Archive for November, 2007
The 5 Senses of Mountain Gorillas Sight: Mountain Gorillas see more or less like we do. So they distinguish colors, dimensions and objects that are close by. Smell: Their smell is probably a bit more developed than that of men. Interestingly the Silverback spreads a very particular smell from his armpits. This is why, if you are ever visiting Mountain Gorillas, the guide will tell you when he can smell them. The Silverback emits this odor when he senses strangers in his midst. Taste: Mountain Gorillas have the same taste sense as man. It is very important for them because it teaches them how to avoid poisonous plants. Sound: This sense is not as strong as ours. Touch: Mountain Gorillas’ sense of touch is less sensitive than ours. These animals have the protection of hairs, and very thick skin on the soles of their feet and the palms of their hands. Mountain Gorillas are also able to eat nettles for example and do not suffer from wasp stings like we do, simple because they do not react like we do.
Buhanga, the Silverback, emits a smell when he senses strangers Finally, we are going to Nairobi tomorrow for 1 week. We have been invited there to help with people who are writing a children’s book on the Mountain Gorillas of DR Congo, and the Kabirizi Family. We have never left DR Congo (apart from a brief trip to neighboring Rwanda), or been in a plane - so it is going to be an exciting adventure for us. We will take many pictures and post them here. In the meantime Jean Bosco, Director Mushenzi and Samantha will post some blogs while we are away on what is going on. Diddy & Innocent
This is Jean Bosco. As you know I am the Community Conservation Officer for the southern sector of Virunga National Park.
After the massacre of the Rugendo family in July we carried out a project in communities to raise awareness about protecting Mountain Gorillas, through the use of films and talks. We did this in schools, churches and the military camps of the 9th brigade. In our team there was of course Director Norbert Mushenzi, my boss, and 3 guys from WWF including Grand-pere (which means Grandfather in English), Gerard and Modogo.
Director Norbert Mushenzi opened the talks. The first session took place near the military camp at Rumangabo.
I also participated in each session. This one is in a church.
People listened. By watching the film and listening to our talks the communities were able to better understand the importance of gorillas as part of our national heritage. We talked about the way of life of gorillas, and how they behave in the family unit. Mountain Gorillas are different to other animals for us.
These are children at a school who live near the Gorilla Sector.
Grand-pere from WWF spoke. He also spoke in Lingala at this military camp because many of the military here are from the west of the country.
Here again are members of the military and their wives. They enjoyed the films and asked us to come back.
And this one is at a church in Buvunga, 2km north of Rumangabo park station.
Justin, a trainee, talks to the congregation.
The people who took part and watched the films all condemned the July killings.
Jean Bosco
Last month I blogged about why I became a Ranger and I talked about the influence of my father, Sylvestre Mburanumwe. At that time I didn’t have a picture of my father. But now I do!
Sylvestre Mburanumwe, born 1947
He has been a Ranger since 1968, mainly in the southern sector of Virunga National Park in the Gorilla Sector and other places like Kibati. He has been head of the Bikenge patrol post in the Gorilla Sector for a year, and before that he was head of the Jomba patrol post in the Gorilla Sector for 14 years. There are 5 patrol posts in total in the Gorilla Sector.
Me & my father at Rumangabo 10 days ago
He was one of the first Rangers here to work on the habituation of Mountain Gorillas in 1985 with Conrad Aveling. First he was part of the team habituating the Rugendo family, and that took about 2 1/2 years. He also worked with the Rugabo family, who took only 6 months to be habituated.
My father is currently evacuated from his patrol post because of the fighting. Today the situation has calmed, but for the last few days it has not been good and security has worsened because of fighting between the army and rebels.
Innocent
We were again looking through pictures with Samantha - in actual fact to find pictures for CBS 60 Minutes. We were meant to go to Rumangabo today but fighting has broken out at Rugari, about 12km south of Rumangabo, so we are stuck in Goma. Rugari is at the bottom of the hill of the Gorilla Sector - there has been sporadic fighting there over the last 3 months that we have blogged about before.
We thought you would all like this picture of Nsekuye and her infant Kabila that has not been posted before on the blog. Nsekuye was the adult female shot and killed in June. Kabila is one of the orphans in Goma, that you can see pictures of here and also on Dr Lucy Spelman’s blog.
Nsekuye means “the saviour of a family”. She was given this name because she seemed very intelligent when she was born.
We do not know exactly how old Nsekuye (also spelled N’sekuye) was but she was old because she had had several children, including the adult female Janja and the blackback Kayenga.
