SOUTHERN NH UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR TO STUDY GORILLAS IN UGANDA.

• Michele Goldsmith, who holds an endowed chair in biology and ethics at Southern New Hampshire University in Manchester.

A Southern New Hampshire University senior who will accompany one of her professors to Africa to study the interaction between tourists and gorillas says she was more nervous about the shots needed for international travel than she was about living in the wild in Uganda.

Heidi Quigley, a communications major, will help associate professor Michele Goldsmith with research into the effects of repeated exposure of gorillas to tourists who spend hefty sums to visit with the primates in their habitat.

Goldsmith is a biological anthropologist who holds the Christos and Mary Papoutsy Distinguished Chair in Ethics and Social Responsibility. Christos Papoutsy was a successful electronics entrepreneur who has lectured and written on entrepreneurship and ethics.

Going to Africa and spending three weeks among gorillas while living in a tent in central Uganda doesn't worry Quigley.

"My family is super-excited, my parents are so supportive of what I do. They're not nervous about it,” Quigley said. “My friends think I'm crazy."

Goldsmith's research concentrates not only on the impact tourism has on the gorillas, but also on how close encounters with human's closest relatives in the animal kingdom affects tourists.

Guided gorilla tracking excursions have grown in popularity in the hills of Uganda. Tourists clamor for government permits to spend an hour interacting with gorillas in the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest.

The adventures are a major source of tourism revenue for Uganda, leading to more and more groups of gorillas being sought out for contact with more and more humans.

Goldsmith's study concentrates on the impact the contact will have on the long-term ecosystem that supports the gorillas.

"The idea behind the tourism started when gorillas were being butchered, even when they had no value to anybody,” Goldsmith said. “They were just being slaughtered. Their hands were being made into ashtrays."

The gorilla tourism industry has raised money to protect the animals. Goldsmith's research examines the ecological cost.

TWO INFANTS GORILLAS RESCUED FROM POARCHERS IN CONGO

 

Musanze, Rwanda – Gorilla Doctors and the Congolese Wildlife Authority (ICCN) are increasingly concerned about the survival of Grauer’s gorillas in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) following the rescue of two poached infant gorillas in separate confiscations on September 13 and 20. Civil war and illegal resource extraction by armed militias in the areas where Grauer’s gorillas live have made it extremely difficult for Gorilla Doctors, ICCN, and other conservation groups to monitor and protect this endangered species.

“In order to obtain an infant gorilla to sell in the illegal pet trade, poachers typically kill the infant’s mother and any other gorilla trying to protect it,” says Dr. Mike Cranfield, Co-Director of Gorilla Doctors, a veterinary team dedicated to saving Grauer’s and mountain gorillas through life-saving health care. “The confiscation of two infant gorillas from different groups indicates that numerous wild Grauer’s gorillas may have been killed recently.”

In the last four years, 10 Grauer’s gorilla orphans have been confiscated from poachers, and authorities investigated numerous other reports of illegally-held gorillas. Closely related to the more famous mountain gorillas, Grauer’s gorillas, also called eastern lowland gorillas, are one of four gorilla subspecies, and can only be found in Eastern DRC in Kahuzi-Biega, Virunga, and Mikeo National Parks and isolated forest reserves. The population size of the species is unknown but most experts believe there may be fewer than 4,000 remaining.

The infant confiscated on September 13 was brought to the Kahuzi-Biega National Park headquarters at Tchivanga, South Kivu Province, by the community conservation group Jeunesse Pour le Conservation de l’Environnement (JPE). The group claimed to have been given the baby by the Raiya Mutomboki, a rebel group active in the region. Gorilla Doctors veterinarians Dr. Dawn Zimmerman, Dr. Eddy Kambale, and Dr. Martin Kabuyaya, who were in park that day working to release two human-habituated Grauer’s gorillas of the Chimanuka tourist group from poachers’ snares, examined the approximately nine-month-old female infant and found her to be in relatively good condition. The ensnared gorillas were later released by the Gorilla Doctors, the first-ever successful interventions to treat ensnared Grauer’s gorillas. 

Gorilla Doctors coordinated with the Tayna Center for Conservation Biology and ICCN authorities to bring the poached infant to the Senkwekwe gorilla sanctuary at Virunga National Park headquarters in Rumangabo, North Kivu Province. Despite recent fighting between the M23 rebels and the Congo army around the park, the headquarters has remained a safe haven. The gorilla was named “Isangi,” after the village where the rebels handed her over to JPE.

On September 20, Virunga National Park Gorilla Sector Warden Innocent Mburanumwe and other ICCN and local officials successfully undertook the sting operation following a tip-off by local community members, and confiscated a four-month-old female Grauer’s gorilla orphan from men attempting to sell her in the city of Goma. Her captors claimed to have taken the baby from the Walikale area, an insecure region where numerous armed groups compete for control over mines. After the men were arrested and transferred to the court authorities in Goma, the infant was moved to the sanctuary in Virunga National Park where three trained careers provide her with 24 hour care.  Gorilla poaching is considered a serious crime in Congo and can lead to a lifetime prison sentence.