GorillaSound

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Apr 29 2009 | By: gorillasound

I know you are tired of hearing just Kusu and Ekendi from me but I can’t help it. I am fascinated by them as a result that most of my attention is directed to these two little seeds. Today, I would love to share my understanding on the relationship between Kusu and Ekendi. We all know that they are inseparable play mates, at least until when the time comes to be an adult and behave like one. But for now, it is the time to lose their self with joy and excitement and play nonstop. It doesn’t feel like there are winners or losers in the game. Both doesn’t care who is the strongest as far as they are having all the fun in the world. But if there is food then there is no game for Kusu. He is the big boss and Ekendi needs to figure out his way without bothering this boss. But, Ekendi, the silly one, always find the way to bother Kusu almost every time. Here are three stories of imitated domination between the juveniles of Kingo. I should start from the less aggressive behaviour of Kusu and end on the really angry face of him towards Ekendi.
1. Generally, Kusu eats what is left behind Kingo. So one time, Kingo broke this huge branch to eat the fresh leaves on it. After he was finished with it, he walked away for Kusu to replace him. After his dad left, Kusu came and start to eat the leaves. Then slowly Ekendi approached to him and acted like his only aim was just to sit next to his brother. He looked at the leaves then looked at Kusu and suddenly he snatched one of the branches and run. When Kusu realized what was going, he left the huge cluster of the branches and run after Ekendi who was holding a little branch with not much leaves on. And as we all assumed, without much difficulty, he caught Ekendi from the back and pull him back. Ekendi knew what he did and as a result he just sit without looking at Kusu then something unexpected happen and they start to eat the rest of the leaves together, shoulder to shoulder like it wasn’t Kusu in the first place who got angry on his brother attempt on stealing the branch.

2. Again, Kusu was right behind Kingo during the foraging process. Kingo was over with eating the tasty fruits around and was having a rest while on his back was comfortably lean against a tree. Kusu collected the left over fruits as much as he can. Both of his hands and his mouth was full with them (I wish I had a picture on that to share with you. It was one of the funniest moments of Kusu, which I can never forget). Imagine a spoiled kid who wants all and want to share none. And Ekendi, again the little silly one, only collected the air so his hands and mouth, once more empty. So he employed the same tactic again and sits next to Kusu. Kusu didn’t mind his presence until Ekendi tried to grab the fruit that Kusu was actually eating. Oh after then Kusu was really angry, screamed at his brother and moved away from him to eat his fruits alone. Ekendi stayed behind and didn’t attempt to go near him. After awhile, Kusu got bored with the fruit and drop all of it to the ground. Then he went near Ekendi and they started to play. Ekendi didn’t even try to pick the fruits from where they were lying. He was having a big fun with his brother so who cares about the tasty left over fruit anymore.
3. Finally, the last desired but not the least important food for Kusu, the delicious and stingy ant species. Kusu, so much like his ant lover mom, loves eating ants or termites. When he spots the nests, first he pushes his face in to get a closer look without caring if we are close by or not; then breaks the nest. The sandy nest on one hand and below the other hand to catch the falling termites. If they don’t fall, he pound one hand to the other one for taking the ants from their sweet home. When he collects termites in one hand, he chucks them in to his mouth. So he was having his insect meal right to the nest when Ekendi came close by to try his chance again with the same exact tactic. But this time, Kusu realized his brother’s purpose even before he sits next to him. Then you have to hear his angry screaming voice towards Ekendi. The same voice at least for my ears, that adults use when are really annoyed by others for any reason. When Ekendi heard the voice, he immediately changed his direction and run for his life. But, Kusu caught him from the back and pull him to the ground, still anger on his voice. Then Kingo came to the sight to stop the fight. He didn’t really look like he was annoyed by them but after he vocalized as I understand it like ‘kids stop it, I want peace’, Kusu let Ekendi goes and turned back to his termites and Ekendi turned back to his mama. I assumed that they would stay upset to each other whole day long after their fight. Isn’t it always what happens with us? You argue with someone then your heart is broken so you want to stay away from their sight as you have a broken heart and anger in. But I think, that’s not what happens with gorillas (and maybe with our babies too- RS note). When the fight is over, it is over. I mean like, really the fight is over. They don’t carry the anger or revenge in. So, the same day, after less than an hour, Kusu and Ekendi was shoulder to shoulder, like two old best friends and with no left over scrubs of anger from the morning fight.

3 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Apr 23 2009 | By: gorillasound

We want to thank Ovid, Brenton and Alexis for their support.

