New king on the mountain: Titus’s son, Kuryama, is now the leader of the “Beetsme” group.

When the phone rang and I heard someone from The Gorilla Fund on the line, I got all excited. I knew it would be an update about Titus, the gorilla featured in The Gorilla King, a Nature show that I worked on that aired last April (2008).

When last we left him, Titus’s son, Kuryama, had gained alliance and support from most of the gorillas in Titus’s group. Kuryama became their leader and left with them, leaving the massive silverback to form his own group from those that remained loyal to him.

Perhaps it was Titus’s age that helped him decide to reunite with Kuryama’s group. It is harder and harder for Titus to protect and lead his group.  At 33 years old, he is considered an old man by gorilla standards.

The amazing thing is that Titus, who lead the “Beetsme” group for 15 years, decided to be second in command to his son, Kuryama.

Family is such a strong and important part of gorilla life, I am happy to see that even with his new role, Titus is still garnering respect and attention from all in Kuryama’s group as well.

To learn more, read the story at the Gorilla Fund Web site. 

- Jill Clarke
NATURE producer 

Before Dian Fossey’s landmark research with the mountain gorillas of Rwanda, people imagined that gorillas were dangerous beasts that lurked in the forest and would attack humans that ventured into their realm. But decades of research, tracking gorillas day by day through the misty forests of the Virunga Mountains, has shown that they are basically gentle creatures with individual personalities and rich social lives. In fact, if you could spend time with the gorillas in their verdant mountainside habitat, you might be surprised to find that their family dynamics and political maneuvers are quite complex — in some ways, almost “human.”

A gorilla family is usually comprised of three to thirty individuals, though in late 2006, Karisoke researchers in the Virungas were monitoring one group that had reached sixty-five individuals. Like Titus’s family, a typical group is led by one silverback — a mature male, so-named for the graying hair on his back — who serves as the family’s protector and main decision-maker. He is usually joined by one subordinate silverback that will help defend the group, several adult females, and a combination of younger males (”blackbacks”), juveniles and infants. Gorillas communicate in a variety of ways, including facial expressions, sounds, postures and gestures. They have been known to make at least 22 distinct sounds to communicate different feelings, from playful chuckling to frightened screams — even belches of contentment. Gorillas are affectionate creatures. In February of 2008, Karisoke researchers discovered that an adult female had been injured in an encounter with a silverback. After the injury, a younger female stayed close by the gorilla’s side, behavior that Veronica Vecellio, featured in The Gorilla King, says is evidence of the young gorilla’s kind personality. When things are calmer, gorillas often greet each other by touching their noses together, and will sometimes even give a reassuring embrace.

The females align themselves with their leader, openly soliciting mating. It is the silverback’s job to keep the group safe from outsiders, but it pays to be in his good graces. In moments of danger, he will beat his chest and intimidate or fight with an attacker while the rest of the family flees to safety. If a conflict erupts within the group, the silverback mediates between fighting family members. The silverback also knows where to find the best food sources throughout the seasons, and he leads the group in their daily travels, up to about half a mile each day. Each evening, mountain gorillas settle to dine on nettles, bamboo, and other plants. An occasional grub or colony of ants spices up the menu. Sometimes, the silverback will start to sing if he finds a particularly lush patch of greenery. As the family gathers round, others may join in the chorus. As night draws near, the adults will make a nest of flattened foliage for sleeping. Then, each morning, the group sets off again for a new home and new food source.

Up in the higher elevations of the Virunga volcanoes, Titus’s family huddles in the cool air.

When the afternoon comes, however, it’s family time. The adults build day nests and leisurely graze and rest together while the youngsters play. Moments like these reveal the tender bonds that form in gorilla families, especially between mothers and children. A newborn gorilla baby will form a very close relationship to its mother — rarely straying more than a few steps from her side for the next three to four years. Baby gorillas learn by imitating, much like human children, though gorilla babies develop more quickly. They can walk at about six months old, and after about a year and a half, a young gorilla can follow its mother on foot for short distances. Before long, the youngster will be exploring, climbing trees, play-fighting, and even walking hand-in-hand through the forest with the group’s other infants.

