Lowland Gorillas in Europe 2015

{Note from mods - this thread continues from here: Lowland Gorillas in Europe 2014}




Chester

Here is a chart for the gorillas who lived at the Chester Zoo, England between 1960 and 1986.
Gorillas: Chester (1960 - 1986)

 

Another gorilla baby in Stuttgart!
It'a boy, mother is Kolo.

 

While London's baby (Kumbuka x Mjuku) is female.

 

Female, Shatilla died at Arnhem today following a short illness

 

GaiaPark Kerkrade, NL

On January 18, Tamidol (Bitam x Baby Doll) gave birth. She is originally from Howletts and a first-time mother.

 

EEP inbreeding cases

I made a family tree for Alika to get an idea of the degree of inbreeding. It's quite complicated, but it boils down to this: Kumba II is her grandfather on her mother's side as well as her great-grandfather on her father's side. Furthermore, Jambo is her great-great-grandfather on both sides. Not as 'bad' as the other cases you listed, and probably not bad enough to exclude her from the breeding programme. — Alika's family tree

 

'Tamidol' is already 16-17 years old(born 1998) so quite old for a first time breeder. Not sure if that was deliberate by Howletts or that they let her out to Gaia Park because she didn't breed, but a switch of groups solved that.

 

EEP inbreeding cases

Sorry for coming up with this subject once again, but after I had a second look on Alika's tree I found a way to arrange the boxes/individuals so that Jambo doesn't appear twice in the chart. And I highlighted the "hot spots" of inbreeding - Jambo and Kumba II - although the actual inbreeding happened with the conception of Alika herself. — Alika's Family Tree (Version 2)

 

I'm sure a lot of wild Gorillas are more inbred than this. And Alika's grandfather 'Keke'(deceased) has only two offspring(Kumbuka & Nasibu) and so far is only represented in the next generation by this one baby.

 

2 male Gorillas from Hannover Zoo ( Kiburi (10 ) and Ubongo ( 7 ) were send to Loro Parque.

 

6 years old male was sent from Moscow Zoo to Warsaw Zoo. Unfortunatelly adult male Azizi broke Vikings two arms "to greet".

 

poor Viking! any news?
_____

Apparently Tano and Okanda from the gorilla nursery group in Stuttgart will be moved to Munich at some point in 2015. Does anyone know /is allowed to say more about the move?

That means Munich isn't going to have a new silverback soon, or one of the two will be the silverback in training?

 

That's an interesting development. I would think as Munich only have the four females at present, it represents a chance to integrate these two handraised four years old males into a group with adult Gorillas that they can socialise with.

Whether the plan is to later add a new silverback(after these young males have already become part of the group), or just stay without one longerterm, remains to be seen. It will be a long time till these males are adult though.

 

yes, socializing is of course the idea. In Stuttgart, they are already a couple of hours everyday in one of the family rooms, together with at least one of the females and the small ones of the family group.
I was just wondering because new silverbacks do not always react nicely towards male kids ...

 

Good to hear they are already socialising them that way at Stuttgart.

Agree about a new silverbacks' possible treatment of young males. If they integrate well at Munich maybe they will try and add a male later on, once the young ones are really established as part of the group and the females would protect them. But it would still be rather trial and error depending on the new male's temperament.

 

La Palmyre Silverback introduction

Excellent video on the La Palmyre website of the recent introduction of the home-bred silverback 'Nyuki' to the small group consisting of one female and two (male and female) juveniles. There is an English translation explaining the background to this introduction also.

Quite a milestone considering that Nyuki and his halfbrother Mike were previously considered social 'write-offs' with no hope of being able to be introduced to other Gorillas. Sadly Mike died recently, but Nyuki, despite his poor background, seems to have proved that theory wrong.

 

Wow, that went off quite well. I'm surprised though about the order of the introductions. Successively they tried all possible combinations, starting with all four, the two males only, the silverback and the two females... I wonder what the masterplan behind that strategy was.

 

Stress reduction, particularly for Nyuki? In the first instance with the whole group the other three were ganging-up against him. When they weren't all together they weren't quite so brave and less keen on 'testing' him. Then they built it up again from there. I liked the play sequence at the end, the two young ones had completely lost their fear of him by then.

'Nyuki' used to have a protruding upper canine tooth which made him look a bit like a vampire.. When he has the playface at the end it looks like he's had some dental work on it.

 

La Palmyre

This makes sense. What surprised me is that initially they put all of them together. I'd expect them to begin with the adult female first. Or offer contact through bars/mesh first, but maybe that option isn't available at that zoo; or they've done that but don't show in the video. Yes, the play sequence is great. The two youngsters are quite rough with their step-daddy though, I guess still in the phase of testing their limits. The article says, there is still some tension but they are confident about the future.

 

The English translation of their text explains that they did have mesh contact for some months prior to the introduction. As the signs were positive they were going to try them together at the end of last summer, but EEP advised them to wait until the younger (female) juvenile was five years old (i.e. past the 'danger' period to a strange male.) So they delayed it until more recently. Of course, how they behave with mesh between doesn't always reflect what happens in the real meeting either.

I think zoos always face a dilemma in this situation- introduce them one by one on a 1.1 basis, or try a whole group intro. In this case it seems they tried the latter but then went back to the former.

I wonder if Nyuki, despite his poor background, will now breed?