On December 22, 1956, a very special gorilla was born at the Columbus Zoo & Aquarium. Colo, a Western lowland gorilla, became the first gorilla to be born in captivity. She was born to Millie (also known as Christina) and Baron Macombo (Mac for short) who were captured by "Gorilla Bill" Said, of Bexley, Ohio, in an area of Africa then known as French Cameroon. Millie and Mac arrived in New York on December 22, 1950, during a snowstorm with no planned destination!! Mr. Said, called his friend, Columbus Zoo Superintendent Earl Davis, who agreed to take the gorillas in the emergency. Millie and Mac arrived in Columbus on January 8, 1951.
Such a small baby (she weighed just 3.75 lbs. and measured only 15 inches long) had a profound affect on the zoo world. Colo's birth enabled the Columbus Zoo to demonstrate that gorillas could have babies in captivity and to contribute the information that Millie's gestation period was about 250 days-an important fact at a time when very little was known about gorillas.
Colo is also special for several other reasons. She gave birth to Emmy, the first second-generation gorilla born in captivity and became a grandmother when Cora, the first third-generation gorilla, was captive born. For ten years, Colo's grandsons, Mosuba and Macombo II, were the only gorilla twins born in the western hemisphere! Colo is also the great grandmother of Timu, the first surviving infant gorilla conceived by artificial insemination.
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32 comments:
Wade,
she is only 2 years and a few months from living longer than Jenny. Quite remarkable how science has changed to better improve these creatures' life and lifespan.
Amy
I don't think the guy who captured Colo's parents was called "Gorilla Bill", but I'm not sure. There were a couple of Life magazine articles about this guy. By some strange coincidence the Columbus Zoo acquired three baby gorillas from him-two males and a female. The Columbus Zoo traded one male to the Basel Zoo in Switzerland, and he fathered the first gorilla born in Europe. These baby gorillas came from a French colony, I forget which one. The man who collected them got all of his baby gorillas from the same place. He was 29 at the time. I think he might have gone by the name "Jungle Jack", and Jack Hanna adopted the same name years later. It's awful to think of gorillas being slaughtered so that their babies could be sold to zoos. The French colony they came from did'nt allow the natives to kill gorillas for meat, but did allow gorillas to be captured for zoos. The Cincinnati Zoo had a "test tube" gorilla born there.
I was just rereading what you wrote, but there were three baby gorillas sold to Columbus Zoo, and the same guy sold more baby gorillas to other zoos in the United States. I think he came back from Africa-from the French Cameroon as you said (London Zoo's gorilla "Guy" came from the British Cameroon.) with as many as five baby gorillas at a time. The parents of the first gorilla raised in captivity in North America also came from a French colony via Denmark. I'm sure you know she was named Patty Cake.
I have the article right in front of me. It's "Life goes on a gorilla hunt 31:175-80 Nov. 19, 1951. It says on page 180 "On his first expedition in 1950 he brought home three gorillas, which were sold to the Columbus, Ohio zoo for $10,000." This was Bill Said. He was 26 in 1950 and had made three expeditions. He almost died of malaria. He had just recovered from gangrene caused by a gorilla bite. There's a picture on this page (180) of a little African boy with a baby gorilla named "Bobo". This expedition was to French Equatorial Africa. That's probably where Colo's parents were born. The article says he lives in Columbus, Ohio.
The article also said that movies were made on Bill Said's last trip for a film to be called "The Gorilla Man", produced by Henri Diamant Berger and Walter Futter. There was also an article in Life 42:57-8 Jan. 14, 1957 titled "First gorilla born in captivity."
The fourth gorilla born in captivity was also the first male gorilla born in the Western Hemisphere, at the National Zoo.
Anonymous,
You have been posting great information for which this blog is appreciative. I would like for you to contact me at wburck3@aol.com and introduce yourself, if you are going to continue to post as anonymous. We have a dislike for anonymous on the blog, no disrespect intended, and I like to know who is doing it, if it is to continue. Thank you.