Internal relations are not always so smooth, however. As Titus’s reign in The Gorilla King shows, an aging silverback will sometimes face a challenge from an aggressive, younger silverback in his own group. The balance of power may shift slowly over time, until the up-and-coming male has convinced the clan that he is the one with the strength to lead. A new silverback leader is likely to kill the infants in the group, so the nursing females will stop lactating and their reproductive cycles will restart. Murdering the young of other males thus makes it possible for the new silverback to sire children of his own.

His violence and posturing may earn him respect, but don’t assume that the silverback is always in control. Females have been known to go behind the leader’s back to mate with other males, confusing them into thinking that the babies might be their own — and earning their protection in case of danger. But overall power, in part, comes from the support of the females in a group. If a leader cannot keep their respect, they will leave. The females also wield some power in the event that a silverback leader dies. If another silverback attempts a takeover but the females don’t approve, they may abandon him and seek another male to take care of them.

High on the Virunga volcanoes is an entire social world that humans still strive to fully understand. A closer look at the lives of the mountain gorillas shows that they are not monsters at all but complex creatures with families, affections, and politics of their own.

While his prolific mating is a clear sign of the king’s success, this unique gorilla’s extensive family tree grew out of tragic circumstances.

At first, daily life for Titus was routine. He was a member of a stable group of happy individuals. The group even surprisingly allowed a young outsider to join them, which is very unusual among gorilla groups. Normally they will not tolerate outsiders. Tragedy struck when Titus’s father, “Uncle Bert,” was murdered by poachers. The young outsider, Beetsme, who had become close with Titus, could sense an opportunity. He exhibited classic takeover behavior and grew aggressive toward the females of the group. In a skirmish with Titus’s mother, “Flossie,” Beetsme struck her infant, killing it. Flossie and Cleo, Titus’s sister, subsequently deserted the group, leaving young Titus orphaned and abandoned.

For a time, Titus, Beetsme, and the other remaining young males formed a group of their own. But when another group disbanded, females from that group joined them, and Beetsme became the leader of the new family group. He drove away every other male, except for Titus, who he allowed to stay, possibly to help keep the group safe from outsiders. He had succeeded in eliminating competitors for what were now his females — or so he thought.

This image shows some of the offspring Titus is known to have sired. Images are not available of all of them, as some may have died or left the area. Click to enlarge.

Beetsme was unaware that Papoose, the dominant female, was growing rather fond of his young companion, Titus. Even researcher Martha Robbins agreed with Papoose’s judgment, joking in The Gorilla King that in her own opinion Titus was the more handsome of the two. Behind Beetsme’s back, Papoose was mating with Titus. It was the beginning of an impressive dynasty.

In the course of her research, Robbins began a series of paternity tests to see who was having the most reproductive success. The tests proved that Titus had fathered several babies with Papoose, among them, Pasika, Bukima, Turakora, and Kuryama (the male whose challenges to Titus’s reign are documented in The Gorilla King).

All told, researchers at Karisoke believe that Titus has sired over 20 babies, though they are still completing DNA tests to make sure. They do know beyond a doubt, however, that he has fathered at least 13 — still more than any other known mountain gorilla.

Not too bad for a gorilla who had such enormous odds to overcome.

For decades after people first tried to keep gorillas in captivity, any gorilla’s path from the forest to the zoo was soaked in blood. As NATURE’s Snowflake: The White Gorilla shows, the animals had to be captured in the wild when they were young — before they grew too big and powerful to handle. Hunters would first have to kill the baby’s parents and sometimes its entire family.

This gruesome situation began to change in 1956 when a zoo in Columbus, Ohio became home to the first gorilla ever born and raised in captivity. Her name is Colo, and “she almost didn’t make it,” says Jeffrey Lyttle, author of Gorillas In Our Midst, a book about the Columbus Zoo gorillas.

