Gorillas really are amazing creatures. Everyone knows that evolutionally, they’re close to humans. But this story makes you realize just how similar to us they are.

Poachers often set snares in Rwanda’s Volcanoes National Park for bushmeat. These traps are designed to capture animals like antelope. But gorillas also often get caught up in them.

Older gorillas are often able to free themselves. But younger ones can get hurt and sometimes killed in the traps.

However, the gorillas have begun protecting their young from these traps.

One day, a researcher at the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund Karisoke Research Center in Rwanda noted that a snare had ended up killing a young mountain gorilla. The gorilla, named Ngwino, tried to free herself, but the rope from the snare cut into her leg and caused gangrene.

Sadly, there was nothing unusual about that news. But what the deceased gorilla’s clan did next was unique.

The researcher saw young gorillas scouring the area for snare traps. And whenever they found a snare, the gorillas would sabotage it. They did this so that no other young family members would get hurt.

“This is absolutely the first time that we’ve seen juveniles doing that […] I don’t know of any other reports in the world of juveniles destroying snares.” – Veronica Vecellio.

Two of the gorillas, in particular, were seen finding many of the traps and destroying them. It isn’t easy to spot the snares. But it appears that these two have become snare destroying experts.

The researchers themselves often destroy as many snares as possible. But they’ve discovered that the gorillas are getting incredibly good at removing the snares. In fact, once, a tracker called John Ndayambaje approached a snare near the gorilla clan. But a silverback called Vubu warned him off. The tracker then saw the two young gorillas in the clan disable the snare themselves.

The way that the gorillas disable the snares is by breaking the branches that the poachers have bent and attached a noose to. After the branch is broken, the gorillas remove the noose.

This really shows just how smart gorillas are and how terrible humans can be. The animals were facing a new threat to their survival. Instead of falling into the traps continually or just avoiding dangerous areas, they have begun actively tackling the problem head-on. Just like humans, when faced with a threat, the gorillas have worked to disable the threat.

Mountain gorillas are endangered. However, they have managed to survive despite the terrible efforts of humans to wipe them out.

Mountain gorillas live in the wild in two places in Africa. One group is in the Virunga Mountains along the borders of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Uganda. The other group lives in the Bwindi National Park in Uganda.

Today, there are more than 1,000 mountain gorillas living in the wild. This is a worryingly small number. But at one point, the scientific community thought that the animals would be extinct by the end of the 20th century.

Hopefully, the mountain gorillas will continue to discover ways to survive in their natural habitat indefinitely.

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Source: WWF, Bored Panda