Quest: Mountain Gorillas: Discovery Channel

Orphan Food Challenge

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Ndakasi/Kabila is weighed daily by her caretakers.
This information is critical to monitoring her overall health.

Last week our tiny patient, the infant mountain gorilla now known as Ndakasi/Kabila (her name is a source of some confusion), recovered steadily from her bout with diarrhea. I was very worried at the outset of her illness: her stools at one point looked like yellow water and she lost nearly 8 percent of her body weight, dropping from 4.5 kilograms to 4 kilograms (from 10 pounds to 9 pounds) — all due to dehydration. Fortunately, she responded quickly to treatment with oral medication and considerable amounts of subcutaneous fluids. We suspect giardia, but our lab tests have been inconclusive. Dr. Eddy Kambale and the orphan gorilla caretakers are happy not to be poking her with needles anymore.

Six-month-old orphaned female mountain gorilla, named either Kabila or Ndakasi,
recovering from a bout of severe diarrhea and dehydration.

Most of the rangers who work for ICCN in the DRC refer to Ndakasi as Kabila based on the identification of the mother gorilla shot dead in June 2007. Kabila's recorded birth date is November 2006, however, and there's no way our patient is almost a year old.

Ndakasi was named for a ranger who died of diabetes in February 2007, and the records show that she was born the next month. Perhaps the names were switched? If so, the next time the rangers can safely check on the Kabirizi Group, they should find a 1-year-old infant named Ndakasi still with her mother. Or it could be that our orphan is a different infant altogether — that Ndakasi is fine and Kabila is missing. While we wait for the rangers to sort it out, she has two names.

Eight-month-old Ndeze continues to grow steadily.

Ndeze, about two months older, appears to be thriving. Fortunately she did not come down with diarrhea. She is amazingly strong for such a small animal, though probably not as tough as a free-living 8-month-old mountain gorilla. At least Ndeze and Ndakasi/Kabila have each other and they now play regularly.

Unfortunately, there are no adult gorillas to test their strength or set the rules; no tall trees to fall out of by mistake. Both orphans need to be encouraged to climb and move about by their caretakers. And we all agree that now is the time to add something natural to their environment on a daily basis when possible — forest food. If the DRC side of the Virungas is not safe for food collection, we will transport it from Rwanda starting this week.

Kwiyongera, 14 months old, chews on the cord of a favorite vine
while his mother, Kubaka, eats the leaves, in Shinda Group.

We've all seen infant mountain gorillas chewing on bits of plant material and this behavior has been recorded in detail by behavioral researchers. The very young do not actually swallow the food. Maybe they are teething — or simply copying their mothers. Possibly they extract tiny amounts of chemicals from the plants they chew on, just enough to settle their digestion or provide a micronutrient. They may also suck in moisture.

In addition to artificial milk formula, we wonder, do Ndakasi/Kabila and Ndeze need something else? Would any fibrous plant, like homegrown green beans, suffice while they are still less than a year old? Or do they also need tiny amounts of specific plants from the forest? If so, does anyone know which ones?

Even when infant mountain gorillas do begin to eat and swallow (not just chew) plant material, milk is their primary nutrition until they are weaned at the age of 3 to 4. The obvious question is whether the human artificial milk formula combined with small amounts of common forest foods — wild celery, gallium and bamboo — meets the nutritional needs of Ndakasi/Kabila and Ndeze.

From years of successful hand-raising of great ape species, including gorillas, we have every reason to believe that the orphans will do fine. The same milk formula worked for the Grauer's gorillas, Dunia and Tumaini. But no one has hand-raised mountain gorillas on human milk-replacer from such a young age. And there's no book with the answers. We need to look in the published literature for related studies and talk to other experts.

Andre Bauma feeds Ndakasi/Kabila during her recovery from pneumonia in June 2007, when she weighed just 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds)

My literature review raised more questions in my mind than it answered. We have much left to learn about endangered species, even the most popular. The few studies that compare the fat, carbohydrate and protein content of gorilla and human milk show that they are similar.

