Gorilla who ‘gave the world a wealth of knowledge’ dies, Ohio zoo says. ‘Truly special’
Kingo, the first western lowland gorilla to be habituated in the wild, has died, the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden in Ohio announced in a Jan. 5 Facebook post.
To be habituated, as Kingo was, means to become acclimated to the presence of humans to the point where an animal’s behavior is not influenced.
This gave scientists a chance to study Kingo and his group in their natural environment, and as a result, he “gave the world a wealth of knowledge about his species,” zoo officials said.
According to the zoo’s post, Kingo was in his late 40s and spent most of his life as a member of the Goualougo Triangle Ape Project – an organization of conservation-focused scientists responsible for the longest-running studies of chimpanzees and gorillas in the Congo Basin.
The Cincinnati Zoo has supported the project for decades, officials said.
After it fatally shot a western lowland gorilla named Harambe when a child fell into his enclosure in 2016, the Cincinnati Zoo increased its support of gorilla conservation in Central Africa, the Cincinnati Enquirer reported.
In 2018, the Enquirer accompanied officials from the Cincinnati Zoo on a trip to the Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park where they observed Kingo and his family.
“Kingo rolls onto his back and props his feet up onto the tree. He crosses his legs and closes his eyes. He seems relaxed and comfortable, even with our group being near,” Meg Vogel from the Enquirer reported, illustrating Kingo’s habituation.
“He has taught humans more about his kind than any other gorilla in the world,” the Enquirer reported.
The zoo called him a “truly special gorilla.”
No cause of death was provided in the zoo’s announcement. The life expectancy of western lowland gorillas is up to 40 years in the wild, according to the Denver Zoo.
This story was originally published January 9, 2024 at 11:16 AM with the headline "Gorilla who ‘gave the world a wealth of knowledge’ dies, Ohio zoo says. ‘Truly special’."
