Houston Zoo Primate Supervisor Lynn Killam went to Rwanda with in November to visit the national parks there and had remarkable experiences. This is the second in the series. If you haven’t read the first part, CLICK HERE.
Our next expedition took us to the southwestern sector of the country, where tea is grown on huge plantations. At the very edge of one of these pristine tea fields is the crown jewel of Rwanda: Nyungwe Forest, the largest tract of montane forest in Central Africa. For the primatologist, this place is truly a jackpot, as 13 species of primate reside here, and for the birder, 275 species await discovery.
Once settled in, the first long trek was at hand — to see chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii). A guide was assigned to us, and we took off down a slippery, muddy pathway to find the trackers, who are employed by the government to follow and protect a habituated group of chimps.
We stumbled through the underbrush and clinging vines to the chimp site, thoroughly exhausted after little more than an hour, and saw that our guide was pointing upwards. We all followed the direction of his finger and our gaze was met by a female chimpanzee and her juvenile offspring, calmly eating fruit high up in the canopy. Squinting in the effort to find them in the sunlit foliage, we gasped and smiled as we realized we were actually seeing wild chimpanzees!
A chimpanzee that we spotted in the trees
For the next hour, we watched in awe as a small group foraged on purple berries, filling up their mouths to the brim with the fruit, and mashing it to release the juices and pulp, then spitting the residue out to produce what is commonly called “chimp chews” or “wadges”. We later rather delightedly found these somewhat disgusting breakfast remnants along our pathway on the long way back to our lodge. Removing mud-soaked clothes and getting into a hot tub to recover from the strenuous trek was a luxurious joy!
That afternoon, after a reviving meal, we went on a thankfully much shorter hike just outside the tea plantation to view a nearby troop of Angolan Colobus Monkeys (Colobus angolensis ruwenzorii).
The striking Angolan Colobus Monkey
These astonishing looking primates were all assembled at the edge of the forest and paid no attention to their human visitors whatsoever as they fed from the salad bowl that is their forest home. These leaf eating monkeys were all preoccupied with feeding on lichens encrusting the tree branches and mosses hanging from them. They leapt from one soft, tangled mass of leaves to another, in search of the most delectable greens. Youngsters played with each other and a squealing, protesting infant was handed from one female to another, in the “aunting” tradition of Colobine monkeys, whereby the related females share maternal duties. Again, after only one hour, we were reluctantly convinced to leave by our guide.
Our trek back to the lodge was plodding and painful, and even with a shortcut it took us nearly 2 hours to hike back!
Written by Lynn Killam
Photos by Barbara Lester
Please keep watch right here on the Houston Zoo blog for the next in Lynn’s series!