Regards,
Wade Burck
I saw a Canadian Geographic documentary recently about white bears on Princess Royal Island on the Aboriginal Peoples' Television Network. Only the white ones are protected by law. You can shoot a black Kermode even though black Kermodes can have white cubs. I was looking at this National Geographic article from March 1964, Jambo-First gorilla raised by its mother in captivity, by Ernst M. Lang. Jambo's father Stefi suffered from gunshot wounds when he was captured. He was traded to Basel by the Columbus Zoo in Ohio. After Jambo a fourth gorilla was born in a zoo. He was Tomoka, born on Sept. 9, 1961 at the National Zoo. What I assume were Tomoka's parents, Nikumba (the male) and Moka, the female, are featured in the National gepgraphic article The Wild Animals In My Life by William M. Mann, April 1957. Captain Russell Arundel of Warrenton, Virginia, donated them to the zoo in 1955. The zoo had been without gorillas for decades. The National Zoo also had the first white rhino exhibited in the United States in 1957, a female named Lucy, after the author's wife, from Uganda.
Billy,
Thank you for the great information. I am wondering if all Kermode black bears carry the gene for white. There may be know way of knowing that, with out exhaustive DNA testing, and then marking/tagging the ones who are carriers. Which is why they may allow the hunting of the black?
Wade
I'm sure that not all of the black Kermodes are heterozygotes since only 10% are white. There must be a mathematical formula to determine what percentage of black Kermode bears carry the white gene. I'll ask my science teacher. I thought there was a Spirit Bear National Park created for the Kermodes, and I don't think you can hunt anything in a national park. Maybe that documentary predated the creation of the Spirit Bear National Park or maybe not all Kermode bears live inside the park. There's supposed to be a law against shooting white bears where the white bear in Winnipeg Zoo was captured, somewhere outside the city, but in the same province. The Spirit Bear National Park was created because a 15 year old boy campaigned for it to protect the white bears. He's a friend of Jane Goodall. There was a made for TV movie about him. The US National Zoo had the first blue bear from Alaska. After that the Detroit Zoo had one and the San Diego Zoo has bred them.
I think I just figured it out. Unless I'm mistaken if all black Kermode bears carried the white gene then at least 25% of the population would have to be white, because one quarter of all the cubs being born from black parents would have to be white, but that would'nt include cubs born from two white parents, or from one white and one black parent, so there would have to be more than 25% white individuals in the population if every black Kermode carried the white gene. I've never heard of any of them being tagged for any reason. This might mean that 30% of the black ones carry the white gene. I'll find out on Thursday. I'll get back to you on this. Thanks for the message.
Billy,
Very good, you came up with the statistical probability of white occurring. There are a number of other factors to be considered, one being what is the viability of the white gene heterozygous as well as homozygous in producing healthy offspring, not lost as neonates.
Tomorrow would have been Mohini's 50th birthday. She was the first White Tiger in the United States. We are going to have some great historic pictures provided by White Tiger Historian supreme, Mary Ann Howell. Make sure you look for them.
Wade
Wade, the boy mentioned is Simon Jackson. 1n 2000 he was named as one of Time Magazine's sixty Heroes for the Planer. He is now in his 20's, and remains the full-time volunteer Chairman and Spokesperson of the Spirit Bear Youth Coalition. I have often wondered "What if the white tigers had had a champion like this in India in the early half of the last century, along with the media we have roday?" Their story may have been much different than it has been.
Mary Ann
Mary Ann,
I suggest the Mohan appeared at a time when people looked at animals through different eyes. Look at the hundreds of animal "shows" Daktari, Wild Kingdom, Disney and many many others. Because of that time the White tigers were used for a purpose, that of fame and recognition, as was the greatest color oddity of all time, Snowflake. Note a lot of white animals now referenced in a spiritual/God like sense today, with the attitude, they are different, leave them alone. The White Tigers like Clyde Beatty because of the time/era/mentality created a sensation almost impossible to overcome. I feel that is the reason animals the "champagne lions" just haven't caught on.
