Monday was a glorious day here in Albuquerque. Monday is usually laundry day, but past-me was clever enough to do the laundry on Sunday, because I wanted to take advantage of the beautifully warm and sunny weather predicted for Monday. Good job, past-me!

I headed to the Albuquerque BioPark Zoo with my camera once I’d finished all my morning chores. I ended up moving in the same direction as two very professional looking photographers. I get a little nervous when this happens, because I’m obviously just a hobbyist. We ended up have a great conversation about wildlife photography as we all focused on photographing the gorilla family.

This is my best shot of the day. I absolutely love the way the background blends with the colors of their fur and the intimacy of it. The mama gorilla was pretty much done with being observed and was heading into the shadowy protection of the lower wall area with her baby when I got this one. It was the last photo I took on this day.

I started with the last photo, because I’m very proud of it! This one is definitely going into my 2026 photo calendar.

I spent about 90 minutes taking photos of the gorilla family at the Albuquerque zoo on this day. I’ll add the rest of my favorite photos from the day below. In case you’re interested, here are the names of the gorillas in this family.

• Father – Kojo
• Mother of the older child – Samantha
• Older sister – Mashika – 2 years old, born August 2022
• Mother of the youngest child – Nia Lewa
• Baby sister – Gila – 8 months old, born June 2024, named for the Gila National Forest)

The father gorilla – Kojo – eating some celery

One of the mother gorillas – Samantha – eating some celery.

The older mother gorilla – Samantha – and her daughter – Mashika

The younger mother gorilla – Nia Lewa – and her baby – Gila

Father, mother and baby – He was definitely keeping an eye on the photographers and other people beyond the barrier.

Baby Gila was stalking a squirrel! It was very cute, but I didn’t get very many good photos of the action.

I had a lot more luck catching good photos of Gila once she gave up on catching the squirrel and settled in to eat some celery. She’s quite tiny, just about the same size as that bunch of celery.

I imagine Gila’s mama decided that there was too much excitement from the humans viewing her baby, so she brought her away from the celery. This is when she carried Gila away from the people, and I got my favorite photo from the beginning of this post.