Hobbies And Interests
Size
Silverback gorillas are the largest species among the great primates. The silverback gorilla has a thickset build, with a broad chest, long muscular arms, and large hands and feet. Males are 6-feet tall on average, and females are around 5-feet tall. Males weigh on average 350 pounds, while females average up to 215 pounds.
Hair and Limbs
Adult males have distinctive silver saddles covering their back and hips. Silverback gorillas are the hairiest species of gorillas; they have longer, thicker and more hair than all others. Their black hair insulates them from cold at high elevations. Their arms are slightly shorter than those of more lowland gorillas. And their legs also are short in comparison to their arms.
Head and Face
The silverback gorilla's ears look small in relation to its heads. Adult males have conical-shaped heads due to the large bony crests on top of their skulls and backs. These crests anchor the huge, heavy muscles they use to support and move their jaws and teeth. Adult females have these crests too, though theirs are significantly less pronounced. The gorilla's jaws are wide and teeth are long.
Physical Development and Significance
Male silverback gorillas develop gray hair on their backs that earn them a high status at around 12 years old. Silverback gorillas usually dwell in groups of two to 40 gorillas. A group typically has one or two male silverbacks; a number of blackbacks, which are younger silverbacks; and several females and children. The dominant male silverback is in charge of finding food for the group, and he mates with most of the females, fathering most offspring of the group. He will occasionally allow other mature males in his group to mate with the females. The other gorillas have to answer to him. He decides where they eat and sleep, and protects the group from predators.
Diet
Silverback gorillas, like human beings, are omnivorous: they can eat meat and plants. Silverback gorillas mostly feed on plants, including shoots and leaves. Silverbacks have 142 species of plants in their diet, ranging from bamboo to nettles and thistles. They also eat wild berries if available. They must consume about 60 pounds of food each day just to sustain their weight. Occasionally, the silverback gorilla will consume insects. If they find a wild ant nest, they break into it and eat up the ants inside it. On occasion, they also eat rotting wood, and more rarely, small animals.