Since this month (April) I started to give the primes to the trackers, so they will find their salaries increased of 10$.
I’m extremely glad you are helping me to do this!
They are working hard and are helping me a lot with the data collection, facilitating the follows of females and the recordings of gorilla vocalizations. I hope other donors will join you in the next months!

Here are two pictures: one of Kete Mokonjo with Mama and the other of Kenga with Kingo, both helping with the microphone.

No responses yet

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Apr 23 2009 | By: gorillasound

Finally!

Here is the video I promised about face to face copulation in western gorillas.

Kingo is on the left side of the screen, while on the right side are Emilie and Ekendi (Mekome son). Kingo is vocalizing asking for copulation while Emilie is slowly getting closer to him, up to the point she embraces him and the copulation starts. You can see her hands on Kingo shoulder and her feet on Kingo legs! The little Ekendi runs in the middle, between Kingo and Emilie, and climbs on Emilie chest and face! Annoyed by Ekendi, the copulation ends with Kingo biting softly Ekendi (unfortunately this part was not recorded). We apologize for the low quality of the video and our inexperience as camerawomen, hoping you will enjoy it anyway!

2 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Apr 20 2009 | By: gorillasound

As me and Roberta told you before, Kingo’s group has a new baby, just 3 months old. We don’t know the baby’s sex yet, as Ugly is not an easy female to get close. Ugly doesn’t like mankind. The closest we can get to the baby and Ugly is between 8 to 10m. The baby is so small yet. Most of the time the baby stays on Ugly’s chest or stomach. Holding the life so tide with her\his little bony hands and doesn’t let go of it. The most strong and early instinct of her\him. Sometimes, the baby can climb on Ugly’s back and that’s the time when the curiosity starts. The other 2 happy seeds of the forest, Kusu and Ekendi, are wondering around who is that little skinny body, with a long hair cut. Ekendi is the most curious one about the baby whereas Kusu hardly ever shows an interest on the baby. You can find Ekendi, sitting right next to Ugly and examining the baby without touching. Ugly doesn’t seem annoyed by his presence. While, Ugly is no patient with men, she is so gentle with the members of her group, including the little ones. I should share another story with you about Ekendi’s insisting curiosity on the baby. Ugly was walking in front of Ekendi and Ekendi was trying so hard to catch a glimpse of the baby. First, he climbed the tree nearby and hang himself upside down to see the baby, but when Ugly walked away he jumped off from the tree and followed Ugly not more than 1cm away. Then when he got close enough, he tried to climb up to her back to see the baby who was hanging on Ugly’s back as well. Ugly continued her walk as she didn’t realize Ekendi was on her back too. But then the baby got scared and started to cry. Just then, Ugly stopped and gently pushed Ekendi away by sitting down, letting Ekendi to climb down after then she placed her hand on Ekendi’s butt and pushed him away softly. Nevertheless, Ekendi hasn’t been giving up trying so far. I have a picture and a video for you to show Ekendi and Ugly sitting shoulder to shoulder, Ekendi’s eyes were totally fixed on the baby. While he was totally stunned by the baby, he clapped his hands franticly with excitement, still eyes fixed first on the baby then on us. He is so amazed by the baby. You can see it from his little dark brown eyes. Maybe he is asking himself: Who or what is this? Or simply searching for someone or something to play. And maybe by clapping his hands, he is calling the baby to the game, unaware of the baby’s limited capacity for now.

Although Kusu has a little curiosity on the baby, we can’t sum up that Kusu is just uninterested to the world around. It is actually the opposite. You can’t leave anything lying on the ground when Kusu is around. He would be easily approaching to it with no fear and preparing his little pointing finger to touch and feel what it is. Then we need to be quick to pick it up before his little fingers touch our dirty stuff. But the way he approaches, silently, for us not to notice and prevent his discovery, and slowly pushing his fingers in front to touch, is amazing. Or every time when we unzipped our bags, he tries persistently to see what’s in the bag. And the funniest I found happens, every time when I tried to take his pictures. He curiously examines what is that I am holding and when the lens tries to focus in, his eyes are totally fixed in the moving parts of the lens, moving his head from one side to other to get a better understanding (I have a photograph for you). For sure, his curiosity isn’t only directed to us, the forest he belongs is his observation site to make new discoveries. You can see him lying 30m above the ground on one of the branches of the tree, swinging his arms slowly on the air from one side to the other and watching the effect he does to the leaves. His curiosity to his world is un-ignorable. The same curiosity all the babies around you show towards their new world. As I mentioned before, there is not much difference between you, me and them.

