Gross 1975; Chagnon and Hames 1979). Hunting by Mbuti in the Ituri has been the subject of several recent studies. Tanno (1976) and Ichikawa (1983) have published data from 38 net-hunts by Mbuti near Mawambo in the southern Ituri. Hart (1978, 1979) has data from over 100 hunts by net-hunters near Biasiko. Harako (1976) studied two bands near Lolwa in the central Ituri; one band hunted with nets and the other with bows and arrows. Terashima (1983) studied Efe archers near Nduye and includes the results of 12 hunts. Wilkie (1989a) used a bounty system to estimate hunting returns by Efe in the Ituri Project study area. A topic that has confounded these and other workers for many years has been the use of two diverse hunting technologies-net-hunting and bow and arrow hunting-by BaMbuti groups in the Ituri. This is an important issue because each hunting technology is associated with a different social organization, net-hunters occurring in large groups supposedly to increase the number of nets on a hunt (Turnbull 1965b, 1968; Tanno 1976; Harako 1976; Ichikawa 1978) and archers occurring in smaller groups to facilitate equitable distribution of meat (Terashima 1983). Stated or implied in all the discussions of why some BaMbuti have turned to net-hunting and why others have retained archery (seen as the original technology) is the assumption that net-hunting is a much more efficient means of acquiring meat in the Ituri than is bow-and-arrow hunting (Abruzzi 1979; Harako 1976; Milton 1985; Tanno 1976). Yet, except for Terashima (1983), no one has questioned this assumption nor collected quantitative data from Efe hunts to compare with the returns from Mbuti net hunts. This issue of the factors accounting for the distribution of net-hunters and archers in the Ituri has been reviewed and investigated in greater detail recently (Bailey and Aunger 1989b). Despite the long-standing fascination with hunting by humans and its central role in theories concerning human evolution, there are surprisingly few studies of hunting and gathering societies that include reliable quantitative data on time spent hunting and the amount of meat returned (cf. Hill 1982; Kemp 1971). Of the few studies that have been published, most come from tropical forest areas in South America and from the Ituri (see Hill 1982; Harako 1976; Hart 1979; Tanno 1976; Terashima 1983). This chapter presents the results of my study of Efe hunting returns and discusses how those returns

Socioecology of Efe Hunting

79

influence men's decisions concerning the time they spend in hunting and other activities.

HUNTING METHODS AND PREY SPECIES Efe employ essentially four different hunting methods: hunting in groups with spears for large mammals, hunting alone with bows and poison-tipped arrows for monkeys, hunting alone with bows and irontipped arrows from trees to ambush duikers, and hunting in groups with bows and iron-tipped arrows for duikers and other mid-sized mammals. Since I observed only four spear hunts, I will present data only from the other three types of hunts. (For discussions of and data from spear hunts see Harako 1976.)

Monkey Hunts Hunting for monkeys is a solitary activity the success of which depends in part upon stealth. The hunter walks quietly through the forest listening for monkeys traveling or feeding in the trees. He attempts to anticipate the direction of troop movement and positions himself accordingly, usually under a fruiting tree. As the monkeys approach to within 70 feet, he attempts to shoot them using poison-tipped arrows. The hunter usually shoots several arrows; the great majority of arrows miss their target and are lost to the hunter. When a monkey is hit, it may flee for 100 meters or more before the poison takes effect. The hunter tries to follow the wounded animal to watch as it begins to convulse and sometimes vomit. It is rare that the hunter can retrieve the monkey within the hour. Most often he marks the area where he thinks the monkey will eventually fall, and he returns later in the day or the next morning to search for the carcass. Frequently, when they are engaged in other activities, Efe or their dogs come upon rotting carcasses of monkeys that were shot and never found by the original hunter. I collected information on a total of 46 monkey hunts. For each hunt I recorded when the man left camp, when he returned, and I weighed each prey item. I accompanied men during 17 of the 46 hunts. A system was devised by the hunters and myself whereby my influence on the hunt was minimal (see Chapter 3 for further explanation). During each hunt that I accompanied, I counted the number of arrows shot, the number of hits, and the number and weight of the monkeys retrieved as a result of that particular hunt. I counted the time spent in retrieving the monkey as part of the hunt, even if it occurred on a different day.

