Lowland gorillas in Europe 2008

Being a record-holder I doubt if he will last more than a few years at the most. Surely when Matze dies a problem will arise if Rebecca has a newborn by him. Both him and Rebecca are over-represented (as Yassa observed correctly).

I will go to Frankfurt tomorrow, but I am not sure if I will make it to the zoo. I will try and get hold of the design plan. But if I recollect what I saw last time around (October-wise) each ape species has only 1 exhibit. The other species are colobus monkey and a Cercopithecus-species.

I probably will end up in the Senckenberg Museum and the Palmengarten. I will fly on Monday to Oman (for some serious sandstorms .... and gazelle/oryx watching).

 

The monkey species planned for the great ape house were guereza, drill and diana monkey. Guerezas and diana monkeys are already in Frankfurt, drills will come from Hannover. The plan was to mix all three species with eahc other and gorillas! It is possible however that this plan has changed in the last months since the old director was kicked out. If I remember correctly the number of monkey species has been reduced to 2, not sure which one. I think the drills are coming to Frankfurt for sure, so it could be either dianas or guerezas. The new house can`t be far from completation now so we will hopefully learn more soon.

 

I think reintroduction of zoo gorillas will never become a serious conservation tool. It is more to welfare of individual animals. And even then it is discussable that gorilla in forest is really happier than in Europe. Human wouldn't.

Zoos however can enormously help wild gorillas by raising money for conservation. Given how small wages are in Africa and most African reserves exist only on paper, I think even little money raised by small zoo can make a difference. Even a small money-collecting bin would do for a start.

 

That is a valid point. It might be better if these two were prevented from breeding together anymore i.e. put Rebecca on the pill.

 

A problem for Frankfurt?

I'm wondering now what the authorities at Frankfurt plan for 'Matz' when the new 'Bonoboland' exhibit opens later this year. Will they transfer the whole group as it is now? Will Matz (now 50!) be able to cope okay with such a dramatic change at his advanced age.?

Might it be kinder to create a new group in Bonoboland and keep him with e.g. the two old girls(Jule and Dorret) in his familiar environment? But again- they probably want to remove the old house totally once the animals have moved. Could they retain just the Gorilla wing for a while? Comments?

 

That won't be possible, since they will demolish the old Ape House as soon as the animals move into the new Borgoriwald (formerly known as Bonoboland). Then the outdoor enclosures will be built partly where the old Ape House is. Here is a link to the building plan. The yellow part is the new house, and the black line with red lines inside indicates the old house.

 

I've resurrected these questions because they were never answered, and I happened to be at Cologne Zoo yesterday

Cologne currently have 2.4 gorillas:

m Kim (b 1976 in the wild, arrived in 1977)
f Kibi (b 1977 in the wild, arrived in 1977)
f Gina (b 1982 at Rotterdam, arrived in 1984)
f N'Datwa (b 1989 at Apenheul, arrived in 1998)
f N'Gambe (b 2000 at Cologne, N'Datwa x Kim)
m Kito (b 2004 at Cologne, Gina x Kim)

The breeding male Kim has also fathered other offspring no longer in the collection. They are:

f Undi (b 1990, Ulca x Kim, moved to Bristol 1998)
f Gana (b 1997, Gina x Kim, moved to Munster 2004)
m Berni (b 2002, Gina x Kim, died from an infection in 2003)

As has previously been mentioned, Ulca moved to Lisbon in 2006

When I was watching the gorillas yesterday, Kim and Kito were spending a lot of time together in the smaller of the two linked indoor dens (in fact, Kim was clearly tiring of Kito's attention-seeking antics but being very patient too). The females were mostly resting and browsing in the larger room, where Kito later joined them.

 

Kim has one more son, Kibo (mother Gina), born 1990. Kibo is now the breeding silverback in Stuttgart and has a couple of kids there. Undi who was moved to Bristol died there a few years ago.

Kim is unfortunately not breeding with Kibi and he wasn`t interested in Ulca any longer neither, so she was moved to Lisboa. In my opinion Kibi should be moved too but it seems the zoo has different plans.

 

I don't think Kibi has ever bred- she and Kim are a typical 'platonic' pair- they arrived at Cologne with a few days of each other and grew up together- so he's not interested in her. She is genetically valuable as a wild caught animal and could still possibly breed if moved elsewhere to a new male....

 

Fritz alive and well.

I've had it confirmed that Nurnberg's 45 year old male 'Fritz' is still alive and well- so the current ISIS listing must be wrong(lists 0.3) Its good news as 'Fritz' at 45 is well up in the male section of the top fifty oldest gorillas..

 

Toddy- thanks for the plan of the new Frankfurt Great Ape 'environment'. I can see how they need to demolish the old house completely before the new outside areas can be constructed. That means the Apes will need to be moved into the new indoor areas well in advance of the expected completion date for the outside areas. So it seems the whole group including 'Matz' will have to move into the new environment- I hope he can cope okay... Does anyone have a timeframe on the construction work and is the whole thing(indoors and the outsides too) due to be completed by this summer, or just the indoor exhibit...

 

I think the original plan was to have the indoor area ready by the end of 2007, move the groups, demolish the old house and have the outdoor enclosures ready by late 2008. But the construction company went bancrupt and the zoo director was fired and the new management found some flares and changed the construction plans last minute. So they are well behind schedule. The indoor area nevertheless should be ready within the next months. No idea how long the completation of the outdoor enclosures will take.
And I think Matze will be ok as long as he has his family around him! There so many examples of old and very old animals being able to adapt to new (usually much better) living conditions, Matze will be ok.

 

Yassa- thanks for the timeframe on the Frankfurt exhibit. Seems its the usual story- behind schedule....

I guess Matz will probably move okay- I've never heard of a male so old being moved to new quarters though. Is he in good condition or physically decrepit nowadays? I did see a quite recent photo of him and he looked good for his age in that...

 

Is this the orang Matz you are refering too? I took that photo last summer in Frankfurt.

 

No, he's the 50 year old silverback in the Frankfurt Gorilla group and something of a record-holder nowadays.

 

The picture shows Charlie, a 50 year old sumatran orang utan male in Frankfurt and also a record holder nowadays. There are a lot of ancient old apes in the great ape house in Frankfurt...

 

Matz, Charlie and Margrit. Its a real 'old people's home.... Are all three record holders for their respective species?

I checked on Matz and he is currently listed as the fourth oldest Gorilla in captivity anywhere, the oldest MALE anywhere (by a couple of years), and the oldest gorilla in Europe.

I imagine Margrit the Bonobo must be the world's oldest too...

 

Gorilla breeding Madrid Zoo

A happy event! Only for the 2nd time inside 16 years of gorilla keeping a gorilla was born in late 2007 (an earlier birth in 2006 failed as the infant died within days of being born).

Female Gorka has produced a female infant with silverback Malabo. The infant was born on 20/12/2007. Her mother is looking after her very well and the male seems relaxed with his offspring too.

 

That's good news. I think its the same parents as with the previous birth...

 

This is great since Malabo has wildborn arents with no or only 1 other offspring, so he is genetically very important. I have hopes that he might breed with a second female too - a few weeks ago, Madrid recieved a new female, Coco from Barcelona. She is wildborn and was confiscated and then raised in the Stuttgart orphange before she returned to Barcelona. She never bred with either of their males, neither Xebo nor Asali, a baby from her and Malabo would be fantastic for the gorilla EEP.