But one recent study done in collaboration with MGVP shows that alpha-linolenic acid, an omega-3 polyunsaturated fat, is found at higher concentrations in the milk of mountain gorillas and other leaf-eating primates. The levels of arachadonic acid and omega-6 fatty acid were also very high. Scientists attribute both these differences to plant lipids in the diet of mountain gorillas.

The artificial human milk formula we use is enriched in fatty acids and both orphans are gaining weight, so it seems all is well. But are we truly meeting their nutritional needs?

Amahoro Group silverback Ubumwe eats a handful of bamboo shoots over the course of a few minutes.

These questions were percolating in the back of my mind during a recent visit to Amahoro group. Since the gorillas were once again very close to the DRC border, two dozen soldiers accompanied us. On my last visit to this family, they'd been scattered among waist-high nettles; this time we found them finishing a bamboo-shoot feast. The group was very calm for a change. Even the mischievous black backs took a break. All four of the breeding-age females and their various offspring gathered around the silverback, Ubumwe, for a group rest.

Six-month-old Nezerwa, the youngest infant in the Amahoro Group, chews on a stalk of bamboo.

The smallest infant in the group, 6-month-old Nezerwa, nursed for several minutes, then began gnawing on a vine. After chewing the stem to bits but not swallowing any of it, the infant turned his attention to a thick, bent stalk of bamboo. As he gnawed on it, I could hear the scraping sound of his teeth. He couldn't possibly have gotten any nutrition from that encounter with bamboo, certainly not water. But he looked so healthy and well-nourished that I watched intently to see what he would do next.

Fifteen-month-old Agasake joins 6-month-old Nezerwa in Amahoro Group,
gnawing on the bamboo and a strand of vine at the same time.

Another infant, 15-month-old Agasake, scrambled over from the opposite side of the nest to grab the interesting stalk of bamboo from the smaller gorilla. For a few seconds, both gnawed on it from opposite sides, as if eating corn on the cob; then they began to play with it, pouncing on the stalk and hanging from it, more interested now in the game than in food.

I thought of the Goma orphans. The orphans in Kinigi are fed celery, gallium, bamboo shoots in season and less often, the whole bamboo stalk. We'd already decided to deliver a small amount of this carefully collected food to Goma. But watching these Amahoro infants made me think we should send larger stalks for play, teething and perhaps a bit of nutrition.

Umugisha's infant has a small sore on his right foot,
not a problem for a healthy animal with a strong immune system.

Nezerwa climbed back to his mother, Umugisha, at the end of the play session. I could see a small puncture wound on the sole of his foot, probably a poke from a sharp stick or piece of bamboo. It appeared to be healing fine. I thought again of our recent discussion at the Maisha Meeting about the future release of the orphans in our care.

When poachers captured Maisha three years ago she was nearly weaned. Kaboko, confiscated earlier this year, was about the same age, between 2 1/2 and 3 years old. Thus both orphans have had the experience in the wild of growing up on their mother's milk, eating different plants, exploring their surroundings, suffering minor injuries, and racing to keep up with their families. This background can only improve their chances of surviving back in the forest as young gorillas.

Ndakasi/Kabila now weighs more than 5 kilograms (11 pounds),
up from 2 when she was rescued in June.

Sadly, we can't give the Goma orphans a chance to gain such experience. Their mothers are gone and we can't safely house them in the forest. During the six or seven years before they are old enough to be returned to the wild, they need other, older gorillas to learn from, as well as a more challenging environment to explore. And even if we can provide such conditions, their chances of surviving in the forest are much lower than that of Maisha and Kaboko.

Some people have said that Ndakasi/Kabila and Ndeze should not have been rescued. They question whether it was wise to take them from the forest, given the time, money, effort and risk of failure involved in their rehabilitation. Perhaps it would have been better to leave them to die of starvation. With so few mountain gorillas left on earth, MGVP intervenes only when the problem is life-threatening or human-induced and when asked by our partners. In this case it was all three.