“At the time, the zookeepers knew that Colo’s [mother] was pregnant, but nobody knew the gestation period of a gorilla,” Lyttle recalls. “They thought it was nine months, like humans, but it turns out it is closer to eight and a half months. So they weren’t expecting the birth. A vet named Warren Thomas was making his morning rounds when he discovered Colo, in her amniotic sack, lying on the concrete floor of her mother’s cage. He reached in, tore open the sack, and began giving Colo mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.”

Luckily, the little gorilla lived. “It was huge national news,” says Lyttle. But zookeepers believed that Colo’s mother wasn’t up to the task of raising her baby. They were probably right, since many captive gorillas never had a chance to learn parenting skills from their own parents in the wild. “So Columbus built a special nursery for her,” Lyttle explains. “Zoo visitation went through the roof. They would dress Colo up for the holidays — put her in an Easter bonnet and fancy dresses. Some people say she still likes to wear her food dish as a hat because she spent so much of her infancy wearing hats.”

A dozen years later, Colo gave birth to her first offspring, and she has since had several more; in NATURE’s Snowflake, viewers get to meet Dotty, Colo’s great-granddaughter.

Much has changed in the years between Colo’s and Dotty’s births. More and more, captive gorilla babies are being raised by their own mothers as zookeepers learn how to re-create more natural conditions. In cases where the mother still may not be able to handle the job, they have developed sophisticated surrogate parenting programs, where the babies spend a short time with human caregivers and then are quickly given to other gorillas to raise.

In Snowflake, Dotty meets her surrogate parents for the first time. It’s a tense moment — some surrogate parents won’t accept and care for their new offspring. Luckily, Dotty was accepted and is doing fine.

“Surrogacy has been extremely successful,” says Lyttle. “It was risky at first. These are very valuable animals, and there were these ideas that introducing an infant into a troop [a clan-like group of gorillas] could provoke violence. But the keepers believed surrogacy would work, and it has. It really shows how much our ignorance about gorilla social life has changed.”

Indeed, surrogacy has helped end much of the trade in wild gorillas. Today, about half of all gorillas that live in captivity are like Dotty — born and raised in a zoo, not torn from their families in the wild.

Producer: Ronnie Godeanu

Design Director: Sabina Daley

Designer: Lenny Drozner

Writer: David Malakoff

Animation: Lenny Drozner, Radik Shvarts

Page Building: Brian Santalone

Production Artists: Leela Corman, Meiza Fleitas

Production Assistant: Peter Tierney

Technical Director: Brian Lee

Scientific Consultant: Gianna Savoie

Thirteen Online is a production of Thirteen/WNET New York’s Kravis Multimedia Education Center in New York City. Anthony Chapman, Director of Interactive & Broadband. Carmen DiRienzo, Vice President and Managing Director, Corporate Affairs.

© 2001 Thirteen/WNET New York

All Rights Reserved

About the Writer

David Malakoff is a journalist covering research discoveries and the politics of science for SCIENCE MAGAZINE in Washington, D.C. His writing has appeared in a wide range of venues, including THE ECONOMIST, THE WASHINGTON POST, and ABCNews.com. He lives with his wife and three children — NATURE lovers all — in Alexandria, Virginia.

Television Credits:

A co-production of Green Umbrella Ltd., Thirteen/WNET New York, Trebitsch Produktion International GmbH, and Devillier Donegan Enterprises

Funder Credits

Funding for the TV series NATURE is made possible in part by Park Foundation. Major corporate support is provided by Canon U.S.A., Inc., Ford Motor Company, and TIAA-CREF. Additional support is provided by the nation’s public television stations.

In a mountain rainforest on the island of Trinidad, at the narrow entrance to a deep and noxious cave, TRIUMPH OF LIFE series producer Nick Upton and cameraman Jim ClarBatse prepare for an unusual challenge. Several hundred thousand bats, including vampire bats, live in the cave, along with millions of other creatures. When darkness comes, the bats will rush to fill the night sky. Upton’s goal is to film this fantastic exodus from inside the cave. The results are on view in the six-part NATURE series TRIUMPH OF LIFE.

