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Endangered

Mountain gorilla

Gorilla beringei beringei

A mountain gorilla sitting in dense green vegetation
Image: Charles J. Sharp / Wikimedia Commons ( CC BY-SA 4.0 )
Endangered IUCN: Endangered

What it is

The mountain gorilla is a subspecies of the eastern gorilla, living at high elevation in the Virunga volcanoes and in Bwindi. IUCN downlisted it from Critically Endangered to Endangered in 2018. The eastern gorilla species as a whole remains Critically Endangered.

Range

Two adjacent highland blocks: the Virunga Massif (DRC, Rwanda, Uganda) and Bwindi–Sarambwe (Uganda/DRC). There is no other wild population.

What happened

Snares, farmland at the forest edge, and disease remain threats. Coordinated patrols and veterinary care raised the counted total to 1,063 when the 2015–16 Virunga survey was combined with the 2018 Bwindi–Sarambwe census. That is the best recent published global figure; it is still a tiny range.

When / status

Endangered now. Numbers are up because of protection, not because pressure ended.

Human role

We squeezed the forest and set snares; intensive guarding is why the count rose.

Sources

IUCN Red List (Gorilla beringei beringei, EN, 2018); IGCP/WWF census release, 1,063.