Watching a gorilla give birth: A rare incident narrated by a Bwindi Park ranger guide

A Uganda Park Ranger Guide’s short narrative about seeing gorillas give birth in Bwindi National Park.

Gorilla tracking is one of the most popular wildlife safari activity in Uganda. Uganda is home to over half of the world’s remaining mountain gorillas and like humans these gorillas live in groups also referred to as Families. A family is headed by the silverback and it obviously has female gorillas that give birth often. However, finding a wild gorilla giving birth is a very rare incident at  Since she began leading visitors into the jungles to look for gorillas ( also referred to as gorilla tracking), Ms. Asasira Gloria has been doing this for thirteen years. She had never seen or experienced a gorilla birth. Usually, they just locate a mother with a baby the following morning or when they reunite with a gorilla group the following day during gorilla trekking.

Ms. Gloria Asasira’s Story  

“I, Gloria Asasira, led a team of visitors to monitor gorillas on July 29, 2025. The Head of the Park assigned us to the Habinyanja group, which normally gets referred to as *H* for gorilla tracking. It took us around an hour to drive from the briefing facility to the beginning of the gorilla tracking site. The advance crew of trackers, who set out early to find the gorilla family, was in communication with me. The trek to the gorillas took around twenty-five minutes. We took a brief break as we got closer to the gorillas to make the necessary preparations, which included donning face masks, setting up cameras, and drinking water if necessary.

On meeting the gorilla group we noticed that with the exception of one adult female known as ADF, all of the gorillas were busily feeding normally as we drew closer. I became worried and approached ADF too closely to observe what was going on. Though I wasn’t sure how long it would take, I warned the tourists and explained what was likely to happen after noticing unusual fluids coming out of her private areas and repeated signs of pain, which led us to conclude that she was experiencing labour pains.

As we eagerly awaited the baby’s arrival, we were fortunate not to have to wait for very long because the labour pains persisted for approximately twenty-five minutes. The baby gorilla was born and the mother began sucking blood from the umbilical cord as soon as she bore her baby, and then the placenta emerged, which she devoured as quickly as she could.

After consuming the placenta, she licked the infant until it was clean and cleansed the area of blood by licking everything nearby, including leaves. All of the other group members, including the silver back, stopped feeding while this was going on. Ms. Asasira said how one of the members remained by her side and even assisted her in delivering the baby, leaving the tourists in awe and referring to her as a midwife.

Family Members Celebrate 

“The most interesting part of it was, after the baby was out, all the family members of the gorillas came and hugged her one at a time as a sign of congratulating her, and then we left the baby breastfeeding normally,” Agatha recalled.

In conclusion, gorillas leave no trace of their births; they clean up after themselves so thoroughly that you won’t even be able to identify the location where they gave birth from the next day. Every gorilla in the family is thrilled about the newest member, and much like humans, there is always someone to lend a hand. It makes sense why primates are considered to be the closest creatures to humans. For more information about gorilla trekking in the wild, get in touch with us. If you’re lucky, you might even get to see a gorilla give birth while on a gorilla safari.