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An Hour with the Gentle Giants of the Forest

An Hour with the Gentle Giants of the Forest
 
 

IN THE van on our way to the gazebo in the forest, we had made bets on what times we will see the gorillas. Sandra had started the ball rolling with suggesting 11:45. Hendrick nominated 12:00, and Sebastiaan nominated 1:45. I was still a bit stiff from having conquered Kilimanjaro a week ago so I was keen to get it over and done with. I also recalled yesterday’s group who saw our gorilla family had only taken one hour to reach them, so I nominated 11:00.

It was 11:05 when we first saw them – I had won the bet.

Trekking through the Congo
Trekking through the Congo

We had started zig-zagging down the thick broadleaf scrub following the route the trackers had cut when following the gorillas. Now gorillas being wild animals have no concept of containment, so they move freely through the forest. We were dealing with a moving target - a target that no doubt moves faster than us.

Dougie led me through the thick scrub which was rather difficult underfoot now with the vegetation along the trail mostly having been pushed over, exposing the slippery stems which we scrambled over. He gestured me to follow him up a rather steep embankment which he cleared a bit more. Then he pointed down the hill into the thicket before going into my bag to pull out my camera.

The cloud was very thick, but deep in the mist just ten metres away was a small female climbing one of the small trees to get some leaves to eat. It was quite dark though with the cloud being thick. It quickly disappeared into the foliage before its weight suddenly caused the tree to collapse. Whether that was accidental or done on purpose I don’t know. Once fallen, it was completely hidden in the foliage.

Mishaya
Mishaya

By now I had my camera. This was going to be challenging. Then Dougie led me another two metres around as Wilbur cleared some more vegetation in front of us, revealing a large male silverback. He mentioned this one was part of a larger family group, but about two years ago it had mounted a challenge against the alpha male of the group. It had lost, so it left the family group with a few of the females to start up its own group.

Wilbur told us there were twelve gorillas in this group, and they were all here, although they were all hidden under the foliage as they tend to do on rainy days. I could hear them all eating. Such enormous vegetarian beasts needed enormous quantities of food each day, so like most other herbivores, they spent much of their time eating. Once they have eaten out an area, they move onto another area.

The small trees were swaying as they broke pieces off to eat. Only the silverback was visible, and only the side of his face was visible in the dense vegetation. Despite their elusiveness they were rather destructive.

A female
A female

There wasn’t much to see with the vegetation and thick cloud obscuring them, so the guides hacked away at the vegetation around us to give us a better view. I had thankfully left the polarizer back at the lodge. Even so the extremely high humidity was causing the lens protector UV filter to fog up on the inside. I had no choice but to remove it exposing the main lens. Additionally the camera was having a lot of trouble focusing on the gorillas and would focus on the vegetation in front instead. The vegetation had a more defined structure with the edges of leaves and branches for the camera to capture. The gorillas on the other hand had very soft fur resulting in the camera ignoring it. I therefore had to switch to manual focus mode in the hope that the focus would at least be reasonable. It’s really hard to tell when viewing on such a tiny screen in difficult terrain and weather.

The gorillas remained elusive under the vegetation as they ate it. At one point though they suddenly decided it was time to move to a new area. The silverback had decided he had enough of the area and moved on with the rest of the group obediently following him. Perhaps the vegetation here didn’t taste too good. They moved quickly to the right below us, so the trackers started clearing a route for us to follow them.

The gorillas were incredibly agile moving through the thick vegetation as we struggled through the track cut by the trackers above them.

The silverback moving through the jungle
The silverback moving through the jungle

The silverback found another location nearby and sat with its back to us for a couple of minutes before moving on again. Apparently this area wasn’t very good. Now I realised why the males are called silverbacks. The middle of its back was almost completely bald, with what little hair was left being a silver grey colour. The rest of its hair was a charcoal grey colour.

This time he shuffled along slowly looking for the next good piece of vegetation to eat. It quickly disappeared into the forest again. We could now see one of the females climbing a small tree through the thick forest. It was hard to see in the thick cloud which had once more descended around us. Its black hair was matted together a bit from the morning rain. It then started heading further away through the vegetation, so Dougie continued hacking away at the thick jungle undergrowth to pave a way towards the silverback.

A baby
A baby

We were only two more metres up the track when a cute baby came into view eating the vegetation. We continued along through the thick undergrowth before we saw the huge silverback again, serenely working its way towards its next location. It found a good spot hidden from view, so we continued along the steep terrain, seeing glimpses of the babies and females in between the huge leaves that we passed. They were there all right, but they were just hard to find.

