The internet has been abuzz with excitement following the release of photos of endangered Cross River gorillas which have been long thought to be extinct.

The photos released yesterday by Wild Conservation Society (Nigeria), an international NGO that has been partnering with local communities on coordinated conservation of the species, showed a group of gorillas including offsprings backed by adult females.

It is indeed a great development!

First-Ever Images of World’s Rarest Gorilla with Groups of Babies

Remote camera trap monitoring by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) in the Mbe Mountains capture first-ever images of a group of Cross River gorillas with several infants
These images are an indication that Cross River gorillas are successfully reproducing and populations recovering as a result of field based protection efforts.

Cross River gorillas are rarely seen in the wild
Gorillas and other wildlife populations are being protected in Mbe Mountains through joint management and conservation efforts by the Wildlife Conservation Society and the Conservation Association of the Mbe Mountains – an alliance of nine local communities
No Cross River gorillas have been recorded or reported killed in Nigeria since 2012.

WCS has released the first-known camera-trap images of a group of Cross River gorillas with a number of infants of different ages. The images were captured in the Mbe Mountains in Nigeria. Cross River gorillas (Gorilla gorilla diehli) are the most endangered gorilla subspecies, numbering only around 300 individuals and found only in an isolated region along the Nigeria/Cameroon border.

Cross River gorillas are rarely seen, let alone photographed, even by remote cameras. Previously, camera traps at WCS sites in Cameroon and Nigeria have captured just a few images including one from 2012 in Cameroon’s Kagwene Gorilla Sanctuary showing one member of the group missing a hand likely from snare injury. In the Mbe Mountains and Afi Mountains in Nigeria, camera traps photographed a mother carrying a single infant on her back and lone silverbacks on separate occasions. Those images were obtained in 2013 and on separate occasions since then, but these recent images are the first time that multiple infants have been recorded in the same group.

Extremely shy of humans due to a long history of persecution, Cross River gorillas live in the most rugged and inaccessible parts of their range. Their presence can be detected mainly by indirect signs such as nests, dung and feeding trails. They are distributed patchily over a mountainous, forested landscape spanning some 12,000 square kilometers across the transboundary region of Cross River Nigeria and Takmanda-Mone Cameroon.

Once presumed extinct in Nigeria and only “rediscovered” in the late 1980’s, approximately 100 Cross River gorillas live in Nigeria in three contiguous sites in Cross River State – the Okwangwo Division of Cross River National Park (Okwangwo), Afi Mountain Wildlife Sanctuary and the Mbe Mountains community forest. The Mbe Mountains forest, which is home to about a third of the Nigeria gorilla population, and provide an important link between Afi Mountain and Okwangwo, have been managed jointly by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and the Conservation Association of the Mbe Mountains as a community wildlife sanctuary since 2005. A team of 16 eco-guards recruited from the surrounding communities, trained and employed by WCS conducts daily law enforcement patrols of the sanctuary to protect gorillas and other wildlife. In addition to protection, WCS works with the local communities to raise awareness of conservation and improve livelihoods.

Inaoyom Imong, Director of WCS Nigeria’s Cross River Landscape said: “It is extremely exciting to see so many young Cross River gorillas – an encouraging indication that these gorillas are now well protected and reproducing successfully, after previous decades of hunting. While hunters in the region may no longer target gorillas, the threat of hunting remains, and we need to continue to improve the effectiveness of our protection efforts.”

The photographs have understandably generated a lot of excitement among Cross River gorilla conservation stakeholders. Professor John Oates, lead author of the first Cross River gorilla action plan in 2007 said: “It is wonderful to see images of gorillas from the Mbe Mountains that show so many young animals, indicating that the population there is in good health. Back in the early 1970s it was widely thought that gorillas were extinct in Nigeria, but work subsequently initiated by the Cross River State Government, and later supported and expanded by WCS and local communities, has clearly held the line and given hope for the long-term survival of these primates.”

Source:- Newsroom