Friday, October 14, 2011

The Bamboo Season

With the onset of Rwanda’s biannual rains, it is time for the bamboo season in Volcanoes National Park, when many of the mountain gorilla groups monitored by the Fossey Fund’s Karisoke™ Research Center make their way down to the “bamboo belt” near the park’s border. The Bwenge, Titus, Ugenda, Kuryama, Ntambara and Urugamba groups have already been observed at lower altitudes in the park, tempted by the prospect of tasty bamboo shoots.
When the groups of gorillas converge on the bamboo zone at the border, we are bound to see two things: an increase in interactions between groups and gorillas leaving their protected forests to venture out into the surrounding farmland....

J Shouse Photojournalism on Facebook!