From Nick Upton’s Diary:

“This is our sixth day at the cave. With luck, it will be our last and we can move on. I won’t miss lugging the equipment up that mountain terrain, and then lowering it piece by piece on a rope down a 30-foot shaft into the caveBats. But that isn’t the worst of it. When Jim and I need to clear our access ladder for a scene, we’ve had to enter the cave through the squeeze hole — an incredibly narrow passage that you have to wriggle through feet first. It bends in the middle and ends in a four-foot drop into piles of bat guano. It’s no joke, especially for a six-foot-three, 210-pounder like me. I’ve come close to getting stuck more than once. And all the while you’re maneuvering, bats are fluttering near your face and the cockroaches are skittering along the walls. We did this as many as six times some nights. Once, when I was about halfway through the squeeze-hole by myself, I knocked out the battery of my head-lamp and was stranded in total darkness. It took several jittery minutes to reinsert the battery and reconnect its wires by touch. Of course, I knew Jim would look for me eventually, but being wedged in solid rock with all that life teeming around me in the darkness made those minutes feel like hours.”

Night of the Guano

“The darkness, however, is by no means the only threatening aspect of this environment. The extreme heat and humidity are stifling, and the air is acrid with gases rising off the huge heaps of guano. Inhaling fungal spores in the air can cause a serious disease called histoplasmosis, so we wore face masks all the time. As for the creatures that share the cave with the bats, most are harmless, even the creepy-looking whip scorpions. But it’s essential to watch out for the poisonous snakes. The intense heat means that protective clothing is out, and one night I was bitten by a blood-sucking bug that sometimes carries a debilitating disease. But I managed to dislodge it before it could really go to work.

“Despite all the creatures in the cave and the dangers of navigating it, one thing above all else stands out as the most objectionable aspect of this underground environment — it seethes with millions of four-inch cockroaches. They live on the bat droppings and sometimes the ground actually seems to pulsate with them. In truth, the roaches aren’t really a physical danger, but they can be a bit disconcerting when they fly into you in the dark or crawl under your shirt.”

Rescuing the Pups

“Perhaps this will surprise some viewers, but the bats pose no danger either. BatsAnd that’s just as well, because in a few moments, Jim and I and a camera will be positioned between the cave’s exit and the third of a million bats that will fly past us at full speed. This should allow us to capture an amazing spectacle. So far, we’ve recorded some truly intimate aspects of bat behavior, such as feeding, breeding, and the dramatic rescuing of bat pups that fall from the roof of the cave by ‘baby-sitter’ bats. Until now, this fascinating behavior had been witnessed only by a handful of researchers. Capturing these scenes required a subtle touch. We used an infrared filming system to avoid disturbing the bats, and spent five long days in the cave, working in total darkness most of the time.

caption goes here

“However, the bats aren’t nearly so sensitive leaving the cave, and so for this scene we’ll use normal filming lights, powered by a large generator, which, by the way, we and our guide had to drag up the mountain, nearly killing ourselves.”

Exodus

“The sun has gone down, and already we can hear thousands of bats flitting around in a deeper portion of the cave, calling loudly. The charge is about to begin, and Jim and I have done all we can to prepare ourselves. And here they come, directly towards us, whizzing by our faces by the hundreds at first, then quickly by the thousands, the tens of thousands, the hundreds of thousands — pouring out into the night through the narrow exit. On and on it goes, for 40 heart-stopping minutes. But it seems like only five minutes to us, as we frantically switch lenses, change camera positions, adjust the lights, and record the eerie sounds.

“This is our chance to record this moment forever. It has been one of the most amazing experiences of my life — an entire civilization of bats swooping past us just inches away. And what an unforgettable demonstration of the astounding accuracy of their sonar abilities, for not one bat ever struck us! For the unique achievement inside that cave, I have the greatest admiration for my long-suffering cameraman. Jim seemed totally unfazed by the conditions; but then, he’s one of the real ‘hard men’ of wildlife filmmaking. As for me, despite all the hard work and discomfort, I find myself lookingBat forward to returning here some day. There is much more to film and to learn. Bats are remarkable animals, far more intelligent and sociable than people realize. I feel privileged to be in their strange, underground world and to have the opportunity to share the experience with the viewers of NATURE.”