Wade
I did'nt do a very good job at all. I have the formula in front of me and can't figure it out. It is the "Hardy Weinberg" formula, and it goes like this. P represts the recessive gene and Q represents the dominant gene. It is P to the power of 2 + 2(P)(Q) + Q to the power of 2 or Q squared. I don't get it and I'm too embaressed to ask the teacher to explain it to me again. I wanted to know what percentage of black bears carry the white gene, and also what percentage of white bears had two black parents, what percentage had one black and one white parent, and what percentage had two white parents. I think we have to assume that for every white bear there has to be at least two black bears which carry the white gene, or maybe four-it's siblings and its parents. I forgot to mention that the baby gorillas which the US National Zoo recieved in 1955 came from the Belgian Congo. Did you hear that horror story from a few years back (more than ten) about the Egyptian lady who brought a baby gorilla home with her on a plane? When she got back to Egypt a vet took it away from her and drowned it. That was in the International Zoo News. Did you hear about the 8 gorillas I think it was that went to a zoo in Maalaysia or Indonesia, and when their return was demanded by the country they came from they were sent to Pretoria Zoo, at the time, and they wanted to keep them. I'm not sure what happened after that. Today is Halloween so I missed Mohini's 50th birthday. Happy Halloween !
I think the white bears may only live on Princess Royal Island. They said in that documentary that the salmon are so abundant that the bears release the males and only eat the females. I was looking at a book about them and the author also mentioned a white grizzly bear cub which he saw. I've heard of white grizzlies before in British Columbia. Did you hear about that hybrid between a polar bear and a grizzly which somebody shot a while back?
Here's an article about the 8 gorillas: http://www.readingeagle.com/article.aspx?id=59409 They came from Cameroon, which demaded their return.
Billy, don't feel bad. I used to be a math teacher and taught Algebra II and trigonometry, and I don't understand what your teacher is saying either. I don't understand where the values for P and Q come from. I never understood how to calculate inbreeding coefficients either. Are you a college student? What is your major?
Mary Ann
P. S. to Billy,
The Mohini's birthday tribute is still on the blog, so don't miss it. It was actually posted late on the 29th, probably so that everyone could see it first thing in the morning on the 30th.
Mary Ann
Billy, the "Taiping Four" gorillas finally returned to their home country of Cameroon in November 2007. The complete story is at
https://secure.ippl.org/taiping-four-home.php
Mary Ann
Billy,
I understand your confusion about the "Hardy-Weinberg" formula. I think Mr. Hardy and Mr. Weinberg were being goofy or had too much time on their hands, because they sure made it harder to understand, then it really needs to be.
In an earlier comment to you, I suggested that: "There are a number of other factors to be considered, one being what is the viability of the white gene heterozygous as well as homozygous in producing healthy offspring, not lost as neonates." I was suggesting genetic drift brought about by inbreeding in a small isolated population.
The Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium doesn't work because it doesn't take into consideration genetic drift. Chance alone may eliminate certain members out of proportion to their numbers in the population. In such cases, the frequency of an allele may begin to drift toward higher or lower values. Ultimately, the allele may represent 100% of the gene pool or, just as likely, disappear from it.
Genetic drift produces evolutionary change, but there is no guarantee that the new population will be more fit than the original one.(which is what Ryan Easly was suggesting at in his comment on the Przewalski horse post) Evolution by drift is aimless, not adaptive.
A factor Hardy-Weinstein use in making their formula work is that mating in the population must be random. If individuals are choosy in their selection of mates the gene frequencies may become altered.(Darwin's sexual selection)
I would suggest that in a wild population such as the Kermode Bears nonrandom mating would be quite common. Breeding territories, pecking orders etc. can all lead to nonrandom mating. Add to this the factor of allowing the hunting of black individuals who may or may not recessively carry the white gene. In each case certain individuals do not get to make their proportionate contribution to the next generation.
In short, man up and ask your teacher again. If he/she explains those nut jobs Hardy-Weinstein in a way that you understand, you can explain it to me, so I don't have to embarrass myself by asking. LOL
I have just found it to be easier in breeding White Tigers in captivity. Initially in the case of Mohan, as you have stated there had to be too normal colored carriers to produce Mohan and his siblings, as earlier reports of White tigers don't seem to indicate that they survived to sexual maturity(genetic drift?). Initially when we mated homozygous white with heterozygous gold, it tended to produce one white for every three normal colored, with a disproportionate number of male to female offspring, similar to what has occurred with the breeding of Asian elephants in captivity. Do me a favor and ask your teacher what his/her thought's are on that.