[Rwanda, Oct. 22, 2007. Pictures: Lucy Spelman/MGVP]

Orphan Update

Rebel fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has been in the news. My friends and family have emailed me asking about my safety. I am fine, but the mountain gorillas in the DRC are not. We have no idea how many more have been injured or killed by rebels or poachers — it's not safe to visit. As it is, we often end up closer to the border than we mean to.

On a recent routine health check of the Amahoro Group in Rwanda, I found myself standing in the middle of an expanse of celery and nettles with gorillas to my right and the unmarked DRC border to my left.

View from Rwanda of the contiguous gorilla park in nearby DRC.

Ndakasi ill with severe diarrhea in October; she responded well to intensive care.

Meanwhile, Ndeze and Ndakasi also continue to attract media attention, more than is healthy for them. Because great ape infants are susceptible to virtually every human disease, MGVP vets have asked that no one visit the orphans at their temporary home in Goma, where they are being hand-raised.

Last week, these orphans apparently had visitors, as evidenced by new pictures of them on the Internet, so Ndakasi became seriously ill with diarrhea. We had to instruct her caretakers to put her in an intensive-care routine, just as we did when she nearly died of pneumonia, though this means more poking and prodding than we'd like. How many more times can we save this infant from humans, whether predatory or well meaning? I'm not sure.

Maisha, a 5-year-old orphaned mountain gorilla, resting on the lap of one of her caretakers.

The challenges associated with the mountain gorilla orphans have been very much on my mind. Last week, I participated in a "Maisha Meeting," so named because its first session two years ago (2005) focused on plans to reintroduce a then 3-year-old mountain gorilla named Maisha to the wild.

Confiscated from poachers, she was nurtured back to health by MGVP vets and hand-raised by dedicated park staff, a situation being repeated now with Ndakasi and Ndeze. Because past efforts at reintroduction had failed — the wild gorillas either ignored or injured the orphan, leaving it to die — it was decided to keep Maisha in captivity for at least two years, long enough to allow her to reach breeding age, a time when mountain gorilla females naturally transfer in and out of groups. For her release to be feasible, she needed to develop normal gorilla behaviors.

Dunia, a 2-year-old female Grauer's or eastern lowland gorilla orphan.

Also at the time of the first Maisha Meeting, discussions had begun among several partners about the best course of action for two other orphaned gorillas, Dunia and Ntabwoba. Like Maisha, both had been confiscated from poachers and raised by humans. But they are a different subspecies.

The "eastern" or Grauer's gorilla is unique to the DRC and distinct from the mountain gorilla — lankier and not as bushy, with longer forearms. The partners agreed that after Maisha's release, they would work together to return the Grauer's gorillas to eastern DRC; meanwhile, the two orphans would serve as family for Maisha.

MGVP co-manages the Eastern Gorilla Confiscated Orphan Interim Quarantine Facility
in Kinigi, Rwanda.

After the first Maisha Meeting, MGVP led the effort to establish a suitable facility for the confiscated orphans and their caretakers in Rwanda, one that would protect the gorillas from communicable diseases and shield them to some extent from humans. There is a fine line between being habituated to people, as are the wild gorilla groups visited by tourists daily, and becoming so accustomed to them that natural fears and other behaviors disappear. The original plan called for the Rwanda facility to be temporary and closed to visitors, in the hope that with strict health protocols in place, all of the animals could someday return to the forest.

As the quarantine facility was being built, preparations were made to move four more Grauer's gorilla orphans confiscated in the DRC to Rwanda: Tumaini, Itebero, Serafuli and Pinga. Not long after Maisha, Dunia and Ntabwoba moved into their new home, these new orphans, each of whom underwent extensive health screening tests by MGVP vets, joined them. This brought the total number of orphans to seven and doubled the number of staff necessary to care for them.

The facility manager, Simon Childs, and seven other caretakers spend much of their time inside the enclosure with the gorillas. Their presence is vital to the stability of the group. In the absence of adult gorillas to maintain order, the caretakers will step into the middle of a fight over food.

Simon Childs, orphan facility manager in Kinigi, Rwanda, with various gorillas and staff.