A Powerful Organ Hearts, eyes, flippers and wings — evolution has forged many remarkable body structures. But none is more amazing than the brain, that bundle of nerve cells that allows us to sense our surroundings, sort out information, and make decisions. Indeed, the great importance of BRAIN POWER to evolution is the subject of this week’s installment of NATURE’s TRIUMPH OF LIFE series.

Brains are not essential to life. Many organisms, from algae to jellyfish, get along just fine without a central information-processing center. But there is no question that a brain gives many animals an edge. For in the struggle for survival, brawn often gives way to a brain that can outthink a competitor.

Not all brains are equal, however. Some brains consist of just a few hundred or few thousand cells, just enough to sense changes in light or temperature, or to sniff out important smells. Others, like ours, contain billions of cells, enabling everything from language to tool-making.

But simple is often more than enough to assure an animal’s survival. A flatworm’s basic brain, for instance, helps it sniff out earthworms, making the worm a lethal hunter. And while a honeybee’s brain is bigger than a flatworm’s, it is still not all that complex. Nonetheless, the bee is capable of amazing feats of memory, as BRAIN POWER shows.

In their short two-month lives, worker bees must learn to remember where nectar-producing flowers are located in relation to the hive, and exactly what time of day they produce the sweet liquid. The life-or-death memorization is aided by an amazing change in the bee’s brain: as it needs to retain more information, the brain grows, adding tens of thousands of cells on an as-needed basis! Once, scientists believed that such brain-changing abilities were limited to just a few animals. In recent years, however, evidence has shown that many animals’ brains are more flexible than once thought possible. Some birds, for instance, grow new brain tissue during the breeding season — perhaps to sing more complex songs — then lose the cells once mating is over. Other bird brains grow or shrink for migration.

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Watch this clip to find out how a bee’s brain can sense changes in time.

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Researchers have even had to rethink their views of the human brain. Once, they believed that our brains grew only during childhood. It was believed that once we reached adulthood, we only lost — and never gained — brain cells. But surprising new studies show that we continue to add some kinds of brain cells throughout life. And other research shows that although our brains are usually very specialized, with particular parts responsible for certain activities, the human brain can sometimes reorganize itself. People who have lost speech or coordination due to stroke or brain injuries, for instance, can sometimes regain those abilities by “training” a new part of the brain to take over. Such findings have raised new hopes for treating serious brain injuries and birth defects.

Scientists, however, are still puzzling over the question of why we evolved such big, complex brains. Clearly, they are a big help in outsmarting predators and finding food. But our brains may also be a product of social pressures. We expend enormous energy in forging complex social relationships and alliances, whether within a family, among neighbors, or among nations. Making these relationships work requires creative thinking, constant problem-solving, and the ability to understand how another person is thinking — all tasks that call for some serious brain power. Over time, evolution favored those individuals with the best social and survival skills.

For the moment, our brains have made us the most influential species on earth. Our tool-making skills have allowed us to reconstruct the landscape, building cities and plowing fields where forests and grasslands once reigned. We’ve figured out how to make the desert bloom, pumping water from far below the earth to quench our thirsts. And, unintentionally, we may even be altering the planet’s climate by burning massive quantities of coal, oil, and wood that produce carbon dioxide and other global warming gases.

It remains to be seen, however, whether even our brainpower will help us avoid the fate of so many other species in Earth’s history: extinction.

Gene Swapping Variety is indeed the spice of life. That is the message of THE MATING GAME, Part 2 of NATURE’s six-part TRIUMPH OF LIFE series. It takes a passionate look at the evolution of sex, which allows a species to pass its genes along from generation to generation.

Sex is everywhere. Bees do it and birds do it — and so do lizards and bacteria. In its simplest form, sex is the process of mixing genes from two parents into a new offspring. This gene swapping ensures that each generation is just a bit different from the one that came before, and that each individual is a bit different from others.

This variation gives the species a better chance of surviving changing conditions. A few individuals, for instance, might be able to survive a deadly new virus and carry on the species, while the rest die. Eventually, the virus-resistant newcomers might even evolve into a new species.

