From the collection: Gorillas and Their Infants

Everyone loves baby animals. This new Pebble Plus series highlights the lives of animal offspring, including how they are born, what they look like, how they compare to mature animals, and how they eat, play, live, learn and grow. Pebble Plus offers the same high-quality nonfiction topics and low reading levels of Pebble Books in an enlarged, graphically enhanced format. This series explores and supports the standard "The Living Environment: Diversity of Life, Heredity, Cells, Interdependence of Life, and Evolution of life," as required by Benchmarks for Science Literacy: Project 2061.

New DVD : Gorillas - From the Heart of Darkness

As seen on National Geographic Romain Baertsoen, A Belgian Diplomat, arrived in Rwanda in 1966 and started to film one of the country's most closely quarded secrets - the gorillas of the Viruga Mountains.. He had to learn to behave with these enormous animals. He filmed the gorillas as well as the Congo's erupting volcanoes. A thrilling view of fantastic flora and fauna.

New DVD : Nature: The Gorilla King

From the mountains in Rwanda comes an extraordinary story of destiny and triumph. At 33 years old, Titus, a 400-pound silverback gorilla, has ruled for nearly half his life. He still rules over 25 gorillas, an astonishing feat given the early trials he faced. When Titus was four, poaches slaughtered his father. Shortly after, an interloper named Beetsme killed his infant sister in a coup attempt. His mother and other sister fled, leaving him orphaned and abandoned. But something in his character led to greatness in a remarkable life that researchers--beginning with world-renowned primatologst Dian Fossey and young researcher Kelly Stewart, daughter of actor James Stewart--have chronicled since the day he was born. Unprecedented footage of silverback behavior, archival footage of Titus as a newborn, and observations by researchers and conservationists chart his dramatic rise to power, and the challenge to his throne today. Is Titus' great reign at an end?

New DVD : IMAX Mountain Gorilla

Named Outstanding Film Documentary by the Genesis Awards (the major award for works about animal issues) and filmed in the lush mountain cloud forests of Rwanda, Africa, Mountain Gorilla provides an amazing encounter with the highly social species that is the largest of all primates. Eat, nap, travel, eat, interact, eat: that's a typical routine for adult gorillas. But for rambunctious three-year-olds, the routine is more like play, play, play, play as they tumble, swing, wrestle and twirl. Overseeing all of the troop's activities is the proud, massive silverback male whose dominance is unchallenged - until a young silverback tries to exert his newfound sense of power.

New DVD : Nature: Koko - A Conversation With Koko

This program doesn't just talk with an ape, it carries on an intimate, decades-long dialogue with her. The story documents the incredible development of a gorilla named Koko, whose learning of American Sign Language (and understanding of spoken English) gives new meaning to the ideas of animal intelligence and inter-species communication. Witness an animal who not only expresses wants and needs but also exhibits creativity and complex, human-like emotions. After being told that her pet kitten died in an accident, Koko demonstrates deep and sincere sadness-and seems to express exactly that when left alone that night. Most amazingly, she maintains a deep and enduring friendship with her human teacher and playmate, Dr. Penny Patterson. But will Dr. Patterson's innovative experiment end with Koko? Or will Koko give birth and transmit her knowledge to a new ape generation? Narrated by Martin Sheen, this inspiring, unforgettable program seeks the answers. The Gorilla Foundation - The mission of the Foundation is to bring interspecies communication to the public, in order to save gorillas from extinction, and inspire our children to create a better future for all the great ape.

TV/DVD playing Koko: The Talking Gorilla

Two new DVDs

Gorillas on the Brink The recent mysterious killings of four critically endangered gorillas in the Virunga National Park, bordering Rwanda and Congo, sent shockwaves through the international conservationist community. In a twist of fate, Animal Planet recently filmed a television special documenting gorillas from this region and their desperate struggle to survive. Golden Globe winner and Oscar®-nominated actress Natalie Portman (Closer, Garden State, the Star Wars trilogy) partnered with Animal Planet to appear in this new special as part of her recent travels to Rwanda. There, she witnessed firsthand the plight of the diminishing number of gorillas in the region shortly before the recent accounts. Welcomed by the Rwandan government, Portman and animal icon Jack Hanna spotlight the gorillas — who so closely resemble humans — in an international effort to bring attention to their dire crisis. GORILLAS ON THE BRINK, slated to air this fall as part of Animal Planet's Emmy® Award-winning series SAVING A SPECIES, is an intimate journey through the mysterious lives of these endangered primates.

Koko : A Talking Gorilla In 1977, acclaimed director Barbet Schroeder and cinematographer Nestor Almendros entered the universe of the world’s most famous primate, to create the captivating documentary Koko: A Talking Gorilla. The film introduces us to the remarkable Koko at the age of three, recently brought from the San Francisco Zoo to Stanford University by Dr. Penny Patterson for a controversial experiment—she would be taught the basics of human communication through American sign language. An entertaining, troubling, and still relevant documentary, Koko: A Talking Gorilla sheds light on the ongoing ethical and philosophical debates over the individual rights of animals and brings us face to face with the amazing "individual" caught in the middle.

From the collection: Koko-love! : conversations with a signing gorilla

More in the saga of Koko, the communicating gorilla who has pet kittens and continues to learn new language skills, is related by her surrogate mother, Dr. Patterson, and illustrated with good color photographs of various sizes showing Koko's activities and accomplishments in a lively format. She paints pictures, uses a computer, plays with a male gorilla friend who also signs, brushes her teeth, and wants a baby of her own. The simple, clear text traces the gorilla's life to date, cites actual conversations she has had with her human friends, and includes two pages of photos of Koko signing various words, from apple to visit.

From the collection: Koko's Kitten

This is the true story of Koko the gorilla and her kitten, All Ball — how they met, how Koko loved and cared for All Ball, and how Koko grieved when All Ball died. The story is told by Dr. Patterson, the first person to communicate with a gorilla using American Sign Language. Over thirteen years, Koko learned about five hundred words from Dr. Patterson, which she used to communicate her feelings and desires. One of the desires she was able to express through ASL was for a kitten. At first, Dr. Patterson was not sure how Koko would treat a little kitten, but there was nothing to worry about. Koko treated the kitten as though it was her own baby. The affection and caring in the relationships between Dr. Patterson and Koko and between Koko and her kitten are captured in Ronald Cohn's beautiful photographs.

Damrosch L!brary Adopts a Gorilla from the World Wildlife Fund

Western lowland gorillas inhabit the vast tropical and subtropical forests of Central Africa. Gorillas are herbivorous, feeding on fruit, shoots, bulbs, leaves and occasionally tree bark. They live in family groups that are led by one dominant male, called the silverback because of the silver hair that runs down his back. With threats such as poaching, habitat loss and disease, WWF is supporting protected areas and other conservation programs across the lowland gorilla’s range to ensure that no population is neglected.
The plush toy and the adoption certificate.

When the library opens, we will read books about gorillas to learn more about them. Here's one from the library's new collection:

Presents a full-color-illustrated examination of the Mountain Gorillas of Rwanda, and describes the effects of human exposure on the gorillas, how emergency medical care is provided to them in the wild, and ways to protect their species from poachers and common human diseases.