Itebero, a 4-year-old female Grauer's gorilla orphan from the DRC, lives with seven other orphans in Rwanda.

Mountain gorillas, Grauer's gorillas and another subspecies, the Cross River gorilla, have never been kept in captivity in significant numbers for any length of time. Why is this, people ask?

Fifty years ago, when wild-animal trade was widespread — and legal — western lowland gorillas in Gabon and Cameroon were plentiful and easy to capture. There was no need to capture the other subspecies, even if traders knew where to find them.

Now, all four gorilla subspecies are in trouble in their natural habitats and conservation organizations are working together to protect them. Last year, MGVP began providing health monitoring for the Grauer's in eastern DRC in the hope that, like the mountain gorillas, they can remain self-sustaining populations. Because of fresh violence in the area, this effort has been intermittent.

Kaboko, a 3-year-old male mountain gorilla, is missing his right
hand after being injured in a poacher's snare.

Sadly, the orphan family gained yet another member earlier this year (March 2007), a 3-year-old male mountain gorilla. He arrived in Ruhengeri still inside the potato sack used by the poachers to conceal him. When we opened the bag, we saw immediately that his right hand had been irreparably damaged by a snare. It was swarming with maggots and a foul smell of dead tissue filled the air. We had no choice but to amputate the hand.

Kaboko — Kinyarwanda for "a person with a bad arm" — healed quickly and was successfully integrated last month into the group at the Rwanda facility, bringing the total there to eight: two mountain gorillas and six Grauer's gorillas. Kaboko has become attached to Maisha, who sometimes picks him up and carries him on her back around the compound.

Ndeze in Goma, DRC.

Meanwhile, the two orphaned mountain gorilla infants, Ndeze and Ndakasi, remain isolated in Goma, though they should soon begin living with other gorillas if they're to have any chance of surviving in the wild.

When Ndeze joined the frail Ndakasi in September, the latter immediately began to show more interest in her surroundings. Now the two often play with each other and their caretakers. Because they are small, the house they live in is adequate for now. But within the year, they will need a proper gorilla home.

IQF staff members Munyambabazi Diedonne and Innocent Kabendera carry the orphaned gorillas to a play session at the quarantine facility for orphaned gorillas in Rwanda.

At the Maisha Meeting last week we discussed all 10 orphans. The question of Maisha's future remains the most pressing, as she represents the best current hope of returning a female mountain gorilla to the wild to contribute to future generations of this species.

Perhaps Kaboko can be released with her, though as a one-handed male he will be at a major disadvantage in the forest. But given the continued unrest in the DRC, there's no possibility of returning either the mountain or Grauer's gorillas to appropriate habitats in the near future, even if any of them were old enough to go.

Note: As of this posting, Ndakasi is much better, having responded to our treatments.

[Rwanda, Oct. 15, 2007. Pictures: Lucy Spelman/MGVP]

A Holistic Health Approach

A marshy clearing surrounded by bamboo in the
Sabinyo Group habitat, Parc National des Virungas, Rwanda.

When I was on a routine health check to Sabinyo Group last week, one of the trackers, Leonard, spotted a snare in the bamboo thicket to the right of the trail. It was a typical model: a rope tied at one end to a stalk of bamboo and made into a loop at the other end with a slipknot. This loop lies flat on the ground, a wooden stake holding it in place so that there is tension on the rope — enough to bend the bamboo horizontal. Leonard stuck the blade of his machete in the loop to spring the trap. Startled, I ducked just in time to miss the bamboo as it whipped back up. He untied the rope and put it in his pocket.

A bushbuck antelope disappears into thick vegetation.

Minutes ahead on the trail, another tracker, Jeanipo, found a second and a third snare; then Leonard a fourth. "Enough," I thought; "I don’t like these things. How can there be so many in a park that is highly patrolled and visited daily by scientists and tourists?"

