How to Habituate a Mountain Gorilla-Uganda Safari
How to Habituate a Mountain Gorilla-Uganda Safari
“Habituating gorillas to human presence is a painstakingly slow process,” the guide whispered as the excitement of the charge faded away. “At first we see them only very fleetingly from a distance. The rangers have to act like gorillas. They pick leaves and pretend to eat them. This is so that the gorillas get interested and come and see what is happening. It is done every day for about a year and slowly, slowly the distance between rangers and gorillas reduces.
Gorilla tours/Gorilla safaris/Gorilla trekking safari/Gorilla trip
This is as the gorillas get more used to the presence of the rangers. After a year, we start to allow tourists to visit. This is done so that the gorillas get used to new faces, white skin and cameras. After two years, they are usually close to properly habituated and they allow people to approach very close. This might sound like a long time But compared to chimpanzees, which can take ten years to habituate, it’s a very fast process.”
What is a Gorilla Habituation Experience?
In the standard Uganda gorilla trekking tours, the apes have been receiving human visitors for years, and they’re so well habituated to our presence that they literally regard you as just another forest object. This means that they will often look right through you and barge you out of the way if you don’t move fast enough when they approach. At times, the experience can almost feel a little too ‘zoo-like’. A gorilla habituation experience is different.
How to Habituate a Mountain Gorilla-Uganda Safari
The gorillas, visitors are taken to see, are normally only halfway through the habituation process, and some members of the group will very much keep their distance. So this begs the question. Why sign up for it? Well, two big reasons stand out. Firstly, unlike on a standard gorilla visit, where your time with the apes is also limited to one hour, you get four hours with the gorillas. Secondly, up to eight tourists (plus guides and rangers) are permitted to visit each gorilla group in a normal gorilla watching visit, but on a habituation experience, only four tourists are allowed. This also provides a more intimate experience.
Whether you’re seeing fully habituated gorillas or those in the gorilla habituation experience, no gorilla tracking experience is ever the same. With so many day-to-day variables involved it’s very hard to compare like for like. One day the gorillas could be sleepy and also lazy, but the next day that same group could be excited and also active. One day they are hiding in dense bush. And on another day they are be playing in a clear forest glade.
Keeping all these day-to-day variables in mind, how does the gorilla habituation experience compare to a standard gorilla viewing? Well, I can only answer from my own personal perspective. When I signed up for the gorilla habituation safari, I was also concerned that the gorillas wouldn’t be very habituated at all and that I’d only have distant, fleeting glimpses of them.
How to Habituate a Mountain Gorilla
As it turned out, I needn’t have worried. I was taken to see a group that was about halfway through the habituation process. However, the group actually contained two gorillas. One female and the dominant silverback male – that had come from fully habituated groups. The fact that these two adult gorillas were completely unfazed by the presence of people. This had given the rest of the group a little more human confidence.
In many respects the viewings were as close and personal as they are with a fully habituated group. On top of that, I was also permitted to spend about half-a-day in the company of the gorillas. I was sharing them with only two other tourists. This was hands down the best gorilla viewing I have ever had. (and I’ve been lucky enough to see wild mountain. Also, and lowland gorillas a number of times in different countries), says Stuart Butler.
Getting a Gorilla Habituation Permit
Currently, the only place where tourist permits are available for a gorilla habituation experience is in Bwindi Impenetrable National Park in southwest Uganda. Permits cost US$1500 per person. This is undoubtedly very expensive. But when you consider that Rwanda charges the same just for a standard gorilla visit permit, it starts to also sound more financially worthwhile.
Book a gorilla habituation safari in Uganda:
