Visiting gorillas in the wild is on many people's bucket list - things to do before you die. And gorilla tourism has been a conservation success story, bringing funds to pay for protection of the apes and their habitat - as well as creating jobs and improving the standard of living of communities in the area.
The visits are designed to minimise the impact on the gorillas - one visit per gorilla group per day, no more than 8 healthy visitors for only one hour, and keeping to a minimum of 7m distance to protect the gorillas from possible droplet infection of germs in the event of someone not showing symptoms but possibly being infectious with a cold or flu virus.
The guides are skilled in finding the best place to view the gorillas at the correct distance in their dense forest habitat, and most visitors respect the rules, but sometimes the gorillas don't! Playful infants can usually be deterred if they come too close with a cough-grunt, which gorillas use to say 'stop that/back off'. But who is going to argue with massive silverback if he decides he wants to walk right past the visiting humans?
Such moments are memorable for the lucky tourists, but in the light of the #Covid19 #pandemic #socialdistancing rules, the potential for disease transmission is very clear. Video No.47 in the #BrightenYourDay series to connect people to nature during #lockdown, raises this important issue.
Ape tourism sites in Africa and SE Asia closed to visitors in March 2020 as a precaution; rangers and vets are monitoring the apes to ensure their well-being while keeping to a 10m distance and wearing masks. But the question occupying the minds of conservationists and tour operators is, when can ape tourism be safely restarted and how can it be conducted in a way that protects these endangered species that people have travelled so far to see?
The Earthday Ape Alliance panel discussion on the topic is available here:
https://www.facebook.com/4apes/videos...
and more information on organisations working to protect apes can be found here:
www.4apes.com