A friend of the enemy

When I was 10, I had clear dreams of my future – I would be a big-cat conservationist, driving around in a shiny zebra-striped Land Rover and spending all my time gazing happily at predators. Here in Ruaha, over 25 years later, some of those dreams have come true – I am a big-cat conservationist, and our project owns three Land Rovers (although none are shiny – they are usually broken – and no one will let me paint them in zebra stripes). However, I rarely get to spend any time watching big cats. Instead, I deal with complexities that I would never have imagined, such as tribal identity, people-park conflicts, and trying to figure out how on earth we can expect grindingly poor people to bear the additional costs of coexisting with dangerous carnivores.

Ruaha is a breathtakingly beautiful wilderness supporting some of the world’s most important carnivore populations, and I feel privileged every day to work here. However, Ruaha’s carnivores are not restricted to the park, but sometimes stray into the adjacent populated areas where they cause intense conflict with local people. The Great Ruaha River runs along the southern border of the park, and in the dry season, it is a magnet for prey and predators. But, during the rains prey animals disperse so carnivores range beyond the park, often preying on poorly-protected cattle and goats.

Predators — A Barabaig girl herds the cattle her community depend on. Understanding the value of such livestock is key to to protecting predators from people.
©Andrew Harrington

When the Ruaha Carnivore Project (RCP) was established in 2009, we found that about 60% of local people had suffered attacks by carnivores. This had crippling economic consequences in an area where 90% of villagers live on less than $2 a day. Unsurprisingly, people frequently snared or poisoned carnivores – either to prevent attacks, or to retaliate for them.

Furthermore, very few people saw any benefits from carnivore presence. Usually the only people who did were young warriors who could receive gifts (zawadi) from their community if they speared a lion – one of the few ways young men could earn wealth and status. A warrior could earn 20 cattle (worth around $4000) in zawadi by killing one lion.

In the early years of the project, most of the lion carcasses we found had the right front paw missing – a clear sign that it had been killed for zawadi, as the central claw is removed and taken to prove the killing. These preventative, retaliatory and cultural killings led to the highest documented rate of lion killing in modern East Africa, with over 35 lions killed in just 18 months, the majority occurring around a single village. So we decided to base our field camp there and try to work out how we could effectively improve the situation for both people and predators.

As a long-time vegetarian, I never imagined I would be so happy to receive a huge chunk of meat

But improving the situation depended upon understanding it and gaining the trust of the local community, including the secretive Barabaig, who are notoriously hostile to outsiders. We established a field camp near the village in 2010, but for over a year, our attempts to engage with the Barabaig failed completely. Most villagers would not speak to us, and those who did approach us were beaten up. We tried everything and were almost ready to give up. But then, in mid-2011, it all changed. We installed a solar panel, and bizarrely, that was the breakthrough we needed. The Barabaig suddenly appeared at camp to charge their mobile phones. We would never have imagined that the way to reach this remote and traditional group would be through modern technology, but it provided a reason for people to come to camp, see what we were doing and talk to us. More than two years after the start of the project, the Barabaig invited us to a traditional community meeting. They slaughtered a cow and said they were ready to work with us. As a long-time vegetarian, I never imagined I would be so happy to receive a huge hunk of meat, but I was. It meant that our work could finally begin.

It became clear that the human-carnivore conflict around Ruaha was incredibly complex, involving not only the high costs of depredation but also the lack of benefits to the community, antagonism towards the park, little knowledge about the conservation reasons, and the fact that killing lions was one of the only ways for young men to gain income and status. So we started with the simplest thing – reducing attacks.

Our research showed that 65% of attacks occurred in livestock enclosures (bomas), the majority of which were poorly constructed. We introduced a cost-sharing initiative to construct predator-proof bomas made of diamond-mesh fencing. To date, we have constructed over 70, and they have proved 100% effective at preventing attacks. However, some attacks occur in the bush, so we have begun trials using specially trained Anatolian shepherd dogs to guard livestock. Although the project is in its infancy, the approach seems promising. In addition, we work intensively with village households to teach people how to identify carnivore attacks and how simple, low-tech measures can prevent such attacks from recurring. Together these measures have significantly reduced depredation, reducing economic pressures on people and the need for preventative or retaliatory killing.

Lion_Conflict1450-lores — Amy hard at work in her field camp near a Barabaig village. ©Andrew Harrington

However, living near predators will always mean costs, and long-term conservation depends upon local people seeing tangible, relevant benefits that outweigh those costs. The villagers voted on which benefits they would most appreciate from carnivore presence and chose education, healthcare and veterinary medicines. To improve education, RCP established the ‘Kids 4 Cats’ school-twinning programme, in which village schools are linked with an international school that can help raise funds for much-needed supplies.

