Mountain gorillas are one of the great conservation success stories — their population has grown from under 700 to over 1,000 in recent decades. But welfare challenges for individual gorillas remain significant.
Mountain gorilla conservation demonstrates that wild animal welfare and population conservation are deeply intertwined. Each gorilla injured by a snare is a welfare emergency; each disease outbreak is both a welfare crisis and a conservation threat. The success of mountain gorilla conservation rests on intensive, sustained intervention — veterinary care, anti-poaching patrols, community development — that treats individual animal welfare as central, not peripheral. The tourism model that funds much of this work brings its own welfare risks through disease exposure; managing these trade-offs requires ongoing vigilance and science-based decision-making.