Keeping baby gorillas safe
Even with the best parents in the world, she’ll struggle to survive. That’s why she needs you
We all know just how difficult it is to bring a baby into the world. And if you’re a parent, you won’t need us to tell you about all the sleepless nights it takes to bring up your children. To say nothing of the worry you face as they grow up. But at least we understand the challenges we and our little-ones face. And we can ask for help when we need it.
It’s not so simple for gorillas.
No matter how hard it is for us humans to keep our babies safe so that they grow up to be healthy adults, it’s much, much harder for gorillas.
It goes without saying that they simply cannot understand the kind of threats their offspring will have to overcome when growing up. Nor can they stop those threats.
The threats are too great for any gorilla parent to overcome
Gorillas can’t find and destroy the deadly traps that maim and kill so many of their kind. They can’t stop human diseases infecting and killing their young. And they can’t stop illegal poachers from hunting them down as ‘bush meat’ or to sell as exotic pets.
Even the most powerful gorillas are powerless in the face of guns. No silverback father can stop an illegal hunter’s bullet from killing his baby son. Adult male gorillas are among the most powerful animals in the world. But they’re powerless when their troop are attacked by determined men with high-powered rifles and shotguns.
Of course, no one can stop a bullet. But rangers can make sure illegal hunters don’t get near enough to gorillas to use their weapons. We urgently need your support today to help keep ranger patrols out in the forest where they can keep gorillas safe.
Just like our own babies, new-born gorillas are completely dependent on their mothers. Once they’re able to walk and feed themselves – after roughly a year – they’re much more likely to survive.
But first, we have to help every single one of those babies to reach maturity. Will you give them your support today?
Every baby gorilla you help to make it to maturity could go on to have many, many young of their own. Typically females start to breed at around 10 years old and go on to have one baby every four years or so.
So if you can help one extra young gorilla live long enough to become a mother, she could go on to have four or five babies. And each of them could do the same. So in 20 years’ time, that one extra gorilla baby who survived could be responsible for 20 more gorillas being alive. That could be the difference between survival and extinction.
Which means we simply have to do everything we can to protect baby gorillas right now. Will you help make sure rangers are always ready to find and destroy deadly traps? To get between illegal hunters and gorillas? To work night and day to save gorillas from extinction?
Because make no mistake about it, that’s what will happen if we don’t act. Fail to protect gorillas today, and there simply won’t be any left in the future.
We can’t afford to lose a single baby gorilla.
It takes special people to help gorillas grow up safely. Will you please be one of them?
Protecting gorillas from extinction is a simple matter of arithmetic. If more babies are born than adults are killed, we have a chance of saving these magnificent creatures.
That means we can’t afford to lose a single baby gorilla. We simply have to help them grow up to be mature adults – so they can have babies of their own.
Just as with humans, the first year is the most difficult. If we can help gorillas survive those vital 12 months, they have a good chance of reaching maturity.
We urgently need your support to keep up our work with newborn gorillas, and to help them grow to reach maturity.
Your gift will help provide
- Essential kit and equipment to help rangers protect gorillas – this can include transport and fuel so that rangers can respond faster to any gorilla babies in immediate danger.
- Ranger patrols – dedicated teams of rangers are needed to patrol the forests day and night, keeping a look out for danger. Identifying groups with new babies is vital so that they are given greater protection during this vulnerable time.
- Walkie-talkies, camera traps and hard-wearing laptops – help us keep track of babies that need our help. Good communications technology can help rangers to know what’s happening and to stay in touch with one another.
- Tree saplings, seeds, and tools – we need to replant forest that has been destroyed by clearcutting. Not only does this protect the gorillas but it also gives local people a source of firewood nearby so the chance of deadly human diseases being carried into the forest is greatly reduced.
If you’ve got children or grandchildren of your own, you’d do anything to protect your little ones if they were threatened. Gorilla parents would do the same if they could. But all too often they’re powerless. Please help us to protect their precious babies too.