The History of all animal capture in the old day's was a horror story, but none more despicable then the capture of the "human like primates."
Here's how one of the first Gorillas arrived in Mexico. An animal trainer was in Japan training a Chimpanzee act for a private primate center/zoo over there. They could not pay him when he was finished, so they agreed to send him 6 baby Chimpanzees as compensation. The shipment of six baby "Chimpanzee's" arrived in Mexico, and not knowing any better they had sent him "5" Chimpanzee's and "1" Gorilla. Mexican Wildlife officials didn't know anymore then the Japanese Wildlife officials at the time, so they cleared the shipment through. For many,many years that Gorilla was the only one in Mexico.
Regards,
Wade
Billy,
I had not heard about the Polar/Grizzly hybrid. Are they sure? Do you have information/photos of the bear in question. Thank you
Wade
Mary Ann,
I think Hardy-Weinstein like many "theories" will only work in a controlled environment. Again, in an uncontrolled environment, I suggest they did not value in genetic drift in their final equation.
Wade
"Grizzly-Polar Bear Hybrid Found-But What Does It Mean?" May 16, 2006 http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/05/polar-bears.html
I screwed up the address. It's http://news.national geographic.com/news/2006/05/polar-bears.html
I am convinced she gave me the wrong formula. I also think I misread her handwriting. I think I read g as q. I think the p stands for phenotype and the q is actually g for genotype, and the genotype was supposed to be 10% or .1, since .1 is 1 over 10. P was supposed to be .9 or 90%. I already suspected that it was the wrong formula, and since I could'nt figure it out I took it to my math teacher. She also said it does'nt work because it's supposed to all add up to 100. It can only work if p and g are both 5. That way it's 5x5 + 2(5x5) + 5x5. That would be 25 + 2 x 25 + 25. In other words 25% + 50% + 25% = 100%. I believe this is actually the formula which gives you the offspring of two black Kermode bears which both carry the white gene. You get 25% homozygous white, 50% heterozygous, and 25% homozygous black.
Wade: I was just looking for this after reading that newspaper article, but this was posted years ago. I was amazed and thrilled to learn that both Colo and Goma are still living !!! I can't get over it. The females seem to do a lot better than the males in the longevity department. I really hope she makes it to 60 or 70, both of them I mean. Did you write something about the first test tube gorilla born at the Cincinnati Zoo courtesy of Dr. Betsy L. Dresser and CREW I think it was ? I was watching gorillas in the wild in the Congo this morning on Jack Hanna. They didn't say which Congo it was, but it was probably Congo-Zaire. I hope you had a good Christmas. Happy New Year. Take care. Sincerely Paul
Wade: I was just looking on the internet at Colo's pedigree (That reminds me. Have you ever seen that old cartoon of the gorilla, probably from "Punch", crying and pointing an accusing finger at Darwin, saying: "That man is trying to claim my pedigree."?) and I see in the studbook that Baron Macombo was no. 22 M born in the wild in Cameroon in 1946, arrived at the Columbus Zoo on Jan. 15, 1951 and lived there until 19 Jan. 1984. His local ID number was (I guess you call that "in house" ) was 512001. Millie (Colo's mother) was 23 F -born in 1949 in the Cameroon (Like Guy the gorilla of London Zoo) and she also arrived on 15 Jan. 1951 at Columbus Zoo and lived there until 14 May 1976. Her in house number was 512002. Colo was the only offspring for either. Somewhere I read the keeper saved her with mouth to mouth resusitation. He found her abandoned on the floor of the cage with neither parent taking any interest. The British Cameroon, as opposed to the French, was appended to Nigeria for administrative purposes. The locals didn't like being a "colony of a colony". Now the two halves have been reintegrated as one country. Anyway take care. Sincerely Paul PS: I am not a robot!
