Hamsters do it. Horses do it. Humans do it, of course. No surprise, then, that gorillas – among our closest living relatives – also trump. A lot.
Farting is the body’s way of ridding the intestines of unnecessary gas produced by gut bacteria. Odourless gases such as carbon dioxide, hydrogen and methane are released, sometimes along with volatile sulphurous components that can taint the offending emissions with a whiff of egg.
There are two species of gorilla, eastern and western, both native to the forested regions of equatorial Africa. Weighing up to 190kg (420lbs), the world’s largest living primates mainly eat plants that are fibre-dense and comparatively nutrient-poor – so need to munch about 20kg (44lbs) of nettles, wild celery and other vegetation daily, spending much of their lives foraging.
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When gorillas aren’t eating, they’re resting; and when they’re resting, they’re digesting. “This is when you can hear lots of flatulence,” says Jordi Galbany Casals of the University of Barcelona, who studies the mountain gorilla (a subspecies of eastern gorilla) in Volcanoes National Park, northwest Rwanda.
In 2020, the BBC series Spy in the Wild revealed just how much these animals toot.
A remotely operated ‘gorilla cam’ was used to film mountain gorillas in Uganda. Gorillas sing as they eat, it turns out – and their dining is interspersed by near-constant bursts of trumping. “Gorillas do have lots of flatulence all the time,” says Galbany Casals.
This article is an answer to the question (asked by Alan Rhodes, via email) 'Is it true that gorillas are permanently flatulent?'
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