One response so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Apr 14 2009 | By: gorillasound

According to my really short term experiences until now, the juveniles are my favorites as they always put a smile on my face. So, once again, I have something to tell you about them:) Kingo was having a meal of nicely selected fresh leaves again. Eating is what he does most of the time and the other most of the time he sleeps and if we are lucky to be around, after eating all that food and taking all that beauty sleeps, he copulates. Like I mentioned before, Ekendi and Kusu, his two little shadows, are almost all the time right next to him. Kingo doesn’t really mind their presents unless they don’t touch his delicious leaves, branches or fruits. If they are playing on the trail that Kingo wants to pass, he gently pushes them away by touching their little butt. When they take the signal that their daddy wants to move, they slowly move aside and continue to play while keeping one eye on Kingo. If they play a little bit louder than normally when Kingo is sleeping, Kingo calls them during his sleep, I think to tell them that ‘big boss is sleeping here, so keep it down’. But it doesn’t matter what is the situation, he is always gentle with them despite his huge and muscler look. But if the topic is food, then things change (however it is true that still Kingo has more tolerance limit to them than any other individuals in the group, even with food). Long to short, yesterday Kingo was eating his fresh leaves on his back towards Kusu and Ekendi. There was this little thin 10m’s tree between Ekendi and him. The tree had no branches in the middle and all the leaves were collected on the top. For you to imagine, it was more like a pineapple but a thin and tall one. Ekendi was looking at the tree, Kingo was looking at Ekendi while he was eating his leaves. Then suddenly Ekendi jumped on to the tree and with ignoring Kingo’s call which I understood as ’stop it, come down from that tree’ , he climbed up all the way to the top. Kingo didn’t hurry. He calmly finished his leaves on his laps then slowly walked to the tree and looked him up. Then he started to climb. Ekendi was so panicked out. He tried to run away but hey, where could he go. No branches close by to jump of or nowhere to go higher to move away from Kingo’s way. He was totally stocked and has to face with consequences. So Kingo was right below him in less than a sec. Ekendi was between the leaves that Kingo dearly wanted to eat and Kingo. Kingo looked at Ekendi’s really scared face for a little while. During that time, Ekendi was even smaller than ever. He buried his face to his puffy stomach, dropped his shoulders and became a little ball. But one thing he couldn’t do is: move away from the way. When Kingo seen all this, he was still calm and no words coming out from his mouth. He probably thought about the situation then found the solution. Kingo used his long arms to reach above Ekendi, and pull himself up without touching the boy. He broke all the branches on top of the tree one hand, while Ekendi was still in the middle as a ball. The thin tree was on the breaking point and shaking from one side to the other. When Kingo was right above Ekendi, he could actually run away but maybe from the shock, he just stayed with no obvious movements. So after Kingo finished collecting the leaves, he get down with the same way he climbed up, by gently squeezing Ekendi between his huge stomach and the tree. After he left the tree and when Ekendi overcame the fear, he jumped off from the tree and run away, I assume to his mom, where he can find some support. These little kids are making my life more colorful than ever in Mondika and I have to admit; I try soo hard to prevent myself to joining in to their game and climb, bite, spin around, clap and beat the trees as they do all the time, every day.

One response so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Apr 09 2009 | By: gorillasound

Yesterday we had a birthday party in the middle of the Mondika jungle. Now I am something between 27 and 28:) We ate the best forest foods we can get. Leaves of the forest, called coco and kind of forest made bread gozo. Full moon behind the mists, African music in our radio, and hot but tasty bears on the hands of dancing men. Oh and slowly dripping rain that no one seemed to mind. Trackers can dance with the music of wind. Their movements together with their speech are always in rhythm, independent of what they are doing. It seems that they can hear the continuous songs of nature during the night and day. As our ears are not as good as theirs to hear the forest music, we played the music videos from the computer. Everyone was on foot, looking at the screen. You know karaoke. This one was the karaoke of dancing body not the lyrics. The trackers were looking at the computer screen to follow the dance, I was looking at them to learn how to shake. It was a beautiful night. The point we occupied in the forest was full with sounds of laugh, music and gracefully moving bodies, however the forest around us was silent for the first time and watching its children, gently caring us with its breeze and rain. For my birthday, I got everything I want. In the end, aren’t we all seeking for the peace of mind?