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Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

The average duration of a monkey hunt was 3.31 hours (n = 46; SE = .35 hours). In addition to this time investment in the search, pursuit and retrieval of monkeys, men expended time making the poison arrows used during the hunts. Making a quiverful of arrows entails at least a full day's work, though a man usually spreads the task over two or three days. Palm fronds have to be cut and split. The arrow shafts must be whittled and fashioned with points and notched to absorb the poison. The roots and vines used in making the poison must be collected from the forest, then pounded, and then squeezed to emit the poisonous juices. The arrow points must then be repeatedly coated with the poison and hardened over a low fire. Each man makes about 75 arrows during one arrow-making session. On average 5.9 minutes (SE = .08; n = 492) are necessary to make each arrow. Efe make no effort to search for poison arrows once they are expended on a hunt; the arrow goes too far in an unpredictable direction, and more time would be spent searching for arrows than manufacturing them. Despite the considerable time investment in making arrows, hunters seem to expend them with surprising insouciance. They shoot 37 arrows for every monkey they bring home (521 arrows returned 14 monkeys). This means that, in addition to the time spent actually hunting for and retrieving monkeys, Efe men expend 3.6 hours of additional labor for every monkey they bag.

Ambush Hunts Ambush hunting (called ebaka by the Efe) involves metal-tipped arrows only and is designed to take advantage of the feeding behavior of forest antelopes, especially duikers (genus Cephalophus). While men are engaged in other activities in the forest, they look for trees near the camp that are dropping fruits preferred by duikers. When a man discovers such a tree with recent duiker spore beneath it, he constructs a perch with vines and saplings two and a half to three meters off the ground. During peak duiker feeding hours-early in the morning and late in the afternoon toward dusk-the hunter stands on the perch, stationary, with bow drawn and ready, waiting for a duiker to walk into range. If he puts an arrow in a duiker, the hunter immediately leaps from the perch and gives chase, calling as he goes to the dogs back at camp. The dogs may or may not hear him; if they do, they often join the hunter in the chase. (J ust as often dogs go running off after some other animal; much time and effort is spent retrieving misguided dogs.) Many animals that are shot by this method are never bagged because duikers are capable of running several hundred yards through dense forest even after a direct

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81

hit. If the fruiting tree is not close to camp and the dogs do not assist in the chase, the animal often escapes, perhaps to die undetected. I collected data from 45 ambush hunts. I went with the hunter during 14 of those hunts and remained nearby until an animal was shot, when I would join the hunter in the chase. For the other 31 hunts I recorded when the hunter left camp, when he returned, and the weight and number of prey items he bagged. I usually knew exactly where the hunter had been since I had each man show me "his tree," and I could tell if he had shot an animal because of the commotion that he and the dogs would cause during the chase. The average duration of a hunt was 1.87 hours (SE =.06 hours). The amount of additional effort that went into this method of hunting consisted of constructing the perch (mean = .22 hour; n = 4) and maintaining the bow and metal-tipped arrows. Since few arrows were lost by this method and bows and metal-tipped arrows had to be maintained for other activities, the amount of time necessary for manufacture and maintenance of bows and arrows that can be allocated to this method is negligible. For every duiker that is bagged by the ambush method, 3.1 are hit (25 hits; 8 animals bagged); and for every animal hit, 2.6 shots are taken (66 shots; 25 hits). This means that only 12% of the animals shot at during ambush hunts ever end up in an Efe cooking pot.

Group Hunts Most Efe hunting is done in groups of four to thirty people. The Efe call group hunts mota, the name of the small fire they build in the forest and around which they discuss the direction and strategy of the hunt just prior to setting off on the first game drive. Group hunts require considerable cooperation among hunters and between the hunters and their dogs. One to three men acting as beaters remain stationary with the dogs for about ten minutes while the rest of the hunters walk swiftly but quietly in the proposed direction of the drive. These men station themselves from 50 to 800 meters ahead of the beaters forming a loose semi-circle around the area from which game are to be driven. Spaced anywhere from 20 to 100 meters apart, the men stand very still with bows drawn and ready. Once the shooters are in position, the dogs, with wooden clappers around their necks so their location can be known at all times, and the beater{s) begin to work the enclosed area trying to flush game. The beater(s) shout encouragement to the active dogs and concentrate their cacophonous movements in thick tangles and natural tree falls-favorite sleeping and hiding sites for cryptic duikers and

