Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund |
Staff at a
gorilla research center are getting some unexpected help to save the lives of
the critically endangered animals: Gorilla youngsters are jumping in to disable
poachers’ traps.
Staff at
the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund’s Karisoke Research Center in Rwanda recently
witnessed two 4-year-olds and a teenage mountain gorilla work together to
destroy the types of snares that have killed at least two young gorillas this
year. It was also the first time staff
members have been able to see up close exactly how gorillas dismantle the
snares.
“We knew
that gorillas do this, but all of the reported cases in the past were carried
out by adult gorillas, mostly silverbacks,” said gorilla program coordinator
Veronica Vecellio. “How they did it
demonstrated an impressive cognitive skill.”
The
discovery that younger gorillas are also learning to recognize and disable the
dangerous snares was especially heartening to research center staff because it
came while they were still grieving over the death just two days earlier of an
infant gorilla named Ngwino who was caught in a snare.
On July 17
field staff and some tourists in the Virunga volcanoes conservation area that
is home to more than half of the world’s 790 remaining mountain gorillas
witnessed a group of gorillas getting close to a snare.
One of the
staff members reported he moved to dismantle the snare when a silverback (adult
male) in the group grunted at him warning him to stay back. Then two youngsters named Dukore and Rwema
and a blackback (teen male) named Tetero ran toward the snare.
Together they jumped on the taught branch
attached to a rope noose and removed the rope.
They then ran over to another nearby snare and destroyed it the same
way. Pictures the staff members took
show the young gorillas then examining broken sticks used to camouflage the
noose on the ground.
Every year,
Fossey Fund field staff remove more than a thousand such simple but deadly
snares set by bush-meat hunters. They
speculate the younger gorillas learned to destroy snares by watching the older
silverbacks do so.
Fossey Fund
staff cannot teach gorillas how to dismantle snares because it is against their
policy to intentionally change gorillas’ natural behavior, but they are pleased
to know the gorillas are apparently teaching each other to protect themselves.
“Our battle
to detect and destroy snares from the park is far from over,” said
Vecellio. “Today we can proudly confirm
the gorillas are doing their part, too.”
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