How to habituate mountain gorillas? Mountain gorilla habituation takes place deep in the dense forests of Bwindi impenetrable forest national park in Uganda. To do this safari moment, you must hike up steep mountain slopes through twisted undergrowth of giant stinging nettles and weeds that grasped at ankles and legs.

Locating a mountain gorilla family will take you some time about 2 to 6 hours. Rapidly other mountain gorillas will come visible. Some of the mountain gorillas will be clearly uncertain about this rude human intrusion, and they will gather themselves up into the darker shadows. Others in the group will be cam by your presence and let you to approach them within a few meters of them

How to habituate mountain gorillas to get used to human presence is definitely a slow process and exciting of the charge faded away. In the beginning the rangers come closer to mountain gorillas and act like them. They pick vegetation and act like they eat them. This action attracts mountain gorillas to come and what is happening.

This is done every day for about 1 year and it’s done slowly, at the beginning there is some big distance left between mountain gorillas and human beings but as time goes by, the distance reduces as they get more used to rangers. After being fully habituated, they start allowing tourists to visit them.  This is done to get mountain gorillas used to new faces, different skin colors and cameras. After 2 years, they are fully habituated and people are allowed to be near them. This is a very short time compared to chimpanzees that take long to get fully habituated.

What is a gorilla habituation experience?

Mountain gorillas have been getting many visitors for so many years and they are fully habituated in your presence that they will call you another forest object. That means that they will look right at you and push you out of their way if you don’t move so fast when they are approaching.

At times, gorilla habituation experience can almost feel like a zoo-like. A gorilla habituation experience is so special. The mountain gorillas, visitors are taken to spot them if they are normally only half way through the habituation process, and some individuals of the group will very much keep their distance. This begs the question.

Why sign up for it? Well there are two big questions that stand out. Unlike gorilla trekking where your time with mountain gorillas is limited to one hour, with gorilla habituation experience you are given 4 hours with gorillas. Secondly with gorilla trekking 8 people are allowed per group while in gorilla habituation only 4 people are allowed per group. This gives a more intimate experience

Where you are seeing habituated gorilla or those still going through habituation process, nor has gorilla trekking never been the same. And with very many day to day variables involved it’s not easy to compare like for like. On a given day the gorilla can be sleepy and lazy and the following day the same gorilla group can be excited and active. Some days they hide in the dense bush and other days they are seen playing in a clear forest glade.

Keeping all these everyday variables in mind, how is gorilla habituation experience compared to a standard gorilla trekking? Well yes you will be concerned that mountain gorillas wouldn’t be habituated at all that you would only have distant, fleeting sights of them.

You will be taken to visit a gorilla family that is half way through that habituation process. However the family in many cases has 2-4 gorillas on female and a male dominant silverback. The fact that these gorilla are completely unbothered by the presence of people they give the rest of the group a little more human confidence and in many cases the viewing are near and personal as they are with a fully habituated gorilla family.

Getting a gorilla habituation permit in Uganda:

Gorilla habituation experience is only done in Bwindi impenetrable forest national park in Rushaga southern sector. The permits for gorilla habituation cost 1500$ per person per day. This is very expensive but worthy it but its equal to gorilla trekking of Rwanda where a gorilla permit buys the same price