Census confirms increase in population of the critically endangered Virunga mountain gorillas

The analysis of a census conducted in March and April 2010 in the Virunga Massif by an international team of conservation groups and researchers, including Martha Robbins of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, confirms a 26.3 % increase in the population of mountain gorillas, Gorilla beringei beringei, in this area over the last seven years, with a 3.7 % annual growth rate. When the census was conducted, there were a total of 480 mountain gorillas, in 36 groups along with 14 solitary silverback males in the Virunga Massif. Of the 480 mountain gorillas, 352 (73%) are habituated (349 in groups and three solitary males) and 128 are unhabituated (117 in groups and 11 solitary males). The last census conducted in the Virunga Massif was in 2003, when the population was estimated at 380 individuals.