One response so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Apr 09 2009 | By: gorillasound

Here, in Mondika, there are two different groups of habituated gorillas. Kingo’s group, which you already know, and Buka’s group. Buka is a new group and under the habituation process for 2 years. Since I arrived to Mondika, the only gorillas I met were Kingo and his family. And as all of you know, they are gorgeous. However, with my own eyes I wanted to see how gorgeous the group of Buka was as well. So I took my camera with me with the hope of capturing amazing moments in Buka’s group. But, things didn’t evolve like that. Before telling you the story, I should mention our daily routine after the work. There are two groups of researcher working for Kingo and for Buka. As I never known how difficult to habituate a group, when I see all the trackers and researchers, who work with Buka, look exhausted in the camp, several times I asked them with the fake knowledge I have ‘come on, how difficult it can be’; my base with gorillas is only with Kingo, who sleeps, eats, copulates without minding our present right next to him. So when I offered to go with Buka, I thought it would be a nice walk with many easily taken amazing shots. Prejudgment is one of the weak parts of the human mind. And from the first moment I came close with Buka, I came on to the realization that how wrong I was. When we approached, Buka was sleeping and there was a female around, totally hide their self in the thickest bushes. So you can only see patches of them. They were at least 30m away. And when they heard us, the female started to scream herself out. I backed off a little bit while the trackers and the researcher didn’t even blinked their eyes. Immediately, the trackers and the researcher started to act like eating the leaves and grooming each other for showing the gorillas that we were not caring about them, just there to eat and no damage would be given. The scan upon my eyes, were funny. Suddenly, we became the hungry and peaceful apes. After the female took the signal, she got relax but not much. Her eyes and Buka’s were on us. Especially on me. In the end, for them, I was the new female they never seen before. There were many branches between us. When I was trying to see them between all that branches, they were trying to do the same thing to me as well. Two different species, Homo sapiens and Gorilla gorilla gorilla, observing each other with curiosity. One more hairy than the other, but most probably similar ideas in the mind. ‘Who is that? Will it bring any trouble to me?’ After the fear overcame the curiosity, they left the area. And we tried to follow them with our best. However, they were fast and we have to run after them non-stop as every time we approach, they were running away from us to the invisible world of bushes. In Bahaka, Buka means back pain, because he always travels in thickets. And I started to see why the trackers named him Buka. I have never seen him anywhere else but bushes for whole day. And here we are, once more I was admired by the talent of trackers. They could hear, smell and see the things that are not visible to our eyes. The forest talks with them, as they were the people of the forest once. When I came back to the camp, I was totally exhausted. Nothing was easy with Buka and I couldn’t even take one picture:) However, I believe that they are as beautiful as Kingo and his family. Kingo is totally habituated and has no fear or anger towards us as far as if we know our limits. When you are around Kingo and his group, you feel like you are also one of the member of his group. That’s how they welcome you. Sometimes, you are not further away more than 3m and they don’t mind your presence. I would love to share a story that I experienced here. Kingo and his harem were having one of their beauty sleep again in an opening. Kusu, the playful and smart juvenile, hardly ever sleeps but stays in the sleeping area when everyone does. Kingo was sleeping 5m away from us and the females weren’t further away than that. We were in the middle of all these sleeping beauties. Then Kusu appeared right next to us. Maybe 2m away. I was trying to take something from my bag and he was following my movements and concentrated on the bag and what was inside. You could see the wonder in his eyes. When I put the bag under me to sit, this time he looked at my face and examined it for awhile. Mine and Roberta’s back were on the tree. Kusu came close to us and put his back on to the tree as well. We were back to back. I was turning my head to look at his beautiful face and he was doing the same thing to us. He was sitting right behind us, with a branch on his mouth, slowly biting it and time to time turning around to check us. We were sitting right behind him, with a notebook on the hand, slowly writing our notes and time to time turning around to check him. After awhile, he fell asleep while we were amused and trilled with their acceptance on us. Around them, we, members of the mankind, become the part of the group, only more clumsy than even Ugly’s new baby.

No responses yet

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Apr 03 2009 | By: gorillasound

One week ago Kingo had mated again with Fini, twice, but unfortunately we were not in the forest….
After that no more sex for Kingo!
The other day we were with him and all females were around, they were feeding mwase (Nacluea diderrichii), small and sweet fruits, when Mekome, mother of Ekendi, made her move and approach Kingo. He was vocalizing, similarly to when he call for mating. Mekome just presented her back to Kingo. Timidly and with a little of fear, she was looking him frequently, waiting for his reaction. Kingo didn’t accept and after a while Mekome left. It was a very strange behavior since Ekendi is still very young.

During the last few days we witnessed several fights between females. Most of them were on food, especially fruits, but few of them, the most aggressive ones, happened in different context.

Day 1: Kingo was traveling; actually he was waiting for the females to go in front of him, especially Mekome and Fini. Suddenly, Kingo start to run toward Fini, she stayed still covering her head. More surprisingly, Mekome and Kusu, who were nearby start to scream and chase Kingo, who started to run…obviously in our direction. The gentleman, just avoid us and continuing to run a little more. After that all the group members start to travel.

