In Jane Goodall's landmark study of chimpanzees in Gombe, Tanzania, she observed one young male who devised an unusual means of raising his status. Dubbed Mike by Goodall's researchers, the youngster had been bullied by higher-status males, rarely received portions of food from others and was locked out of any potential for procreation (H. Kummer and J. Goodall Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B 308, 203-214; 1985). But one day Mike discovered that when he accidentally knocked against the large metal kerosene cans lying around Goodalls camp, the racket startled the other members of the chimpanzee group. One afternoon, Mike ran into the centre of the group, batting and banging on one of the cans and scattering all the chimpanzees. Then he sat quietly in the centre of the clearing until the other chimpanzees slowly returned to gather around him. The females began grooming him, and the other males, even the largest alphas, gave him a wide berth.
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