So far, I've managed to photograph only the rear end of a bushbuck, but there's no question that the park is full of antelope. We see their tracks often. I asked Leonard and Jeanipo how many snares one would have to set to catch a bushbuck or a duiker (never mind a gorilla). The answer: five catches three. While the trackers made a radio call to the patrol team, I tried not to envision a dozen more Magayane cases.

An African elephant forages on bamboo in the
Group 13 habitat in the Parc National des Virungas, Rwanda.

We continued on the trail. Suddenly, several very fresh elephant tracks appeared. I held my breath, thinking we might actually see an elephant. That would be amazing luck, given that I've seen only one, three weeks ago on a routine visit to Group 13. I'd learned that day that elephants and gorillas sometimes travel together, often in the morning. But the huge prints disappeared from the trail after a short distance and my thoughts returned to the snares. They seem too small to harm such a huge animal, but I know of one elephant here that may have lost its trunk to a snare last year.

Gihishamwosti, a young male mountain gorilla in the Sabinyo Group,
has wounded toes on his left foot.

As we caught up to the Sabinyo Group, the gorillas left the bamboo area and crossed the marsh to a small water hole. Leonard announced that one of the young males, or black backs as they are called, Shirimpumu, had a wire snare around his toe last week. The gorilla had removed it himself, no problem. But while they gathered around the water, I noticed that another black back, Gihishamwosti, had a toe injury. He was missing two toenails on his left foot and his big toe was swollen. The problem was minor and very likely a random injury or a wound suffered in a fight. Then again, he too could have been caught in a snare for a short while.

As I understand it, gorillas rarely drink water for any length of time. But this group spent five minutes at the water hole. Watching them drink, my mind shifted to the issue of disease. We'd been talking earlier in the week about MGVP goals for the future and had agreed that the project should work harder to exchange information with local public health officials, district veterinarians and lab technicians in order to create a better network for alerts of disease outbreaks that could spread to the gorillas. One of the easiest routes of disease transmission is water.

Tourists visit a habituated mountain gorilla group in Rwanda, Park National des Virungas.

It's not always obvious to people why the mountain gorillas are at risk of disease or why they need vets. After all, the animals live in a protected area. But from an everything-is-connected or integrated health point of view, the gorillas are healthy only if the humans and animals in their ecosystem are also healthy. Thus, another of MGVP's future goals is to share the reasons for existing health regulations and to make recommendations to strengthen them if necessary. Tourists are asked to keep their distance, for example, because they've been in airports and crowded places. Even a common cold can make the gorillas sick.

Members of Pablo Group outside the Parc National des Virungas, Rwanda.

We also agreed that MGVP should continue to offer employee health screening programs for trackers, rangers, guides and scientists. There's every reason to screen this group of people carefully, considering that they spend hours with the gorillas. But the biggest challenge is how to protect the gorillas in the face of a disease outbreak in the villages near the park boundary. When the gorillas leave the park to forage for thistle or eucalyptus, there's always the chance that they may move into an area where flu or measles is active. We need better information exchange with health officials so that more people understand the risks.

A domestic cow inside Akagera National Park, Rwanda.

Cows can carry tuberculosis, brucellosis and a variety of intestinal parasites and bacteria that can be harmful to other animals and humans. When we went to Akagera Park last week, looking for the giraffe that whose snare we'd removed several months ago (Misson Giraffe), we saw cows everywhere, both inside and outside the park. Though the main focus of MGVP vets will always be gorillas, we also talked in our meeting about ways to improve domestic animal and livestock health. We agreed that another goal should be to help train more domestic animal vets in the region.

Giraffe, Akagera National Park, Rwanda

As for our giraffe patient, though we never found him, the rangers and guides reported seeing him a few days earlier. They said he looks a bit thin and still has a limp, but they described a wound that sounds as if it's healing slowly. His case underscores yet another need in this region — more trained wildlife vets. Again, this isn't something MGVP can do alone, but it can help by establishing a network of experts and helping when time and resources allow. We hear Akagera Park will soon hire its own vet. Maybe he or she can help us find our patient next time.

[Rwanda, Oct. 2, 2007. Pictures: Lucy Spelman/MGVP]