Just because sex is everywhere, however, doesn’t mean that all organisms do it the same way. Evolution has produced virtually every conceivable combination of mating behaviors, as THE MATING GAME shows.

A male’s bird’s bright plumage is more than just eye-catching. Colors can also tell a potential mate about the man’s health a vigor.

In some species, for instance, the males compete with each other for the chance to mate with females. But in others, it is the females who vie to be the more attractive mate. Sometimes, the female is bigger, in order to hold more eggs. But in others, such as humans, the male is typically a bit larger. In some species, the females do most of the hard labor of child rearing; in others, it is the male that does all the work. And in some species, such as many marine fish, the kids are left to fend for themselves.

Other animals have evolved especially creative approaches to sex. Some female lizards, for instance, don’t need males to reproduce. Each female can lay eggs that produce “clones,” or genetically identical baby lizards. While cloning allows the species to reproduce under very harsh environmental conditions, it also leaves the identical offspring much more vulnerable to disease or environmental changes.

Some marine worms have taken another approach — each individual is both male and female. These “hermaphrodites” have the option of being mother or father. And a few fish take the idea in another direction. They can change sexes depending on circumstances, spending part of their lives as males and part as females.

It all goes to show that sex is never simple. But it has proven an essential engine for the evolution of life on Earth.

Choreographed Cooperation Life may be a contest in which only the fittest individuals survive, but cooperation has also played a key role in evolution. WINNING TEAMS takes a close look at the alliances that animals have forged — with others of their own kind and very different organisms — in a bid to stay alive. In fact, teamwork occurs everywhere, from flocks of birds and herds of wildebeest to colonies of ants and termites.

For some animals, the motivation for joining together is defense. A flapping, pirouetting flock of birds, for instance, can make it harder for a hungry falcon to home in on a single victim. Similarly, a thundering, shifting herd of wildebeest can be an intimidating — and confusing — sight to a hungry lion. And in both cases, there are more eyes to keep on the lookout for attackers. There is, indeed, safety in numbers.

Not surprisingly, some predators have responded to herding defenses with teamwork of their own. Feeding dolphins, for instance, have been known to work together to herd schools of fish toward the surface, where the seafood meal finds it harder to hide. Lions also team up to spring the trap on wildebeest, with several lionesses needed to topple one of the big beasts. And early human hunters, of course, learned to work together to hunt creatures, such as woolly mammoths, that were many times their size.

In many insect societies, every individual in a hive or colony can be the offspring of a single queen, making them all siblings that share genes.

Other times, however, the benefits of teamwork are less obvious. Animals that feed together, for instance, can spread out and cover more territory, making it more likely that one will hit a mother lode of food. The strange Damaraland mole rats featured on WINNING TEAMS, for example, drill through the soil as a team of up to 40 family members, looking for the roots and tubers that fill their empty stomachs. For years, researchers were unaware of this choreographed cooperation, since the underground-living rats are quite secretive.

Similarly, the link between some plants and the birds that eat their seeds took years for researchers to recognize. These plants, which include some wild rose bushes, produce tough berries that, if dropped on the ground, won’t sprout. But if the same seed is eaten by a bird, and is then etched and cleaned by the bird’s stomach acids and excreted onto the ground, it is ready to germinate. Similarly, some flowers can be pollinated only by a particular insect. The arrangements have led some scientists to ponder who is getting the better deal: Are the birds and insects slaves to the plant, or is it the other way around? The answer lies in their “symbiotic” relationship — meaning both organisms benefit mutually from the other.

Often overlooked is the important role that microscopic organisms play in the lives of many plants and animals. Some of these “symbiotic” bacteria live on the roots of plants, helping them draw nutrients from the soil. Others reside in the stomachs and intestines of everything from termites to humans, helping to digest food and remove toxins.

Without us, our stomach bacteria would die. But without the bacteria, we might fall prey to illness. It’s a classic case of the evolutionary ties that bind all life together in the drive to build highly competitive — and ultimately winning — teams.