Gorillas

All you ever wanted to know

Physical Description



The coat is black. Mature males of all races develop a saddle of grey hairs across the back, hence the term "silverback" for an adult male. In adulthood, the western lowland gorilla is greyish or brownish; the lighter saddle extends to the thighs and is not sharply defined from the rest of the coat; in G. g. graueri, the fur is fairly short.

Height and Weight

There are three different types of gorillas.

(Gorilla gorilla gorilla)
height: males 1666mm (5ft 6in); arm span: 2336mm (7ft 8in); wt: 140kg (307lb)

(Gorilla gorilla beringei)
height: males 1725mm (5ft 8in); arm span: 2286mm (7ft 6in); wt: 155kg (343lb)

(Gorilla gorilla graueri)
height: males 1750mm (5ft 9in); arm span: 2590mm (8ft 6in); wt: 165kg (360lb)

Diet

Gorillas are primarily vegetarians, and large quantities of food are needed to sustain their massive bulk. They will eat large quantities of fruit when it is available, sometimes as much as the far more usually frugivorous (fruit-eating) chimpanzee. The main difference between the species is that when fruits become scarce, the far larger gorilla readilly switches to a fairly coarse diet of ground vegetation. The mountain gorilla's diet consists basically of leaves, bark, pith, coarse stems, roots, vines, bamboo, wild cherry, thistles and nettles, and occasionaly insects, snails and slugs.

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Troy Ruivenkamp and Ben Stock.
Copyright © 1998 by Colonel Hogan Productions. All rights reserved.
Revised: 25 May 1998 10:10:51 +1100.