Smile of The Day: Gorilla’s in Animal Kingdom
Gorillas are the next closest living relative to the human after the chimpanzee. We share about 95 to 99 percent of the DNA and nowhere is that more obvious at Disney World, where you can watch them at Animal Kingdom as they like to play, stay cool from the heat, care for their crying children and wish they too were on vacation.
Disney has a troop of lowland gorillas which can be observed from numerous viewpoints.
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| © Steven Liebman |
Species: Gorilla gorilla
Where to find at Animal Kingdom: Pangani Trail.
Where they live: Western lowland gorillas
live in lowland tropical forests in Cameroon,
the Central African Republic, the Republic of Congo, the Democratic
Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Angola and Nigeria. Eastern lowland gorillas live in tropical forests in the Democratic
Republic of the Congo. Mountain gorillas are in mountain forests up to 11,000 feet in Rwanda, Uganda,
and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Height and weight: Males grow to between 5-foot 6-inches to 5-foot 9-inches in height and weigh from 300 to 400 pounds. Females grow to 5-foot 3-inches to 5-foot 6-inches and weigh between 150 and 250 pounds.
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| A lowland gorilla in the Animal Kingdom. © Steven Liebman |
Life span: 35 years in the wild, but can live up to 50 years in captivity.
What they eat: Mountain gorillas will mostly eat foliage. Eastern lowland gorillas eat leaves and fruit. Lowland gorillas east foliage, fruit and insects – they like ants.
Talkers: At least 25 vocalizations have been classified used for finding others in their group, for discipline, warning, alarm, content and event happiness
Where the word gorilla comes from: The name was derived from the Green – Gorillai, meaning “tribe of hairy women.”
Status: The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species classifies the western lowland gorilla as critically endangered and the eastern lowland and mountain as endangered.
Famous gorillas in Disney movies: Kala, the female gorilla in “Tarzan” raises Tarzan after losing her own child.
Other Disney wildlife photos