82

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

chevrotain. If an animal is flushed and runs within range of a shooter, the hunter takes a shot at the animal as it courses by. The most successful shots occur when an animal, hearing the commotion of the dogs and beater in the distance, walks nervously within range of the stationary hunter. If his arrow hits the animal, the shooter calls the dogs by popping his bow string against a wrist guard and shouting, "aas, aas, aas, ibude, aas, aas." The dogs then course the wounded animal, hounding it until it collapses or, more often, until it circles back to within range of another hunter who finishes it off with another metal-tipped arrow. A drive is completed when the beater reaches the most distant stationary hunter, at which time the process may begin again. On some drives the shooters may not remain stationary, but rather walk along maintaining a moving semi-circle formation as the dogs and beater work the forest. In this case, if an animal is flushed, everyone will stop and hope that it will approach them, or they will run to a position to intercept the coursing animal. While the Efe do tend to be more assiduous about searching for prey near tree falls that may be encompassed by the standing shooters, the group hunting method treats the forest environment as essentially uniform. Game drives are set up more or less continuously in a large semi-circle leaving camp in one direction and gently curving around for several kilometers to return toward camp 90-180 degrees in another. The target prey species of cooperative group hunts are the eight species of forest antelope that occur in the !turi: Bates's pygmy antelope (Neotragus batesi), the water chevrotain (Hyemaschus aquaticus) and six species of duiker (Cephalophus monticola, C. dorsalis, C. natalensis, C. leucogaster, C. nigrifrons, and C. sylvicultor). Other animals are also taken, including genet, mongoose, elephant shrew, monitor lizard, francolin and guinea fowl. When the quarry is killed, the hunters convene to butcher and distribute the meat. The manner in which the meat is distributed is discussed below. The data presented are based upon 71 group hunts. I was present for all but three. During each hunt, all participants and the number and weight of animals shot were recorded. Seventy percent of the animals taken were weighed, as were all the portions distributed from them; the weights of the other 30% of animals and the portions distributed were estimated. The mean duration of group hunts was 5.49 hours (n = 71; SE = .38 hours). The additional labor that goes into this method of hunting consists of making and repairing bows and arrows and caring for dogs. Approximately 7% of men's time (or 50 minutes per day) is spent in manufacturing and repairing hunting and honey-gathering implements

Socioecology oj EJe Hunting

83

(see previous chapter), of which about 35% (or 17.5 minutes per day) can be allocated to this method of hunting. Estimating that a man takes part in a group hunt three out of every seven days, maintaining his hunting equipment would add another 40.8 minutes of labor to each hunt. Most caretaking of dogs occurs during the hunt; this includes putting special potions in their noses, tying and untying the clappers around their necks, putting special compounds on cuts and abrasions, frequently hitting or scolding them for getting in the way, and searching for them when they get lost. The labor extraneous to the hunt that goes into caring for dogs is negligible.

TIME ALLOCATION DURING HUNTS Locomotor Patterns The results of the one-hour focal observations show that when men are hunting, they spend 53.1 % of their time on the move. Of this time 83% is spent walking at a leisurely pace while searching for prey. The fact they they hardly ever run (.23o/0--0nly 11 observations out of 4,758) indicates the controlled mB-nner in which they travel through the forest even when coursing game. Most instances of running are of short, five or ten-second spurts as a man tries to position himself to intercept a flushed animal. Efe never run long distances (over 100 meters) in the forest. Hunters spend about one third of their time standing (31.1 %). Much of this is interspersed with walking, as they stop to listen and search for prey or for beehives, and as they stand waiting for prey during group hunts. Men squat or sit during hunts 10.1% of the time. They usually sit for a few minutes around a small fire (the mota) prior to the first drive on a group hunt, and beaters often sit waiting for the other hunters to position themselves between drives. The hunters also sit around a kill during butchering and distribution, arguing about their shares and plotting their best strategy for the remainder of the hunt. In addition to moving, standing, and sitting while they are in the forest hunting, Efe men also spend time climbing or perched in a tree, primarily during ambush hunts. They spend 4.3% of their time in trees, most of it standing on a perch waiting for a duiker to approach the ripe fruits fallen on the ground below. When Efe are in the forest searching for or extracting honey, they spend 11.9% of their time in trees (2.7% climbing and 9.2% perched). They climb trees in the process of extracting the honey or simply in order to get a closer look at a suspected beehive. They are perched in the tree during the process of smoking, chopping open, and actually extracting the honey. Of all the time that Efe are in

84

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men

the forest, away from their camps and away from the villages, they spend 7.7% of their time in trees.

Distance Traveled To calculate the distance that men travel while they hunt we can first calculate the average rate at which men travel when they are moving (codes = amble, walk, hustle, and run) across all focal observations (3.39 km/hr). Since they spend 2.53 hours per day hunting (21.1 % of 12 hrs), and they spend 53.1% of that time traveling, we can conclude that Efe men travel an average of 4.61 km per day in the course of hunting. By the same method we can calculate that men travel 1.60 km a day when they are searching for or extracting honey. For all forest activities they travel an average of 6.87 km. This figure, which comes from the 376 hours of focal observations, is in close agreement with the results from the 10 all-day follows which show that men travel a mean of 7.03 km (SE = .71 km) while they are engaged in forest activities.

