Lowland gorillas in Europe 2009

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It's Irala from Gaiapark who has died. She was euthanized because she suffered from an advanged stage of cancer. Very sad, she was only 24 years old and leaves a 2,5 year old daughter, Gaia.
 
Kriba said:
It's Irala from Gaiapark who has died. Very sad, she was only 24 years old and leaves a 2,5 year old daughter, Gaia.
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Very sad. Presumably her daughter will stay in the group and the others look after her?
 
Yes, according to the press release of Gaiapark they hope Loango will help her wth the loss because she`s playing a lot with him. She`s old enough to survive without her mother and there is no better place for her then with her own family (mainly her father and Loango will be important for her, Dalilah is still new and she never seemed to have a relationship with Sangha).
 
Loango will be a great playmate for her, but I hope Dalila will mother her. She has been a great mother to all her infants, so maybe she will take this role again with Gaia? I also hope silverback Makula will give her special attention. I've heard the story of Bauwi, the silverback in Arnhem, who brought up his daughter of 1 and a half when her mother died. He was very protective (in such a way the keepers had diffilculties to bottle feed her) and they slept together at night for a few years!

In this photo (made by Jean Kern in april) you can see how thin Irala had become:
 
I wanted to give a link to the flickr photo site but it's not possible with zoochat I think!?
So if you want, look for the name Jean Kern and in her latest photos you can see one of Irala.
 
Yassa said:
She`s old enough to survive without her mother and there is no better place for her then with her own family (mainly her father and Loango will be important for her, Dalilah is still new and she never seemed to have a relationship with Sangha).
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That's what I was thinking, the only other adult female is newcomer Dalila who doesn't know her, so her main protectors will probably be the two males. Maybe Irala's cancer was another reason for Apenheul to transfer an adult female into the group....?
 
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Pertinax - I don`t think they knew Irala was having terminal cancer before she died. She was sick some weeks ago, but seemed to have recovered after being given pain meds and antibiotics. It`s very good that Dalilah is there, certainly!
 
Yassa said:
Pertinax - I don`t think they knew Irala was having terminal cancer before she died. It`s very good that Dalilah is there, certainly!
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In that case Dalila's arrival was very fortunate as she will now take over Irala's role.
 
Any fresh updates?

I only found out by chance the youngest male(Nasibu) from Frankfurt has been transferred to Rotterdam as he was being bullied by their new male Viatu -as I happened to look in the Frankfurt 'Gallery'. Its now quite impossible to search all the different threads on the Forum as there are so many nowadays.

Anyone know of other recent moves/transfers/births/deaths among the European Gorillas?

In the UK new males are still awaited at both London & Twycross zoos but identities of the individuals or dates of proposed transfer have still not been publicised.
 
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Rotterdam has now confirmed to the press that he`s there, I didn`t know that the transfer would happen that soon. The only other transfer I`d heard about is Chuma/Heidelberg who is scheduled to go to Rotterdam too, in hope she will learn to raise her kids there. Although I don`t know why that should go any better in Rotterdam then in Heidelberg. She isn`t totally neglecting them, just not very careful, but hopefully that will get better by itself in time as she matures and learns from the other females.
 
Oh, forgot the death which has been announced today:
Sangha, the old female from Rostock Zoo, has died. Her partner "Assumbo" (non-breeding, handraised offspring of Jersey) is now alone.
 
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