When Nsekuye had been carried down the hill she was brought to Rumangabo for an autopsy by the MGVP vets. Then she was buried in our gorilla cemetery. (I, Innocent, am on the left in this photo).
Janja, taken about a year ago
Diddy & Innocent
As today is Thanksgiving in the US, it seems appropriate to thank you all for your donations this last week. That is 15-21 November, inclusive. A special thank you to Pamela T who donated $100 in honor of Lynne G and Paul B. And for those of you who didn’t read my comment on the previous post, fighting has calmed in Rutshuru and Kiwanja and Diddy and Innocent’s families are safe. Rebels and army retreated to previous positions, and now we have to wait and see what will happen. From all the Gorilla Protection Blog Team: Diddy, Innocent, Norbert, Jean Bosco, Augustin, Samantha
This is Samantha.
I have just met with Innocent and Diddy and fighting has broken out again between the rebels and the army at Rutshuru, north of Rumangabo. Innocent’s mother is literally hiding under the bed, and has been for several hours. She is eating raw bananas because that is all there is. And Diddy is unable to get hold of Justine, his wife.
This information is quite literally hot off the press. It should calm down, fingers crossed, by the end of the day. I will let you know when I hear any news.
On a similar note, on Saturday I went to Rumangabo with Innocent, Diddy and other Rangers. Diddy was actually in Kiwanja, north of Rumangabo, so came down on the motorbike (that takes about an hour) while Innocent went up from Goma at the same time as me. Goma to Rumangabo takes about 1h30. Diddy has been in Goma now since Saturday pm, which is why Justine is up at Kiwanja, next to Rutshuru where the fighting is going on.
As you know Rumangabo is the headquarters for the southern sector of Virunga. For a map of this go here.
So the 70 Rangers from the Gorilla Sector are camped out there for the most part, unless they have somewhere else to go. Some of them are with their families, which can mean a lot of children.
I saw Jean Marie Serundori, who is the number 2 of the Bukima patrol post after Augustin Kambale. You will remember Jean Marie from previous posts.
His wife had just given birth to their eighth child - who has yet to be named. She was born 4 days before I got there, so last Wednesday.
Jean Marie and his wife and the newest addition to the family.
She will be named soon!
Jean-Marie was in good spirits despite being away from his patrol post - undoubtedly the birth of his daughter had something to do with this.
This is where Jean Marie is living - it is temporary accommodation for the displaced Rangers. It is extremely challenging at this time for everyone. Amid the insecurity and the uncertainty of how long the conflict will go on, it is very difficult to plan and accommodate. Today’s events show this very clearly.
I actually went up with Daniel Pepper, a freelance US journalist for a bunch of publications who had come to cover the Mountain Gorilla crisis that has been evolving since September 3rd. As you know that is part of my job - to get this issue in the international media. Daniel will be writing the story for US News and a couple of other publications. I will let you all know when it comes out.
Innocent and Diddy, with Daniel at the gorilla cemetery, explaining about the July massacre. I also met Innocent’s father, Silvestre, who is a Ranger too as you know and head of the Bikenge patrol post. That was the first time for me so it was fun to see them both together.
Innocent and others had also been on patrol the day before and detained some people who were making charcoal in the park. Innocent has lots of photos on that and wants to post over the next few days. About 30 people in total were detained.
The atmosphere at Rumangabo is one of frustration. The Rangers are trying to do what they can - as shown by the one-day patrol on Friday to stop charcoal burning. But there is really not a lot they can do other than wait it out. It is beyond the Rangers and beyond conservation organizations. We are all reliant on the political will of the government and the armed forces, which today does not seem to be working too well.
I can honestly say that the Rangers appreciate all the support they can get - moral and financial. They want to speak to journalists when I take them up to Rumangabo, because they want to have a voice in all of this mess. And the Rangers, like us and other organizations, are poised to start working as soon as we can get a foot back in the Gorilla Sector.
Let us hope this recent spate of fighting stops soon, and that progress can be made toward finding a solution.
Samantha
Pili-Pili is one of the four sons of Rugabo. His name means “Pepper” - he was given this because as an infant he was quite feisty. We started monitoring Pili-Pili in 1997, when he was part of the Lulengo family, that had 12 individuals at the time. Lulengo is his brother. 1998 was a tumultuous year. On 15 January Pili-Pili had an interaction with Lulengo and split with 5 individuals to form his own family - these were 3 adult females: Bagenzi, Amahoro and Mahane and 2 juveniles: Birori and Gasigwa. Shortly after an adult female, Mwirakazi, joined Pili-Pili after he had an interaction with Ruzirabwoba. Then a few months later the 4 adult females disappeared from his family, and Birori and Gasigwa were killed by armed men.
