From nutcracker monkeys to woodbending apes, primates come in an amazing variety of shapes, sizes, and power styles. Some rely on powerful muscles, while others rely on explosive power, iron grip, or slow, relentless muscles.

Introducing carefully selected primates that you don’t want to meet in a pillow fight…

world’s strongest primate

gorilla

Honestly, you don’t stand a chance. Here we are talking about the heaviest of living primates. The largest silverback gorilla is about 50 percent heavier than any living gorilla. World’s Strongest Man Reino Nell, Weight is 148kg.

If you still think you might be able to win a pillow fight, it’s worth considering that while a human’s outstretched arms are roughly the same as their height, a gorilla’s reach is much longer, up to 2.7 meters. (It’s not without reason that arm width is known as the “monkey index.”) You’ll probably be knocked off the pole before you can get into range. If you’re still on the fence, take a look at this absolute unit…

chimpanzee

According to YouGov research: 15% of British men and 22 percent of US men They believe they can beat chimpanzees in a fight.

True, chimpanzees are not as large as gorillas. The world’s strongest man, Reino Nel, weighs twice as much as the largest wild male chimpanzee. But the vast majority of men are not Rayno Nels. In addition to that, Chimpanzee muscle produces about 35% It has more power per kg than human muscle. Experiments conducted in In the 1940s, captive male chimpanzees were shown to be able to pull ropes. He has almost the same strength as a human male. Chimpanzees in the wild may be even stronger. And I’m pretty sure they don’t follow the rules of pillow fights.

human

Aside from the world’s strongest men, humans aren’t really built for power. We value stamina. Our ancestors probably hunted by tracking their prey over long distances, rather than by overwhelming them in direct combat. That being said, there is one feat of power that humans are really good at.

Once they started walking upright on two legs, their arms became free to use for other purposes, such as throwing things. And thanks to the structure of your shoulders and hips, you can quickly rotate your upper body while extending your arms. We can throw objects farther and faster than other apes.Even if they are specifically trained to do so.

Chimpanzees may be able to throw feces at zoo visitors, but no non-human ape can propel a javelin 100 meters. Indeed, it may be thanks to our throwing ability that we need to kill exhausted prey with spears or rocks at the end of a long hunt.

Interestingly, the same skeletal and muscular features that allow us to throw with great force may also allow us to pack a terrifying punch. Scientists have calculated that a fist blow delivered by a heavyweight boxer is equivalent to a 6kg mallet being swung down at 20 miles per hour (32 kilometers per hour). https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/3936571/ .

capuchin monkey

This stocky South American monkey may only be the size of a small house cat, but it punches well above its weight.

First, they have disproportionately large jaw muscles; A bite that can crack open nuts and seeds that are not on the menu of other similarly sized monkeys.. Their arms are also surprisingly fleshy, allowing them to swing rocks like hammers to break in or crush bites too hard for their teeth. This is a rare example of tool use among monkeys in South America.

Capuchin monkeys are a powerful combination of brains and brawn, with the intelligence needed to formulate plans and the horsepower needed to carry them out.

Pott

This slow-moving, nocturnal denizen of Africa’s tropical forests has long been famous for its strong grip. According to one rather gruesome historical account, the pot is so tightly attached to the branch that it can only be removed by cutting off a finger.

However, in one study, Muscles that increase pot grip strength It turns out that they are not particularly large compared to other primates. In that case, Poto’s grip strength has either been exaggerated in the past or is a product of something other than muscle mass.

gibbon

It’s no surprise that an animal that spends its entire life swinging from branch to branch in the forest canopy boasts amazing upper body strength. And sure enough, the gibbons do not disappoint.

If the size of your biceps is a measure of your strength, and for many gym buddies, it really is, then gibbons are the strongest of them all.

The biceps, along with two other muscles responsible for bending the arm at the elbow, the brachialis and brachioradialis (perfect for animals famous for their brachial movements), are small compared to their body size. Gibbons are especially large and powerful compared to other primates.

Brachiation involves endless repetitions of pull-ups with one arm, so it’s no surprise that gibbons have flexor muscles. On the other hand, gibbons may have trouble doing push-ups because the muscles in their elbows that extend their arms (such as the triceps, which are quite heavy in humans) are abnormally small in gibbons.

indri

If gibbons are the world primate pull-up champions, indris are long jump specialists. It has long legs and weighs about 9 kg, making it the largest living species. lemur. they pass madagascarThe forest species uses a mode of locomotion known to zoologists as “vertical cling jumping,” jumping between upright tree trunks, and has been reported to cover more than 10 meters in a single leap.

Indri uses an explosive burst of leg strength to leap into the air with a force approximately eight times his body weight. For comparison, the force exerted by a human standing up and jumping is approximately three times their body weight.

orangutan

As the largest fully arboreal mammal on Earth (large males can weigh over 100 kg), orangutans must tread carefully through the trees. Rather than swinging wildly like gibbons or jumping explosively like indri, they move purposefully, testing the strength of branches and shifting their weight with controlled precision.

orangutan More like a tractor than a gymnast, it’s designed to deliver a lot of power at low speeds. This is a locomotion style that can be sustained for long periods of time in habitats where one wrong move can have dire consequences.

Muriki

Some South American monkeys have access to sources of strength that African and Asian primates do not have.

A member of the cat family. spider, howling Woolly macaques and muriki (also called woolly macaques) have muscular, prehensile tails that can be deployed with great force and dexterity to grab branches and leaves as the monkeys climb the tops of trees.

These amazing appendages effectively act as a fifth limb and are strong enough to support the entire weight of the bearer. Perhaps the most powerful of these “prehensile” tails are those of the muriki, two of the heaviest of all South American primates, weighing up to 10 kg.

Gigantopithecus

The eastern gorilla may be the largest living primate, but it’s not the largest that has ever existed. This title was given to a relative of the orangutan. Gigantopithecus It became extinct about 250,000 years ago.

Known only from fossilized teeth and some jawbone fragments found in caves in China, it probably specialized in eating hard, fibrous plant material. We may never know how strong it was. However, with a height of about 3 meters and a weight of up to 300 kg, it’s a pretty good bet that it would easily overpower even a gorilla in a pillow fight.