Wade: I have this article right in front of me: "Life Goes On A Gorilla Hunt, A Big "Garcon" Dies Protecting His Family". It was published in Life in the Nov. 19, 1951 issue. There is also an article about a baby Indian elephant being imported to the US. The article is all about Bill Said capturing baby gorillas in French Equatorial Africa. It says the French Government protected gorillas from big game hunters, but granted permits to collectors like Bill Said, who was an American businessman. Bill Said was 26 and nearly died of malaria and had just recovered from gangrene from a gorilla bit ! As of 1951 he had made three expeditions, and on the first of these he brought back three baby gorillas (in 1950) which he sold to the Colombus Zoo for $10,000. These would have been Colo's parents and the father of Goma and Jambo, who I'm sure you know all about. They were born at the Basel Zoo in Switzerland (Goma & Jambo I mean), which was the first zoo to breed gorillas in Europe. I believe that Goma and Jambo's father had shotgun wounds in his arms when he was captured. There is a National Geographic article about the Basel Zoo gorillas. I think it was titled: "Jambo: First Gorilla To Be Raised By His Parents in Captivity". The same issue has an article about Kennedy's state funeral. Sincerely Paul PS: I don't think that Colo was the first gorilla born in captivity. I think that a place in Africa had an Eastern Lowland Gorilla born in captivity before Colo.
Wade: I was looking up Bill Said on the computer and found this: "Life Goes On A 'Gorilla Hunt', 1951": http://life.time.com/culture/on-a-gorilla-hunt-striking-photos-from-1951-life-magazine-article/#1 And I also found this article: "The Life And Death And Life Of Bobo" (about another baby gorilla captured by Bill Said who lived in the Seattle Zoo for 14 years from 1951 and is now a museum specimen.) http://www.thestranger.com/Seattle/Content?oid=4922 Jack Hanna devoted a chapter to the Colombus Zoo gorillas in his book "Monkeys On The Interstate" and he also wrote an entire book about Colo titled "Colo's Story". Take care. Sincerely Paul PS: By co-incidence King Kong is on Turner Classic Movies this afternoon. Seeing that newspaper article about Colo reminded me of how much I love gorillas.
Wade: I did some more looking and found more articles about Bobo which reference Bill Said. One is Bobo's Wikipedia article and another is this: http://durangonorthwest.blogspot.ca/2010/07/seattles-woodland-park-zoo-bobo-gorilla.html That reminds me. Andy Goldfarb, the erstwhile tiger trainer from Tiger Island at MarineWorld/AfricaUSA in Vallejo, California, and the Tiger Island at Australia's Dream World on the Gold Coast, now works at one of the zoos in Washington State. Sincerely Paul PS: Bill Said had difficulty selling Bobo because he was, in 1951, the youngest baby gorilla ever collected, and no zoo wanted him. The articles disagree about when Woodland Park Zoo acquired him, in 1951 or 1953.
Wade: I was trying to find the 1951 article from Life magazine about the Maharaja of Rewa trying to sell his white tiger "Mohan", I think for $25,000. I couldn't find it on the internet, but of course it's here at the library. Gerald Iles told me that he had a letter from the Maharaja offering the white tiger for sale in 1951. I asked for a photocopy, but he didn't know where it was, and wasn't willing to dig through his personal papers to find it. Co-incidently I did find this-the Island of Jersey has issued a postahe stamp with Jambo's image on it: http://www.colorofstamp.com/2012/10/jambo-gorilla.html I didn't know that Jersey issued it's own postage stamps. I once asked Gerald Iles whether he knew Gerald Durrell. He replied: "Know him? I've seen him naked!" Not the reply I was expecting. He told me that Gerald Durrell was the director of the aquarium at BelleVue Zoo. I also read something about Timmy the gorilla on the internet. He fathered a lot of babies, I think 13 or 17, and at the time of his death was the oldest male gorilla in North America. I read that a Japanese zoo payed $750,000 for a pair of baby gorillas smuggled out of Africa. Sincerely Paul PS: I'm sure you heard Saudi Arabia has a new king.
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