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| In the Kingdom of Gorillas : Fragile Species in a Dangerous Land | 
| Authors: Bill Weber, Amy Vedder
Category: Book
List Price: $27.50
Buy New: $6.54
You Save: $20.96 (76%)
New (6) from $6.54
Avg. Customer Rating:  11 reviews
Sales Rank: 1143349
Format: Bargain Price
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 384
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 8.9 x 6.4 x 1.3
ASIN: B000F6Z9BO
Publication Date: September 25, 2001
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 Work with the local communities March 20, 2005
3 out of 6 found this review helpful
Bill Weber is a gorilla expert at the WCS in New York, and co-author with wife Amy Vedder of In the Kingdom of the Gorillas: Fragile Species in a Dangerous Land (2001). He says what is needed now is a mix of protected areas, enforcement of protection for endangered species wherever they are located (inside and outside protected areas), and sound and sustainable natural resource management by local people outside reserves.
This is the strategy that WCS has been promoting for the last 20 years in places like Rwanda. Most of the countries already have laws banning poaching, but there's insufficient staff and funding to enforce them. Some wildlife experts have been campaigning against poaching for bush meat for the last several years. Those most familiar with the issues on the ground recognize that hunting takes many forms, is conducted by different people for different reasons, and is done at very different intensities. Where endangered species are at risk, where national laws have been established to protect such species, and especially where the drivers for over-use are not local, Weber says that resources are needed for law enforcement. There were virtually no resources at all going into gorilla conservation when he first began work. He says groups should also work with the local communities to address their very real natural resource concerns.
Conservationists point out that Africans are not horrible awful people who are eating gorillas. Further to the west, they coexisted for thousands of years, but the equation has changed phenomenally. Now central Africa has growing human populations, shrinking forests, and roads cutting into the heart of the forests. Bush meat satisfies a large and growing urban population that has retained a preference for the wild meat it grew up with. Gorillas were a traditional food source. Conservationists are not trying to turn everyone in the African forest into vegetarians. But they would like to see gorillas and chimpanzees removed from the dining table. One way is to enforce existing laws. Weber says "blame also should not be put on the African governments for the lack of law enforcement, these governments have a lot of other priorities, and some continue to have very serious problems with security and outright warfare. Protecting wildlife is not at the top of their priority list, generating resources from our own deep bank accounts would help, we have to remember we're the ones with the resources and the interest in this right now."
Reviewed by David S. Fick, Author of Africa: Continent of Economic Opportunities, STE Publishers, Johannesburg SA, May 2005, www.ste.co.za
Amazing book August 17, 2002
4 out of 6 found this review helpful
This inspiring book is written by two amazing people who found themselves at the right time and place, with the right knowledge, insight and determination, to develop and implement plans to save the mountain gorilla.
The book covers a wide variety of topics -- from the lives of the mountain gorilla, to the human problems of East Africa (particularly the genocide in Rwanda), to the perplexing life of Dian Fossey, to the politics and reality of conservation, and how their mission affected their own lives, all told with clarity, empathy, and even a bit of humor.
You cannot miss with this book!
Gentle giants in a hostile world. May 29, 2002
20 out of 22 found this review helpful
The goal of the Weber-Vedder research team goes way beyond the single-minded documentation of one species: they study not only the life of the mountain gorilla, but also their changing habitat and the needy humans who share it. Amy Vedder is a biologist, her husband Bill Weber a social scientist, and their multidisciplinary approach to conservation offers a fresh look at opportunities to create win-win situations for both the animals and the humans who live near them.
In a lively and fast-paced narrative, Weber and Vedder document threats to the gorillas from 1978 y 1992, presenting graphic accounts of animals injured by snares, beheaded by poachers, exposed to diseases borne by humans, allowed to die for lack of medical care, and forced to live in ever decreasing habitats, with more and more limited food supplies. Working first with Dian Fossey, whose battles with the bottle and mental illness are well documented, they eventually found the Mountain Gorilla Project, working with local governments and international foundations to develop educational programs, slow down the devastation of forests to create farmland, and make Rwandans proud of the unique environment they share with the animal world.
The outbreak of the Rwandan civil war in 1993, and the ensuing genocide of over a million people, which no western nation or the U.N. intervened to prevent, are depicted dramatically, emotionally, and thoroughly, as the research team returns to Rwanda to find their workers dead, missing, or in jail. Ironically, the gorillas are thriving. As the country tries to heal its wounds and rebuild, the authors comment about values: "There are more than a few Rwandans who wonder if the Western world would have intervened more quickly and forcefully if mountain gorillas, rather than Africans, were being slaughtered in 1994." In Rwanda, it may be the humans who are the more fragile species in this dangerous land. Mary Whipple
 Intriguing! January 30, 2002
2 out of 4 found this review helpful
Very interesting account of a life of struggling to save Rwanda's mountain gorillas, with riveting accounts of life with Dian Fossey. Brings conservation issues and problems truly to light in central Africa. A very smooth and easy read. Recommended for those interested in conservation lifestyles and those already in conservation.
An intimate, engrossing tale January 20, 2002
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
An intimate, engrossing tale of an American couple's long and largely successful campaign to protect the mountain gorillas of Rwanda. In the Kingdom of the Gorillas is a multi-layered story that moves easily from the intricacies of field research in the tropics to the dynamics of Rwandan society and politics. Particularly rewarding for this reader were the insights into the conflict between the Hutus and the Tutsis provided through the personal stories of the authors' many friends and acquaintances on both sides of the ethnic chasm, and the careful observations of the personality and behavior of Dian Fossey which go far to correct the public record of this complicated researcher and advocate.
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Wildlife, nature and the Environment
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