HUNTING RETURNS Monkey Hunts Table 5.1 shows a summary of the returns by each man during the 46 monkey hunts. Based on this sample, we see that when a man goes hunting for monkeys, his chances of bringing home a kill are 30% C4/46); the average weight of edible meat derived from a kill is 4.62 kg (SE = .24 kg). The mean weight of meat returned per hour of hunting by all the men combined is .424 kg/hr, but there is a great deal of variance between men (SO = .464 kg/hr). It is difficult to determine from this small sample what accounts for the differences between men with respect to their success in killing monkeys. There is no correlation between the number of hours that a man hunts monkeys and his per hour return, so we cannot say that those men who hunt more by this method are more or less successful. As we shall see, these findings are different from those from group hunts in which the more successful hunters actually hunt less than the less successful hunters. In monkey hunting there is, however, a highly significant correlation between the number of hours a man hunts and the total weight of the monkeys he kills (r = .64; P < .01). This finding is hardly surprising: it indicates that the amount of meat that Efe get by monkey hunting is a function of the amount of labor they put into it; the more hours they hunt, the better their chances of bringing a monkey back to camp.

85

Socioecology of Efe Hunting TABLE 5.1 Returns of 46 Monkey Hunts

I.D.#

# Hunts

Total Hours

# Monkeys

Total Kg

Kg/Hr

530 531 532 533 534 538 630 631 632 633 634 635 636 650 652 656 670 Others

7 5 2 1 3 2 3 2 1 2 2 2 3 2 2 2 3 2

25.83 18.75 3.08 2.00 4.42 7.92 10.00 8.00 2.00 8.08 3.92 8.00 10.00 6.00 7.92 8.08 8.00 10.38

2 3 0 0 1 1 2 2 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 1

8.19 13.58

.317 .725

6.44 5.74 8.75 9.80

1.457 .718 .875 1.225

0 4.67

0 .467

0 3.68 3.82

0 .460 .368

Totals

46

152.38

14

64.67

.424

For the purposes of comparing this hunting method with others, we should factor in the additional amount of time devoted to making and repairing the poison arrows used. Again, considering that 36 arrows are shot for every monkey bagged and it takes on average 5.9 minutes to make an arrow, the return from this method ends up being .319 kg/manhr.

Ambush Hunts Table 5.2 shows a summary of the results of the 45 ambush hunts. During the hunts, men succeeded in bringing in prey only five times11 % of the hunts. On one occasion a man (No. 630) killed three squirrels (two Protoxerus stangeri and one Funisciurus lemniscatus) and on another occasion the same man killed two squirrels. The other three animals killed were duikers (two C. monticola and one C. nigrifrons). Based on this sample of 45 ambush hunts, not only are the chances of a man successfully bagging a prey small, but the average amount of edible meat gained per prey item is also small (2.19 kg; SE = 1.20 kg). There is no relationship between the amount of time a man spends hunting by this method and his per hour return, and in fact we cannot

86

Behavioral Ecology of Efe Pygmy Men TABLE 5.2 Returns of 45 Ambush Hunts

LD.#

# Hunts

Total Hours

# Prey

530 531 532 533 538 630 631 632 633 634 636 650 656 670 Others

4 4 3 1 3 4 1 1 3 1 1 1 1 4 13

7.00 7.33 5.25 2.00 6.08 7.00 1.33 2.67 6.83 2.58 2.00 1.33 1. 75 7.75 23.15

0 1 0 0 5 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0

Totals

45

84.05

8

Total Kg

Kg/Hr

9.94 2.91

1.356 .553

1.42

.203

3.22

.471

17.49

.208

say that the more time Efe devote to hunting by the "ebaka" method, the more meat they bring in. This is counterintuitive, not just to an anthropologist, but also to the Efe, who do recognize their chances on anyone hunt to be very small, but who emphasize that persistence is the main ingredient for success. As one man put it to me, "if you sit in camp, you'll only eat cassava." For the purposes of comparing hunting methods, factoring in the additional labor that goes into ambush hunting-the construction of the perch-the mean return by this method is .185 kg/man-hr. Group Hunts

More man-hours are devoted by Efe men to cooperative group hunting than any other method of pursuing game. Figure 5.1 shows the frequency distribution of 71 hunts by the number of men that participated in the hunt. The 71 hunts represent just over 4,043 man-hours of labor. The hunts range in size from 4 to 25 men, only five hunts having more than 15 men participating. The mean number of hunters on a hunt is 9.75 (SO = 4.32). Since the average number of men in an Efe camp is close to seven, this mean group size reflects a degree of cooperation between the males of more than one band. Loose patriclans may reside together

Socioecology of Efe Hunting

87

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