The Mountain Gorilla Project
We were working hard to complete our tasks in Karisoke as the mountain gorilla project started to take form in the spring of 1979. Dian never carried out her threat to leave the research station, but as our intended seventeen-month tenure drew to a close, we had much to do. Starting the mountain gorilla project right away seemed quite important as well.
Amy spent her last months and then days with Group 5. The weeks of vegetation sampling offered an unexpected kind of emotional separation; the first time since our encounter with Mweza, we passed more than three field days consecutively away from her new family. She also brought Beethoven and his family to Peter Veit, a fresh researcher starting his own study on sexual cycles among group 5 ladies just after Amy ended her work.
Although Amy knew we would be living and working on the mountain gorilla project nearby in several years, it was regrettably unclear if we would be able to visit Karisoke. Every hour with the gorillas so gained significance. For how much more would Beethoven rule? Icarus seemed to be an even more unlikely successor; more inclined to quit the gang and go alone. Next in line came ZIZ, a remarkable black back with an apparently powerful group network of connections.
Certainly, gorilla leadership included social and political abilities as well. Then there was Pablo; it was difficult to picture the clown prince with his crossed eyes, twisted smile, and inclination for trouble as an adult, let alone with the mantle and authority of a silver back, but it was sad to think of him outside of the family setting, banished to the social life of a solitary man.
Amy wanted him to get a job allowing him to stay with the family. Amy could only hope that poor, shy Shinda might sometime muster bravery, much like the lion in The Wizard of Oz. And what about the predominant matrilineals? Effie, the alpha female, was in charge of the group in big measure. Would Puck, her eldest daughter, continue in such capacities? Would she team with her sister, Tuck, or compete? Alternatively, would Tuck go to another family before starting her breeding?
There were so many queries with so few answers. If we were to go from study to the more crucial MGP conservation activity, there was also too much to accomplish. There would be time to address some of our questions if we could assist in rescuing the mountain gorillas. Otherwise, such questions were essentially irrelevant.
Spending over half of his time in Kigali, Bill was establishing the groundwork for the MGP’s tourist and education components. While not working with the vegetation sampling, he watched outlying groups in camps. By then, we had also persuaded Dian to engage Craig Sholley, an old Peace Corps buddy and flatmate from Bukavu, to assist with non-study group projects and other necessary tasks for full-time researchers unable to handle.
Craig was working to habituate Nunkie, or at least his family, to the everyday presence of human observers in our last months. David Watts visited the Nunkies group for research as well. Nunkie showed every sign he would continue that way as long as he lived and was still uncomfortable in human contact.
Others in the Nunkies group were more personable. Two adult female transfers from group 4, Papoose and Petula, and their youngerlings, were the most laid back; N, Gee, and Lee were equally friendly. In a frequently turbulent household kept on edge by Nunkie’s anxious disposition, the two mother—child pairs were welcome sources of calm.