Pili-Pili From 1999 to 2000 we didn’t see Pili-Pili (the civil war was going on) but during this time he managed to gain another family. We do not know how or from whom. In 2002 Mapuwa fought with Pili-Pili. Mapuwa took 3 individuals, and forced Pili-Pili to leave the family unit and become solitary. 2002-2007: Pili-Pili roamed solitary. He tried to win over females to form a family, but was unsuccessful. During this time we monitored Pili-Pili and the other solitaries. We need to do this so that the day there is an interaction and individuals are taken by another Silverback, we know the Silverback. In February this year Pili-Pili had an interaction with Mapuwa that lasted 3 days. Pili-Pili finally got a family again: 2 adult females Mafaze and Maganya, and a sub-adult female Bavanyuma.
Mafaze the adult female. She has never had any children which is unusual, so we think she is sterile. In August Pili-Pili and Lulengo had a fierce interaction. Lulengo won and took Pili-Pili’s family. Pili-Pili is solitary once more.
Lulengo won the last battle, but will he be able to hang on to his family? If you want to see more about the gorilla families, click here. Diddy & Innocent
I am Jean Bosco Bichamakara and I head up community relations in Rumangabo. This means that I work with the communities that live around the Gorilla Sector and in the southern sector of Virunga National Park.
I work very closely with Innocent and Diddy and so I will also start contributing to this blog. I have been in this job since 2003 and with ICCN for 9 years.
My name Bichamakara actually means “Forbid Charcoal” in the KinyaBwisha language.
So my job is to protect the park and to work with the local communities to do this. For example, if animals leave the park to steal the crops of the local populations, we need to intervene to help solve this problem. Buffaloes, elephants and gorillas are the main animals that do this. Remember the Rugendo family in particular does this because they are so habituated to humans.
So we often help coerce the animals into re-entering the park, and we try and educate the local communities into the importance of preserving our park. When we finally get stability, tourism will be one of the major sources of revenue for the local populations. So we need to protect Virunga and the wildlife so that this can become a reality.
Here I am with my colleague Pierre Ndeze. His grandfather was a tribal chief who died in February. Ndeze, the Mountain Gorilla daughter of Safari who is now orphaned in Goma after the Rugendo massacre, is named after him.
I have 12 Rangers in my team, so we are 13 including myself. There are 12 patrol posts in the southern sector of Virunga National Park, so this is how we come to this figure - 1 community relations officer at each post.
I look forward to posting more about my work on this blog and receiving your comments.
Jean Bosco
Thank you to EACH and EVERY one of you for your donations. This is the list from 1st to 14th November inclusive. We know that you all work hard for every cent that you donate. This money will be spent exactly on what you have donated it for - if donated for a specific item like a Medical Kit - or if the donation is unspecified it will go toward protecting the Mountain Gorillas of DR Congo. The amounts shown below are gross, ie net of paypal fees. We have sorted the donations by item to make it easier. Thank you from all of us: Diddy, Innocent, Director Mushenzi, Augustin Kambale, Samantha - and all the other Rangers who benefit from your generous support.
Finally some good news everyone! We have just spoken to Ranger Patrice Tuyisenge. He told us that on 12th November the rebels who control our Gorilla Sector let him go in and see what he could find. He saw 2 families that he said are the Humba and Kabirizi families. The Humba family was very near the Bukima patrol post.
Humba the Silverback and chief of his family, taken in August Patrice does not know how to identify each Mountain Gorilla by the noseprint, and this also takes a lot of time, but we are confident by what he described to us that the Humba family and the Kabirizi family are doing well. Humba has 9 individuals, and Kabirizi 31. Patrice was not able to tell us exactly the number of gorillas he saw in each group, but for Humba it was roundabout the right number, and for Kabirizi too. This is very very good news and we are very very happy to hear this.
Mahindure, a juvenile in the Humba family, taken in August Patrice is a Ranger usually based at Jomba. He is one of the Rangers who for a couple of weeks tracked the Mapuwa and Rugendo families and the solitary Ruzirabwoba back in September. This was because the rebels let him and some others do this. We do not know if Patrice or any other Rangers will be allowed back in to the Gorilla Sector to do any more tracking. Patrice had to go in from the Ugandan side via Bunagana. But we hope so. We also need to get back in to complete a proper identification of these two families, and of course the other habituated Mountain Gorillas. But today this is most definitely a positive light in what has been a dark scenario for so long. We are happy to share this with you. Diddy & Innocent |
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