How One Zoo Helped Save the Mountain Gorilla
Finding work for poachers, teaching children to read—Columbus Zoo’s people-first philosophy in Rwanda pays off.
Imagine sitting in a clearing in Africa and having a group of endangered mountain gorillas saunter over to you. That was Charlene Jendry’s experience in Rwanda in 1992. “They were so close I could feel their breath,” says Jendry, then a gorilla keeper at Ohio’s Columbus Zoo and Aquarium, on her first trip to Karisoke Research Center, established by primatologist Dian Fossey of Gorillas in the Mist fame, inside Volcanoes National Park.
For someone who cared for zoo gorillas but had never seen them in the wild, this was the manifestation of a dream—especially since the numbers of the endangered species had dwindled to around 250.
One night the dream took a terrifying turn. Park patrolmen brought a critically wounded poacher to the camp for emergency treatment. Jendry and her campmates, none of whom were medical doctors, scrambled to provide first aid for someone who was shot while illegally hunting the very gorillas they were trying to save.
“I looked into his eyes,” she says. “He was thin. His clothes weren’t fancy. I thought, He’s not the enemy. He’s just a man trying to feed his family. There’s got to be a way to help this man and help the gorillas.”
PEOPLE FIRST Back in Ohio, Jendry told her boss, Jack Hanna, then the zoo’s director, about her concerns. At the time, Hanna was becoming well-known for his appearances with wild animals on TV shows such as Good Morning America and Late Show With David Letterman, and later became famous for his own programs, including Into the Wild and Wild Countdown. “Charlene asked if the zoo could help,” says Hanna. “I said,
‘Yes. Let’s just do something.’” Partners in Conservation (PIC), the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium’s signature conservation program, was born. Its goal: to connect partners in the U.S. (school kids, donors, volunteers, zookeepers) with partners in Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (veterinarians, park rangers, teachers, government officials) to destroy the cycle of poverty that threatens animal habitats.
25 YEARS OF HELPING In the years since its founding, PIC has sent more than $6 million to Rwanda, founding and backing a long list of projects, in collaboration with local organizations in Africa.
In addition to helping educate Rwandan children, PIC trains and hires trackers, guides and porters and supports 16 artisan cooperatives, providing job alternatives such as pottery and candle making to 400 men and women who otherwise might have resorted to poaching. The nonprofit pays the salaries of three veterinarians on the staff of Gorilla Doctors, a conservation organization that treats gorillas in their native habitats. It also provides annual medical exams for trackers, guides and porters who work with the gorillas.
IS IT WORKING?
There are still fewer than a thousand mountain gorillas left on earth (current count: 880), but their population is increasing at about 4 percent per year. The regulated tourism business, the reduction of poverty in Rwanda, as well as the veterinary care provided by Gorilla Doctors have all helped increase gorilla numbers.
Meanwhile, a new generation of animal lovers is supporting PIC with events such as the Rwandan Fête, an annual fundraiser that takes place at the zoo every September. An up-and-coming crop of young veterinarians currently studying in the new field of conservation medicine will soon be ready to sign on with Gorilla Doctors. And zoo reps continue to visit U.S. schools to share their philosophy and what PIC does in Rwanda, says Jendry. “The kids come up with their own projects, like raising money to plant a million trees at the buffer zone of the forest.” All of the efforts continue to be celebrated by their biggest cheerleader: Jack Hanna.
“This zoo hasn’t just saved a species of animal,” he says. “They’ve saved a lot of people’s lives.”