The Barcelona Zoo has just lost one of its oldest inhabitants, the gorilla Xebo. The elderly animal died last night, after a weakening process that could not be reversed despite the attention provided by the zoo's team of veterinarians and caretakers.
Xebo was 39 years old, above the maximum life expectancy of this species in its natural habitat. The animal was born in the Rotterdam Zoo on October 6, 1985 and arrived at the Barcelona Zoo in 1996, within the framework of the EEP ex situ conservation program of the European Association of Zoos and Aquariums (EAZA).
Throughout the more than 27 years that he has lived at the Barcelona Zoo, Xebo has lived with other female gorillas, their sons and daughters and also a granddaughter. During this period, she has had a total of four partners, Kena, Virunga, Machinda and Makena.
Xebo was a friendly animal, protective of the group of gorillas and open to the team of keepers at the Barcelona Zoo, whom he integrated as part of the group. He liked to play with the rest of the gorillas with whom he lived and also had a lot of play and interaction with the zoo staff.
Thanks to this interaction and conciliation with its keepers, Xebo has made possible an evolution in the knowledge of gorillas, placing the Barcelona Zoo as a European reference in the care and well-being of these animals.
Xebo was a western lowland gorilla (Gorilla gorilla gorilla), one of four subspecies of gorillas living in West Central Africa. Specifically, its habitat is in southern Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Gabon, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea and northern Angola.
It is a critically endangered species, according to the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), which has an ex situ conservation program EEP of the European Association of Zoos and Aquariums (EAZA). of which Xebo was a part.
These gorillas live in stable groups made up of a dozen individuals and led by a breeding adult male, commonly called “silverback,” in reference to the gray fur on their back that characterizes them.
The main causes of its critical conservation status are the destruction of the forest to introduce crops, the extraction of minerals, poaching, illegal trafficking and hunting for meat consumption.
In addition to Xebo, a total of 462 individuals, distributed in 69 institutions throughout Europe, are part of this ex situ conservation program for the western lowland gorilla. The Barcelona Zoo participates in this program, contributing, above all, to raising awareness of the need to conserve the natural habitat of this critically endangered species, as well as participating in numerous research projects.