Day 2: Kingo was in a ticket and we were with him, while we heard screams from two females. Samedi and Aylin were closer to the females and saw Mekome biting Emilie. Since Emilie screamed, Kingo just run towards them and Mekome just fly away. After this fight we saw another similar, always with Mekome being aggressive towards Emilie!

Day 3: The group was in a big Ngombe tree eating leaves and bark; it was a rainy day. The last member to get in the tree was Fini. Fini chose the way Kingo utilized, but the big guy stayed on the first branch of this really big and height tree. Fini had to stay in a very uncomfortable position until Kingo decided to move a little more up. Just at this time Fini could get rest for a little while, and start to eat something. After 10 minutes she had to leave again the spot for Kingo, so she descended a little and try to get in a better position from another tree. Half an hour later, Ugly, who was first in the Ngombe tree, wanted to descend (just when Kingo went down). For Ugly to get down there was another obstacle…..Fini. Since they were really high in the canopy (more than 20 meters) I couldn’t hear all the vocalizations before the screams!! Suddenly Fini jumped on the back of Ugly and try to bite her from behind. Then she went in front of her and tried to grab her arms or potentially her baby!! Ugly was screaming and all the females in the tree were cough grunting, but no one came to help Ugly, a part Kingo who climbed rapidly half tree. At that moment the two females were already separated and Ugly descend and approached Kingo for resting. Strong and dangerous fight!

One response so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Apr 03 2009 | By: gorillasound

I had my first encounter with African Elephants. OK i should be honest here, I haven’t really seen them but i am glad that i didn’t when i was totally stuck in that bush. However, the next day during our breakfast time, another elephant was right next to our tent and I was happy to see that one when I have the freedom of freely running just in case of emergency (there is an attached picture for the shy elephant behind the tent). Anyhow, I would love to tell you the scary story of the elephants in the wild:) Roberta and I were observing Kingo and his group. That day, they walked a lot and we were trying to be right behind them for not missing any vocalization. But I have to admit. It is hard. Forest is not a flat road build for hiking. There are lianas all over and I think they like purposely hiding their selves under the fallen leaves that someone may flip over (which I have fallen on their tricks already many times). Almost every part of the vegetation has really sharp spines, waiting for you to pass. And many different types of flies, targeting your eyes, ears, nose, shortly every openings your body has. However, even though your skin turned to be an alien to you and your openings full with flies buzzing continuously, there is not a better place to be in regards to its liveliness together with its calming effect. All your senses are on action for not missing anything. You are, after such a long time of superficial life, right at the moment and living the NOW with no question of future in the mind. I think you get the picture of difficulties as well as the beauties we are dealing with. The wild story of elephants took its place when we were on Kingo’s back in the bush. They were traveling the fastest I have seen. I couldn’t figure out how they easily pass from all that thickest bushes with no particular difficulties especially if you bear in mind their comparable bigger body size. Mamandele, the best tracker I know, was leading the way for me. I was going on four hands, successfully managing to rip my skin of with every spine around. My hair was all on my face. When Kingo have seen my troubles on how I can’t walk, I bet the thing in his mind was: who or what is that clumsy creature of the nature trying to follow me when she can’t even walk properly. Despite of my troubles, Mamandele had no problem at all. But suddenly he started to move quicker. I can see there was something wrong. He passed the bush and from the end he was trying to reach me with his hands with a smile on his face but an anxiety on his eyes. He was silently telling me: quick, quick, quick. I was trying hard and moving in a quick way of mine which is not quick at all. When I managed to take myself out from the bush, he was so excited, calling Roberta and the other tracker, Mbolo. Then I figured out, with my really broken Sango, that there was two elephants one right behind and one right next to me. They were so close. When Mamandele has seen them, he took the right decision of not telling me for preventing me to panic out. If he told me that I was surrounded by two wild African Elephants, there is 80 percent chance that you wouldn’t be reading all this now as I would be stepped on by the elephants and took my deep place in the forest ground. Mamandele is perfect and he doesn’t only know the forest like his palm but he also knows how to behave in difficult situations. From now on, he is my hero. After our encounter with elephants, we started to talk about the situation, Roberta thinks, luckily and more scientifically, that the two elephants didn’t take our smell but I think differently. Maybe I am the ancient elephant rider, long forgotten:) Ok I should stop dreaming, maybe not that much, but still it took its place in my list on ‘the most scary and amazingly beautiful story I have’… until now… Who knows, what tomorrow brings in Mondika:)

One response so far