We also established competitive ‘Simba Scholarships’ to enable pastoralist children (both girls and boys) to attend secondary school. To improve healthcare, the project equipped a medical clinic in the heart of the pastoralist area, focusing on maternal and infant health. Regarding veterinary medicines, we worked with authorities to help provide subsidised, high-quality medicines to households that had invested in a predator-proof boma. This helps to recoup their initial costs by reducing livestock loss to disease. Although these initiatives are small, significantly more villagers now report seeing a personal benefit from carnivore presence on village land.

Local people are better able to support conservation initiatives if they see tangible benefits
1. Opening of a healthcare clinic.©Ruaha Carnivore Project
2. A newly reinforced boma to protect livestock. ©Jon Erickson
3. Visitors to Ruaha National Park learn about the park’s role in conservation. ©Ruaha Carnivore Project

Despite living so close to Ruaha National Park, most local people have never legally entered the Park and knew little about its role. RCP now conducts weekly trips to the park for villagers, enabling them to learn about wildlife in a non-threatening atmosphere. These have been incredibly valuable, with 95% of people saying the experience had (positively) changed their attitude towards predators like lions and 99% saying it gave them a greater appreciation of the park’s role. Education is also provided through DVD nights, which are very popular, and we are now working with international partners to translate some key wildlife DVDs into Swahili for greater impact.

To address cultural killings, we partnered with Lion Guardians and Panthera to replicate the Kenyan Lion Guardian model around Ruaha. Under this initiative, warriors are trained as lion trackers and community guardians. Through this programme, they are given highly-valued literacy training and receive a good income to buy cattle instead of killing lions to obtain them. The Lion Guardians receive status through their jobs and, as influential warriors, dissuade others from going on lion hunts because their jobs, status and income depend on the survival of carnivores in their zone.

Despite challenges at the start, we are already seeing progress. Local people are more economically secure, are seeing real benefits from wildlife and specifically predators, and are gaining conservation awareness. Hearteningly, the largely-Barabaig community just awarded us land for a permanent camp. And let’s not forget the animals. Carnivore killings in the core study area have dropped by 80% since 2011.

There is much we still need to do as RCP works intensively in only a few of the local villages, but we are hopeful as we go forward. My experiences in Ruaha have taught me that, although real big-cat conservation differs vastly from my childhood dreams, it is richer, more complex and more rewarding than that wide-eyed 10-year-old could ever have imagined.

ALSO READ: The emotions of human-wildlife conflict

Hadza: a short history of an ancient tribe

You sit where you are, a modern man or woman connected: by the internet, airliners, the stock exchange and international trade. So it is a strange and perhaps comforting thought that in an area rich with hominid fossils there is an Apex predator, a fellow Homo Sapiens. Nestled in the Great Rift Valley on the banks of Tanzania’s Lake Eyasi, the Hadza people are among the last of the true hunter-gatherers, a connection to your pre-agrarian past.

In Hadza oral history there is no record of famine. When neighbouring countries and tribes have reported such events, they have remained self-sufficient: never taking more than they need (which is considered rude) and adapting to their environment instead of changing it.

The Hadza (also known as the Hadzabe) are historically nomadic, moving with the seasons and attending to their immediate needs. They have been doing this in the region of Lake Eyasi in Tanzania for the last 50 000 years. However, their once borderless world has become more and more confined due to the pressure of other tribes and agricultural encroachment. Ultimately the Tanzanian government were motivated to create a Hadza reservation in 2011. Although the Hadza now have land rights to 1000 square miles, it is a quarter of their original range.

The Bantu expansion which began about 3 000 years ago resulted in the loss of many of the hunter-gatherer tribes in Africa, one of the greatest influences being domestic cattle taking over the grazing of the free-roaming antelope that hunter-gatherers preyed on. Driven from their lands in Kenya by the Maasi warriors about 2 000 years ago, the pastoralist Iraqw and Datoga tribes started encroaching into Hadza territory from the North East. The Isanzu, farmers of millet and sorghum, settled to the South of Hadza territory and sometimes kidnapped them for the slave trade. Hadza women were kidnapped by the Datoga, and skirmishes would break out when cattle of neighbouring tribes were killed by the Hadza, but marriage between these groups was not uncommon. Today, the Datoga, the fastest growing tribe in Tanzania, live bordering the Hadza and in the dry season, hostility builds up as the Datoga use Hadza watering holes for their livestock, placing considerable pressure on resources in an already agriculturally challenging region.

