Between 2022–2024, I began the first phenological study in the Lac Tele Community Reserve (LCTR). This protected area is the Republic of Congo’s only ‘community reserve’ and lies within the largest swamp forest and tropical peat reserve in the world. A remarkably high density of western lowland gorillas, chimpanzees, and forest elephants coexist with people across this landscape. However, it remains critically data-poor and understudied. The phenology study was part of a larger project examining great ape dietary ecology and founded on the question: What dietary resources are spatiotemporally available to these gorillas and their potential dietary competitors? My collaborators and I: 1. set up four phenology transects in terra firma forest, raphia swamp forest, hardwood swamp forest, and seasonally-flooded forest respectively; 2. trained four teams of three local men each in phenology data collection methods; 3. Teams have been collecting phenology data and fecal samples of apes and elephants (for DNA dietary analyses) every month since April 2023.