Mountain gorillas are the world’s largest living apes living in Bwindi national park and Mgahinga gorilla national park in Uganda, Volcanoes national park in Rwanda and Virunga national park in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Mountain gorillas share 98 percent of their DNA with humans and they have their nose prints each unique to each other just like human thumb prints. When gorilla babies are born they are vulnerable just like human babies and depend on their mothers.
Rwigi gorilla family
Rwigi mountain gorilla family was formed from Kahungye gorilla family when silverback Rwigi took away an adult female and some juveniles to start up his own family. The name Rwigi was derived from the dominating silverback and means “door” in the local language.
Rwigi mountain gorilla family now comprises of six members including; 1 silverback, 3 adult females, 2 juveniles and 1 baby. It should be noted that numbers in gorilla groups keep changing from time to time due to a number of factors like births, deaths, moving to other groups, members joining the group and so much more.
Kahungye gorilla family
Kahungye mountain gorilla family is the group that silverback Rwigi left to form his own gorilla family, the name Kahungye is derived from a hill in Bwindi where the family was first spotted. The family was composed of 27 members at the time of habituation with 3 silverbacks in 2011.
Gorilla trekking
Gorilla trekking is one of the most tourist activities in Africa since mountain gorillas cannot survive in zoos, gorilla trekking starts early morning after a briefing from the park headquarters. The trek takes 30 minutes to 7 hours depending on the movement of the gorilla family and phase of hikers. Once the family is found then visitors will be given an hour to observe and take photos.
Gorilla habituation
Gorilla habituation can be described as the process of making mountain gorillas get used to human presence, this normally takes a period of about 2-3 years then they will be given a mocking exercise that determines if they can be opened for trekking.
The southern sector of Bwindi impenetrable forest national park gives tourists an opportunity to join researchers and rangers in their daily work of habituating gorillas. Gorilla habituation takes 4 hours unlike gorilla trekking that takes 1 hour.
Gorilla permits
Mountain gorilla permits in Uganda cost $700 per person per trekking and gorilla habituation permits cost $1500 per person. Tourists should always book their permits in advance f about 3 months before arriving in the country.
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