HOW DO GORILLA FATHERS TAKE CARE OF THEIR OFF SPRINGS?
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!In most cases, a dominant male Gorilla (silver back) has the mating right in the group – therefore, he is the father of all babies produced by females in the troop.
Young Gorillas stay close to their father and some times sleep in his nest. Young Gorillas some times play with their father, lean on him and climb on his back.
The father’s role is to protect young ones from any danger and in case the mother leaves the group or die, the father take full responsibility of the young ones.
In case of any danger, the father runs to rescue. If the young Gorilla is caught on the snare or trap – it can be quickly removed by the father who uses his canine teeth.
In case the dominant Silver back is overthrown by another male Gorilla, the successor can kill some Baby Gorillas in the group. He does so to speed up the fertility rates among female in the group so that he can also get babies in the short period of time. However, to date this has been observed only in the mountain gorillas of the Virunga Volcanoes.
The number of off springs produced by the female Gorillas
At the age of 10 years, the female gorillas begin giving birth to baby Gorillas. Every 4 years, the female Gorilla give birth to one off spring however, 26% of the babies die in their first year.
As most gorilla mothers have only a few offspring who survive to adulthood, gorilla numbers increase only very slowly. One mountain gorilla mother holds the record with six surviving offspring. Another female gave birth to eight babies, but only two of them reached sexual maturity. The fertility of free ranging mountain gorilla females has not been observed to decrease with old age.