Mountain Gorillas Making a Comeback

Levonian

Levonian

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From the January 23 issue of sciencenow, an online publication of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Mountain Gorillas Making a Comeback

Mountain gorillas have managed to thrive despite conflict in central Africa, according to a new census. "The results show that it's at least possible to prevent extinction of the mountain gorilla, even in times of conflict," says Eugène Rutagarama, director of the International Gorilla Conservation Program in Nairobi, Kenya, which helped sponsor the census.

The most critically endangered of the three gorilla subspecies, mountain gorillas (Gorilla beringei beringei) are restricted to two forested areas: Bwindi Impenetrable National Park in southwest Uganda and the Virunga Volcano Region, which spans Uganda, Rwanda, and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Although their entire range is now encompassed by national parks, the Virunga gorillas are surrounded by one of the highest human population densities in Africa. This has put immense pressure on the gorillas through habitat loss and poaching. Pressures increased during the 1990s when, due to the Rwandan war and genocide, 1 million refugees moved through the area. The conflict also made it difficult to patrol the forest, although some guards persisted, despite the risk to their lives and without pay.

War and political unrest prevented gorilla censuses in the Virungas between 1989 and 2003. With increased stability in the region, six teams from the national park authorities of Uganda, Rwanda, and DRC were able to survey the region last September and October. They systematically searched the Virunga mountains, counting gorilla night nests and assessing the animals' age and sex from the size of dung and presence of silverback hairs. Results of the census, released 19 January, put the Virunga population at 380, a 17% increase since 1989. Adding the Bwindi gorillas, last censused in 2002, puts the world population at about 700.

"It's such a phenomenal increase in such a slowly reproducing species," says gorilla researcher Bill Weber of the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York City. Conservationists attribute the increase to a combination of antipoaching patrols, habitat protection, and establishment of a strictly controlled gorilla tourism industry, accompanied by local awareness that the gorillas are a valuable asset.

Despite the welcome news, experts agree that mountain gorillas will always be in danger. "There's no room for complacency whatsoever here," warns Craig Sholley, program development officer with the African Wildlife Foundation in Washington, D.C. "The pressures are much too great and the population much too small."
 
Glad to see that your cousins are doing better. Soon Koko will return to her real home. Maybe she can teach ASL to other gorillas! :fingersx:
 
tekkmortal said:
Glad to see that your cousins are doing better. Soon Koko will return to her real home. Maybe she can teach ASL to other gorillas! :fingersx:
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i thought koko's dead
 
i never knew that robin williams is co-chair of the gorilla's fountain..
 
VamPyroX said:
This is good news. We need more animals!
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Absolutely. :applause: Have you ever wondered why chimps and gorillas can learn ASL but hearing people can’t? Maybe chimps and gorillas are smarter than hearing people.
 
Levonian said:
Absolutely. :applause: Have you ever wondered why chimps and gorillas can learn ASL but hearing people can’t? Maybe chimps and gorillas are smarter than hearing people.
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:lol: would be such a pity for the hearies
 
Gorillas

Ill be sure to tell one of my friends...he s such a nut over gorillas...*smh*...he even acts like one at dinnertime!

Smiles!
Love,
DD
 
I think that firecracker really represents banana because in nonhumorous world a banana would be set by a chimp not a firecracker.
 
DeafSCUBA98 said:
i never knew that robin williams is co-chair of the gorilla's fountain..
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Actress Sigourney Weaver was made ambassedor of 'The Digit Fund' after she portrayed in a true story about Dian Fossey and her study and battle in saving the lowland mountain gorillas between 1969 to 1986.
 
WaterRats13 said:
Actress Sigourney Weaver was made ambassedor of 'The Digit Fund' after she portrayed in a true story about Dian Fossey and her study and battle in saving the lowland mountain gorillas between 1969 to 1986.
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Dian Fossey was killed by the poachers at the end, right?
 
Dian Fossey was found murdered in her cabin on December 27, 1985. She was laid to rest in the gorilla cemetery at Karisoke, next to Digit—the giant silverback whom she befriended during her first year in the Virungas.

Fossey’s murder has never been solved. Wayne McGuire, one of her research students, was tried and found guilty in absentia by a Rwandan court. However, there is no real evidence to support his conviction. It is also unlikely that she was killed by poachers, since a poacher could have easily killed her while she was out in the forest, with virtually no risk of apprehension. The most likely explanation is that Fossey was killed by somebody close to her, who was hired by influential locals who viewed Fossey as a threat to their attempts to exploit the gorillas and the Parc National des Volcans for commercial purposes.
 
Yeah Dian Fossey was cruelly murdered as she slept in her cabin that fateful day of December 27th, 1986. No one knows who really murdered Fossey, but they've had a lot of suspicions on different suspects for different possible reasons.
 
Dian Fossey’s eulogy, delivered on December 31, 1985, by the Reverend Elton Wallace:

"Last week the world did honor to a long-ago event that changed its history—the coming of the Lord to earth. We see at our feet here a parable of that magnificent condescension—Dian Fossey, born to a home of comfort and privilege that she left by her own choice to live among a race faced with extinction….She will lie now among those with whom she lived, and among whom she died. And if you think that the distance Christ had to come to take the likeness of Man is not as great as that from man to gorilla, then you don’t know men. Or gorillas. Or God."
 
From the March 23 issue of sciencenow, an online publication of the AAAS.


All in the Big, Hairy Family​

Humans are distressingly prone to conflicts, a behavior we seem to share with our primate cousins. When groups of chimpanzees or gorillas cross paths, violent quarrels are frequent and sometimes deadly. Recent observations of the elusive western gorilla, however, have turned up an exception to that pattern: Some groups mingle surprisingly peacefully. Now a DNA analysis of 65 gorillas in 14 groups suggests the friendly interactions may in fact be family reunions.

Brenda Bradley and Linda Vigilant of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and their colleagues used DNA analysis to piece together the genetic relationships among gorillas living in the border region straddling the Central African Republic and the Republic of the Congo. The area is home to western gorillas, which are more numerous than the extremely endangered mountain gorillas in East Africa but are also more mysterious. Their home in the dense forests of Central Africa make it much more difficult to track and observe them, and only a handful of groups have habituated to the presence of researchers.

Bradley, with help from local trackers, spent 3 months collecting hair and fecal samples from gorilla nests in the forest. Each morning, the group would identify gorilla trails and then track them back to their nesting site. There, the team would collect hair and fecal samples for DNA analysis, using the size of the droppings to estimate the age of each individual. Back in the lab, the DNA samples suggested that neighboring groups were often led by males that were related to each other, either as half-siblings, siblings, or father-son pairs.

Although the DNA data are from groups that haven't been directly observed, the researchers suspect that their findings might help explain one puzzle of western gorilla behavior. Researchers have observed a variety of reactions when groups cross each others' paths. Some groups tend to fight, but others seem to get along just fine. Bradley and Vigilant propose that genetics might set the tone for these encounters; related silverbacks might form a sort of network that encourages peaceful interactions between neighboring groups, they suggest in the 23 March issue of Current Biology.

The use of DNA analysis is a powerful tool to help primatologists refine their ideas about how relatedness influences interactions between animals, says primatologist John Mitani of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. However, he says, until researchers have DNA information from groups they have observed directly, "it's a bit premature" to draw strong conclusions.
 
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