Gorillas Under Attack in Heart of Africa
COOPER: Central Africa is home to several species of gorillas, all of which are endangered right now. Animal conservationists have their work cut out for them trying to save these gorillas. Not only is their natural habitat disappearing; the young gorillas, the baby gorillas, are regularly snatched by poachers who sell them on a thriving black market, often killing the entire family in order to snatch the baby. I met with some of those on a mission to rescue orphaned gorillas.</s>COOPER (voice-over): A baby gorilla stolen from her mother, a young victim of a chaos here in the Congo. She's just 5 or 6 months old, one of four young lowland or growler (ph) gorillas who found a temporary refugee behind the guarded walls of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund Headquarters in Goma. Like the other gorillas here, she was brutally taken from her family to be sold on the black market. Now, none of these gorillas can survive in the wild in their own. (on camera) So someone, soldiers or whomever, would just go in and grab them from their families and hope to sell them?</s>ALECIA LILLY, PRIMATE PSYCHOLOGIST: Exactly. The worst thing is they had to kill significant numbers of their family members to get them. They are like human children that are suffering from war and have seen family members killed.</s>COOPER (voice-over): Lilly is a primate psychologist who hopes one day to reintroduce these gorillas into the wild.</s>LILLY: We work with them to encourage them to bond with their caregivers, because gorillas are like babies. They're like human babies. They have to have a close bond with the caregiver when you don't have a parent or they don't survive.</s>COOPER: After several months here, these gorillas have improved dramatically. They're once again playful and naturally curious, as interested in us as we are of them.</s>LILLY: You have a gorilla...</s>COOPER (on camera): I know. I can feel the gorilla behind me. Any advice on...</s>LILLY: Just ignore her.</s>COOPER: Ignore the gorilla?</s>LILLY: Just ignore her.</s>COOPER: This is a gorilla named Utabari (ph). She's 3 1/2. She was rescued from poachers about a year ago. They stole her from her family and hoped to sell her on the black market. She's now smelling my armpit. (voice-over) It's not known how many lowland gorillas still live in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Estimates range from 7,000 to 15,000, but their population has dropped 25 percent in recent years.</s>LILLY: And so there's hunting in the forest. People are going in to bring in food for the mining camps.</s>COOPER (on camera): So the more mining there is, the great the threat?</s>LILLY: Exactly.</s>COOPER (voice-over): It's believed a gorilla like this one might fetch from $50,000 to $100,000 on the black market, sold to buyers in Asia or Eastern Europe.</s>LILLY: Someone, in fact, came here trying to sell us a baby gorilla, because we had...</s>COOPER: They tried to sell the baby gorilla to you?</s>LILLY: Yes, yes. Dian Fosse Gorilla Fund International. Because they saw our logo with the gorilla on the gate, and they thought, oh, they must like gorillas. So, we called the wildlife authorities and set up a sting, pretended we were going to buy the gorillas.</s>COOPER (voice-over): It was a small victory in a war these gorillas are not yet winning. Innocent victims of a conflict they simply know nothing about.</s>COOPER: It's not just the gorillas. Other creatures from this region need protection, as well. Illegally captured animals are ending up in pet stores in the United States and even in specialty butcher shops. Conservationists and wild expert Steve Corwin talks to us about the animals at risk, next on this special edition of 360.