And that is why the silverback male spent his time sleeping during our visit.
If you look closely at the image above (click to bigafy!) you can see a rather nasty wound on his arm. When he did stir during our visit, it was mainly to clean out this wound.
Which is no doubt why we didn't see any bugs on or about the wound.
Our park guide explained that the trackers had witnessed an encounter between this male and a lone silverback. A fight. In which this wound was suffered.
As with most such tussles between male gorillas, it was over women. The lone silverback wants some. This guy doesn't want to share. As per the trackers, it seems that this male was injured in more ways than one. Two female members of the troop have not been seen with it since the fight. This may be because they went off with the other male. But they may be with the troop but not visible. The group we visited has over twenty members. And while we had great looks in a nice open area we saw only fifteen or so members of the troop. And even if they did leave with the other male it does not mean that they will stay with him.
This wasn't his only wound as he had a cut on his foot as well.
The park guide and trackers were less sure of the origins of this wound. It has the appearance of the snare cut, not a fight injury.
Regardless of the origins both wounds had to be taxing to him. And thus his desire to rest and let them be. And hopefully heal without complications.
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