The recent report on the significant declines in gorilla and chimpanzee populations in Gabon and the Republic of Congo shows that once again the conservation community is forced to rely on a crisis mode to harness international support for the protection of endangered species. We only need recall the outcries over the piles of ivory from elephant poaching outbreaks in the 1980s to recognize this cycle of alarm and reactive intervention. Hopefully this demand for attention will prove as effective for the lowland gorilla and chimpanzee as it did for the African elephant.