We eventually reached a spot where the silverback’s face came into full view. It just sat there picking leaves, putting them into his mouth and chewing away. Its huge elongated nostrils were breathing heavily. Occasionally it would look over to us, the strange bald white apes that would come by each day, each coming from far-away places unimaginable and paying $500 each just to see them.

A baby suddenly popped up about four metres in front of the silverback. The cloud had now risen giving us a clear view again. Hopefully I can start getting some good shots now. A female appeared right next to the baby. It was obviously its mother.

Mishaya eating foliage
Mishaya eating foliage

The restless silverback was on the move again. This time though it only moved about two metres. Now it was out in the open giving us a clear view of it. Now he was finally photogenic. He picked more leaves and chewed on them slowly. These beasts obviously spend all day eating like this, going from one location to another. They were clearly a close family group. He had a very long flat forehead over his elongated face. His ears were almost identical in shape to ours.

It sat there for a good twenty minutes eating away when it suddenly let off a phenomenally loud ripper of a fart. It sounded like thick canvas being torn. It was far louder and stronger than any fart that any human could emit. Naturally there was a lot of sniggering from the group, but that incident was quickly forgotten as we continued to admire the awesome animal, which was genetically so close to us. None of the other gorillas laughed. I think the laughing at flatulence is just a human thing.

Trekking through the jungle
Trekking through the jungle

I did get a lot of shots of him from where I was standing, but had to stay on manual focus which isn’t a good thing with my eyesight. The few times when I did try autofocus, the camera would focus on the sharp edges of the leaves either in front of, or behind the gorilla, always putting him sadly out of focus. I would never know whether any of the photos would be any good until returning home in a few days. The screen on the camera wouldn’t be able to pick the detail, nor would my little travel computer. Even if I could, it would be too late to discover that none of the photos had turned out. I crossed my fingers hoping that at least some of the shots would be good.

Mishaya continued eating in its melancholy manner in the same spot, still looking at us on a regular basis.

Munching on the vegetation
Munching on the vegetation

Finally he left the spot and started lumbering on all fours continuing through the forest with surprising ease given his enormous size. His ghostly figure continued through the thick undergrowth, and we heard more rustling around him as the smaller females and babies joined him in his quest for more food.

Wilbur continued cutting the track further up the hill towards where the group were heading. Mishaya had now found another location facing the other way. Again he was sitting down in the thick foliage munching away. Again the autofocus was almost impossible with all the foliage around, so I kept the camera on manual focus. I hoped it wasn’t bothering him as we had been told at the briefing this morning not to make eye contact with them.

A juvenile
A juvenile

A female with rather wiry hair passed close to us, but remained hidden in the dense foliage apart from the odd patch of fur showing. The jungle here was quite thick, here at the very edge of the Congo. I gave my camera to Dougie to take a couple of shots of me, but he didn’t really understand the concept of getting both me and the gorilla in the shot. I then handed it over to Hendrick who was successful in getting a couple of shots despite the very difficult terrain.

From this angle we could see that one eyebrow was paler than the other. Perhaps it was a result of a battle when he left the larger group two years ago.

Michaya disappears into the forest
Michaya disappears into the forest

One of the babies poked its head up allowing me to get a couple of reasonable shots. It was probably more of a child than a baby though. It was chewing on a long shoot.

Then suddenly the hour was up. Wilbur told us we could have another five minutes though, but it seemed that Mishaya knew the hour was up, and he got up and left his comfortable spot. He headed further around the ridge with the other gorillas. We continued tracking through the thick forest. One of the females walked close beside him whilst the rest of the group stayed hidden beneath the foliage. Once more we got to see his rear end which was disproportionately too small compared to his enormous front.

Time to head back
Time to head back

Within a minute they were all gone, leaving us alone in the remote wilderness forest. We were all still in awe of having spent an entire hour with our closest relatives in the animal kingdom. Wilbur and Dougie continued cutting a bit more bush until we reached an old walking track. We followed the track past where we had watched the gorillas from and continued around the hill. Dougie had a machete no bigger than a large kitchen knife, but he easily cut through a five centimetre thick branch that was in the way.

After another ten minutes we suddenly reached the top of the ridge where it was clear with a vegetable farm going down one side of it. There were a few crude wooden structures perhaps built a few years ago to store the vegetables. We continued following the track for a bit longer before finding a good place to sit and have our lunches which had been packed for us at the hotel.

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26 August 2011

 

Bwindi Imp. For. Park

Uganda

 

1°05'52"S
29°40'53"E
2700m ASL

 

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