This photo provided by Kyoto City Zoo shows Genki, a female western gorilla, carefully holding her newborn at the zoo in Kyoto’s Sakyo Ward on Nov. 24, 2025.
KYOTO — A western gorilla was born at Kyoto City Zoo here on Nov. 24, the first such birth at the facility in six years.
The baby was born at around 8:10 a.m., marking the sixth western gorilla birth at the zoo and the 20th in Japan. The baby was clinging tightly to its mother, and both are reported to be in a stable condition. The gorilla’s gender has not yet been determined.
The newborn is the third offspring of father Momotaro, 25, and mother Genki, 39. Footage captured by an observation camera showed Genki gently stroking the baby, while older brother Kintaro watched the mother and baby from an adjacent room. The zoo will decide on a public viewing date after monitoring the baby’s nursing and other conditions.
According to the zoo, western gorillas, native to the tropical rainforests of West Africa, face declining populations due to environmental destruction and poaching. They are at risk of extinction, and their trade is strictly regulated under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, also known as the Washington Convention. As of Oct. 31, only 19 western gorillas were kept at six facilities across Japan, making breeding a significant challenge.
As understanding of their ecology has improved, Kyoto City Zoo has made efforts to adjust the gorillas’ enclosure to more closely resemble the wild. To date, the zoo has achieved Japan’s first three-generation breeding and the first breeding by a pair born in the country. In October, Momotaro and Genki’s first son, Gentaro, was moved to Ueno Zoological Gardens in Tokyo to mate with Annie, a female gorilla transferred from Higashiyama Zoo and Botanical Gardens in Nagoya in November. Annie’s father is Shabani, known as the “handsome gorilla.”
(Japanese original by Reona Mizutani, Kyoto Bureau, and Video provided by Kyoto City Zoo)
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