The western lowland gorilla can be up to 6 feet tall when standing and can weigh up to 450 pounds.  It has a broad chest, a muscular neck and strong hands and feet.  Short, thin, gray-black to brown-black hair covers the entire body except for the face.  It has a thick ridge of bone that juts out above its eyes and has flared nostrils.

A normal, healthy gorilla may live up to 37 years.

Females become sexually mature between 6-9 years of age.  Males reach sexual maturity between 9-12 years of age.

In the wild, they eat mainly leaves and stems.  In the Zoo, they are fed a scientifically developed commercially produced leafeater chow, variety of fruits and vegetables, and oranges everyday.

Gorillas live in groups of one adult male and several females.  They play, sleep and eat within this structured family group.  The old, dominant silverback male leads the group.  He regulates what time they wake up, eat, and go to sleep.  Gorillas are most active in the morning.  They wake up just after sunrise to search for food and then they eat for several hours.  During midday, adults usually nap while the young wrestle and play games that to observers resemble games played by human children such as “Follow the Leader” and “King of the Hill.”  After their midday nap they search for food again.  Before dusk each gorilla makes its own nest bed on the ground.  Some males become solitary after they have reached adulthood.

There is no set time of the year to give birth.  A female may have between 3-6 offspring in a lifetime.  Only the silverback is allowed to mate with the adult females in his group.  The western lowland gorilla has a gestation period of 8-9 months.  The offspring are born helpless and weigh about 3-5 pounds.  They grow at twice the rate of a human baby.  

The western lowland gorilla is characterized as a quiet, peaceful and a very non-aggressive animal.  They never attack unless provoked.  However, once provoked, an adult male protecting his group will attempt to intimidate his aggressor by standing on his legs and slapping his chest with cupped hands, while roaring and screaming.  If this elaborate display is unsuccessful and the intruder persists, the male will rear his head back violently several times and drop on all fours, charging toward the intruder.  They merely pass them by and usually do not hit the intruder.  This demonstration of aggression maintains order among separate troops and reduces the possibility of injury.  Overlapping troops in the wild rarely have confrontations.

The western lowland gorilla is predominantly folivorous, feeding primarily on leaves and stems rather than fruits.  While in captivity they also prefer foods such as baked sweet potato or yam, baked banana, oranges, other raw fruits, berries, milk, eggs, dry cereal and raisins.  A silverback can eat up to 6.5 pounds of vegetation a day.  Contrary to popular belief, only captive gorillas eat meat.

Gorillas usually walk on all fours. They have a very stocky build, with a broad chest. The face, ears, hands, and feet are bare and dark. The muzzle is short and the arms are longer than the legs. In comparison to the mountain gorilla, the western lowland gorilla has a wider and larger skull.  Also, the big toe of the western lowland gorilla is spread far apart from the alignment of his other four toes compared to the alignment of the mountain gorilla. They are mostly terrestrial, though they can climb well enough. Adult males spend most of their time on the ground because of their weight.

Western lowland gorillas thrive on their secure family structure and they require companionship and attention in order to live.  It was said that the first gorillas captured died of loneliness.  However, they do not form personal friendships, nor do they desire long periods of physical contact.  They do not groom each other and appear to be irritated by grooming and bathing.

A landmark study of the ability to learn language was done in 1972 at Stanford University.  Francine (Penny) Patterson taught the female gorilla Koko how to use sign language.  Now she knows how to use several hundred different signs.

Even in antiquity, reports filtered into Mediterranean cities about large apes sighted and even captured.  Reports described gorillas as “exceedingly ferocious and always offensive in their habits” and encounters were described as “often fatal to the hunter.” 

Paul Du Chaillu, reportedly the first person known to shoot a gorilla, described the encounter as “reminding me of nothing but some hellish dream creature – a being of that hideous order, half-man half-beast . . .in some representations of the infernal regions – an ogre killed at six yards range.” 

The Western lowland gorilla has no known enemies except for humans.  Humans have threatened their livelihood for over a century and have caused them to become endangered throughout the degradation of the tropical rainforest, illegal hunting for meat, big game hunting and subsequent sale of live young through the over collection by zoos and research institutions.  Many gorillas have been shot and killed in the name of self-defense because if provoked long enough gorillas will charge toward an attacker in order to scare them away.  However, they charge to intimidate, not to injure and rarely make actual contact with one another under these circumstances.  Their last chance for survival may be a few gorilla sanctuaries in Africa, zoos, and other captive environments in other parts of the world.

The four males currently on exhibit - Quito, Lash, Rumplestiltskin and Ben – are the first western lowland gorillas for which we have any records.  They began arriving in February 1998.