Among a total population of around 1 200, less than half of the Hadza still adhere to the hunter-gatherer way of life. The population has grown steadily since the 1960s, along with population density, as they now inhabit a smaller area.

Genealogy

The Hadza are not closely related to any other people. Genealogists believe they are so unique at gene level that they could be one of the primary roots in mankind’s family tree. The Hadza will tell you that they originated from a tree: descending from a giraffe’s neck into a baobab and onto Earth.

Language

The Hadza language is simple, yet it has held the fascination of linguists for half a century. Hadzane is one of the oldest languages that employ click sounds, supposedly so as not to scare off prey. It was once believed that Hadzane was related to the language of the Khoisan but it has since been classified as an isolated language – meaning it is entirely unique to the Hadza.

Religion

Having chosen to ignore the holy words of the missionaries, their religion is minimalistic and their society is truly egalitarian.

Modern Influences and Challenges

Ultimately, the Hadza are regarded as an embarrassment to a modernising Tanzania when perhaps they should be an example to a society far too dependent on technology. The Hadza, armed with wood bows, hardly seem to have left a footprint on the land in the tens of thousands of years that they have lived among the megafauna of northern Tanzania.

Tourism, the one industry that could possibly protect the Hadza way of life, has introduced alcohol and alcoholism, and due to their prolonged isolation, the Hadza’s immune systems are unable to cope with western diseases like measles and tuberculosis. The Hadza youth seem to be caught between a rock and hard place: at a young age, Hadza children usually bear the scars of the bush, the harsh lessons of the wild. Increasingly, children are being sent to school and are losing the ability to survive the way their ancestors did, and Hadza children don’t flourish in the Western schooling system. The Hadza’s current situation of disease, land degradation and segregation is not far from a past already written on the Great Plains of America centuries ago.

This tribe has become an egalitarian island, lost somewhere in time. While you take business calls on your cellular phone, there is a hunter following the call of the honeyguide to the hives high up in the baobab tree; arrows dipped in deadly desert rose poison, ready for a baboon raid.

Giving life to Cape vultures

Slowly we chip away at the eggshell, revealing the two-layer membrane beneath. Starting at the site where the chick surfaced, we peel, tear, or fold the membrane, taking care to avoid ripping the active blood vessels running along the inside. This process must not be rushed and can take days. We are assisting in the hatching of VulPro’s fifth Cape vulture chick of the season. This bird and Cape vultures generally have an uncertain future, yet now this one is healthy and being cared for by its parents on the captive-breeding cliff.

The egg was laid 54 days ago. When we removed the egg from the enclosure for artificial incubation, the unusually thin shell cracked. Luckily we could repair it with epoxy glue, and ten days later, it was confirmed fertile.

The mother habitually rolled the dummy egg out of the nest, sometimes off the cliff entirely, for incubation. We routinely replaced the egg in the nest until we integrated a nest box with the natural nest, providing a barrier to stop the egg from rolling off the cliff ledge.

The chick required our assistance hatching before we could return it to the parents because the hardened epoxy was over the egg’s air cell, near where the chick would externally pip (break out of the shell), and the risk of the parents rolling the egg off the cliff was too great.

The chick hatched relatively quickly for Cape vultures, 24 hours from externally pipping to fully detaching from the egg. The chick externally pipped independently, but we helped it break the shell around the epoxy. We kept it in the incubator while all the active and final blood vessels dried up, allowing the chick to detach completely from the shell. We placed it in a specially designed dummy egg for speedy ‘hatching’ on the cliff and returned it to the parents in the nest box. It was immediately accepted and incubated by the mother.

VulPro’s captive breeding cliff now holds five healthy chicks, with another four expected by the end of August.

In Flight

A CELEBRATION OF SOARING

by
MARK DRYSDALE

“The reason birds can fly and we can’t is simply because they have perfect faith, for to have faith is to have wings,” said the author J.M. Barrie. Photographer Mark Drysdale has a perfect appreciation of that faith. He masters the fine art of capturing light and balances it with the skill and patience needed to capture birds in the perfect expression of flight.

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In flight photographer

MARK DRYSDALE has been involved with photography most of his life; educated in the Eastern Cape, he lives in Johannesburg and regularly frequents his home in Dullstroom. He left the mainstream industry to pursue his passion for photography about 5 years ago. His philosophy about imagery is wonderfully insightful: “Light is the essence of all images. Its quality defines the emotional and physical aspects of photography. The subject is the vehicle, which we use to illustrate that light. It can be warm or cool, soft or harsh, vivid or muted. When the light and subject intersect, they can complement or contradict each other, and how we portray that through the lens depicts who we are. It is the perfect point when the two elements combine to form a scene greater than them individually. Birds in flight provide amongst the best examples of this” Click here to see more of Mark Drysdale’s work and here for another gallery of his work.

