Interesting Facts About Gorillas

Interesting Facts About Gorillas: Gorilla trekking in Africa will lead you to several rewarding tourism destinations that will make your safari experience quite memorable. The gorilla trekking experience in Africa will lead you to the mountain gorillas in Africa. You see them when you participate in gorilla trekking in Bwindi impenetrable national park. Alternatively, you can do gorilla trekking in Mgahinga National Park for a gorilla safari in Uganda. You can also watch the mountain gorillas by participating in gorilla trekking in Volcanoes National Park for rewarding gorilla safaris in Rwanda. For the Eastern lowland gorillas, you can see them while you participate in gorilla trekking in Kahuzi Biega National Park.

Some Interesting Facts about gorillas

They live in Isolated groups

Mountain gorillas live in east-central Africa in just two isolated groups – one in the Virunga Volcanoes (a region spanning 3 national parks in Uganda, Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)) and one in Bwindi Impenetrable National Park, Uganda, which connects to Sarambwe Nature Reserve, DRC.

They’re found in high altitude montane and bamboo forests, where agriculture and settlements surround them.

The dominant male has all the mating rights with the female

Interesting about the gorilla family is the fact that for every gorilla family, there’s a dominant male called a silverback. The male has all the mating rights with the females in the wild. If any other male gorilla is seen mating with the females in the gorilla family without permission from the dominant silverback, a fight can break out. In extreme cases, the male can be chased away from the gorilla family. You should note that the dominant gorilla must expand the gorilla family. The dominant male may lead its family to raid other gorilla families for their members. It can also expand the family through reproduction which can increase the number of its members.

They can eat all day long

Mountain gorillas spend about a quarter of their day eating, mainly plants. Around 85% of their diet is made up of leaves, shoots and stems. However, gorillas can also eat larvae, snails, ants, and even roots, barks and rotting wood (a good source of sodium/salt).

Power is received through challenges/fights

For a gorilla to become the dominant species, they obtain it through challenging the dominant to a fight and the winner becomes the dominant silver species. If a dominant male silverback is challenged and defeated, he is overthrown from the post of being the dominant silverback/ the ruler of a gorilla family. The dominant gorilla will chase them away from the gorilla family with a few females for them to start a new family. In some cases, they can remain in the gorilla family which is quite unlikely to happen.

 They live in family groups

Most mountain gorillas live in stable family groups of around 10 individuals, with one dominant male and several females. Both males and females in the group care for their infants; hugging, carrying and playing with them.

When they get older, most males and around 60% of females then leave their birth group to join another troop. This helps prevent inbreeding.

Half of the world’s remaining gorillas are in Uganda

Several travelers interested in participating in gorilla trekking in Africa they will have the chance to access the world’s remaining mountain gorillas in Bwindi.  Bwindi Impenetrable National Park is among the top gorilla trekking destinations in Africa. You can also see the gorillas when you participate in gorilla trekking in Mgahinga National Park. Gorilla trekking in Mgahinga National Park will lead you to the habituated gorilla families. There are about 1070 gorillas in the wild as per the latest World Wildlife fund census. Half and a bit more of those gorillas are in Uganda’s Bwindi Impenetrable National Park.

This will give you access to the species for an hour to understand their behavior in the wild. This will help you understand more about the behavior of the species as they carry out their daily activities in the wild. Also, you will enjoy taking pictures of the species in the wild. For a more satisfying experience, you would need to partake in a gorilla habituation experience. This experience involves tourists following a group of researchers into the forest. They trek until they find the gorillas which are not familiar with human presence. Contrary to the trekking experience, habituation allows tourists to spend four hours with the gorillas.

They are six times stronger than man

An average adult gorilla which is between 8 and 12 years which we know as the blackback is 6 times stronger than an average male/ female aged 25 years. This makes them quite dangerous species to provoke as it can lead them to attack you. The attacks can be fatal therefore while you take part in gorilla trekking, you should ensure that you participate in the briefing. The briefing session helps you understand the rules and regulations to follow to have an amazing safari experience. This ensures a memorable safari experience in the wild. Among the rules and regulations to follow include avoiding petting the infants. This can lead the silverback to attack you to protect their infants. You should also maintain a distance of about 8 meters from them. Tourists should not throw objects at them as the gorillas may charge against the tourists.