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Among the Ba'Aka -- a forest-dwelling people indigenous to the Central African Republic, Republic of Congo, Gabon, and Cameroon -- stories of the "one who stops rivers" have endured for centuries, says Abong'o.
阿邦奧說，在巴阿卡人（中非共和國、剛果共和國、加蓬和喀麥隆的森林原住民）中，“阻斷河流者”的故事已有千百年的歷史。
If the legendary creature does exist, it would likely reside in Lake Tele, a remote body of water cocooned by virgin jungle in the Likouala swamps.
假如這種神話生物真的存在，它很可能住在泰萊湖，那是利夸拉沼澤中的一處被原始森林環繞的偏遠水體。
The lake lies within the Lac Télé Community Reserve, a pristine, 4,400-square-kilometer expanse where surveys in 2006 and 2007 uncovered an astonishing 125,000 gorillas -- more than the species' total estimated global population at the time.
水體位于泰萊湖保留地，這是一片占地4400平方公里的原始大地，2006年和2007年的調查發現當地大猩猩數量驚人，有12.5萬頭，比當時預估的全球大猩猩總數還要多。
Yet, despite its remoteness, habitat loss is escalating in the region.
盡管地處偏遠，棲息地喪失仍在這片區域呈擴張之勢。
Settlements in the region rely heavily on slash-and-burn agriculture, clearing patches of forest to grow cassava, peanuts, bananas, and maize.
這里的人類居住區嚴重依賴刀耕火種，人們清除大片森林，以便種植木薯、花生、香蕉和玉米。
Trees and shrubs are felled, and the remaining vegetation is burned to enrich the soil with ash, offering short-lived fertility.
樹木與灌叢被紛紛砍到，剩下的植被則一把火燒成灰，給土壤增加肥力，創造短暫的豐沃。
Usually, within two to five years, the soil becomes depleted again, which forces farmers to clear new land -- perpetuating an ecological nightmare of a cycle.
通常，2到5年之內，土壤便再次枯竭，迫使農民清理出新的土地--一場生態噩夢由此循環往復。
In 2023, Congolese biologist Joseph Oyange observed this firsthand when visiting a family in northern Congo.
2023年，剛果生物學家約瑟夫·奧揚吉在探訪剛果北部的一個家庭時，親自觀察到了這個現象。
He watched the smoke rise from two hectares of the jungle they had cleared, unwittingly disrupting the gorilla habitat.
他看著煙霧從人們清理掉的2公頃叢林里升起，不經意中毀掉了大猩猩的棲息地。
The displaced primates foraged in the fields by night, leaving crops trampled by morning.
那些流離失所的靈長類夜晚來到田間覓食，到了早晨，留下一地被踩爛的莊稼。
One teenager, hearing gorilla cries, later told Oyange, "It was mokele-mbembe roaring."
一名少年聽到里大猩猩的嚎叫，他后來告訴奧揚吉：“那是魔克拉-姆邊貝在咆哮?！?/div>
"There's often a certain degree of truth to these myths, so I don't completely disregard them," says Allard Blom, vice president of global programs of African forests for the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).
“這些神話里通常有一定的真實成分，所以我沒有完全置之不理，”世界野生動物基金會“非洲森林”全球項目的副主任阿拉德·布洛姆說。
"But I am skeptical, and until someone shows me proof of a dinosaur-like animal, I don't believe it. There's usually a real animal it's being mistaken for."
“但我還是保持懷疑，除非有人向我展示類恐龍動物的證明，否則我不會認為它是真的。一般來說，故事的背后是一只被認錯的現實中存在的動物。”