Hunting with the hadza

Spending time with traditional hunter-gatherers could be likened to spending time with yourself – with the clock wound back several thousand years. It brings to the fore everything we find alluring and appealing about spending time in the bush – the wild animals, the scenery and the savage beauty. And in this case, the Hadza people form part of that environment as one of the apex predators.

I recently guided a wonderful family from the USA through Tanzania. One of the highlights was spending time with one of the least-known tribes of Africa – the Hadza. I am particularly interested in hunter-gatherers, and I knew this would be a special experience for my clients.

Hadza-grouping-2-1280x1797 — Clockwise from left: Hadza steady their arrows with the same feathers of the birds they shoot. Hadza youth. Baboon skulls – common raiders of Hadza settlements. Hadza elder. ©Greg Lederle

Living near Lake Eyasi in northern Tanzania, the Hadza have managed to preserve their hunter-gatherer way of life for over 30 000 – maybe over 50 000 – years. Their language was once classified with the Khoisan due to similar click sounds, but it has since been reclassified as an isolate – a language unrelated to any other. They are also not closely genetically related to any other tribe. This, combined with their location in the Great Rift Valley, only adds to the intrigue and mystique of these wonderful people. Unlike most African tribes, even their oral history does not indicate that they moved to Hadzaland from elsewhere, making them one of the oldest tribes in Africa – if not the oldest.

Our journey took us to the shores of Lake Eyasi where some of the last remaining 1200 Hadza still live as their ancestors have done for centuries. We arrived with the rising sun and soon joined three men on an early morning hunt, following from a respectable distance as they went about the – for them – routine task of hunting for food.

My greatest hope was to hear a honeyguide fly overhead beckoning us to follow. This would have given my clients the privilege of witnessing the unique bond between these interesting birds and these amazing people. The Hadza are able to communicate with the honeyguides using a series of whistles and calls, a symbiosis that anthropologist Richard Wrangham described as ‘the most developed, co-evolved, mutually helpful relationship between any mammal and any bird on earth.’

Using bow and arrow, Hadza hunters shoot tiny birds from 30 yards with deadly precision

But alas it was not to be. In the absence of honeyguides, the three young hunters were more intent on shooting birds than communicating with them. Boubous, barbets, sparrows and other small birds fell prey to the Hadza’s traditionally-made bows and arrows – from 30m away, sometimes even further! It’s not surprising they are such good shots. Young Hadza boys get their first bows and arrows at about three years of age – and so begins a life of constant practising and hunting, resulting in the astonishing accuracy and deadly precision we saw displayed.

As we continued trailing behind the three young hunters, they would split up and lose sight of one another. They did not speak, but communicated using a range of whistles that enabled them to stealthily blend into their environment with very little disturbance.

A few hours (and several small birds) later, the stealthy demeanour of the hunters changed. One shouted out from a distance, his calls echoing through the baobab-dotted landscape. The other two answered loudly and joyfully, their tone signalling that the hunt was over.

As they ran in the direction of the shouting, we followed as best we could. When we caught up, one hunter stood holding an adult Kirk’s dik-dik with a perfectly placed arrow through the shoulder. No sense of pride, celebration or achievement. He had simply done what he had set out to do, and they now had sufficient meat to return to camp. The dik-dik was slung over a shoulder, and we walked off towards a particularly large baobab.

Baobab Trees are common in the area and form a very important part of the Hadza’s existence. The fruit makes up about 13% of their diet, and the trees often conceal large beehives that provide honey for the hunter-gatherers. This one provided shade and demarcated both the kitchen and dining room. The hunters lit a fire in no time and, when it was at its highest, placed the whole, unskinned, unbutchered dik-dik on the leaping flames. They relaxed and sat around chatting, and plucking the birds they had killed. Once all the hair had been burnt off the dik-dik, it was taken off the fire and gutted. The liver, diaphragm and some cuts of shoulder were placed directly onto the now smouldering coals, as were the small birds.

We were all offered a piece of the meat, but the birds were kept for the hunters themselves. They handle different kills in very specific ways. Small birds are eaten in the bush by the hunters, while larger prey that is small enough to be carried is taken back to be shared at camp. If they kill a big animal such as a kudu or giraffe, the whole camp is moved to the food source, where they feast for days.

After being out for several hours, we headed back to camp, walking beneath the cathedral-like baobabs, musing over the day’s events, and the future of these amazing people. Authenticity and the pursuit thereof is something we all strive for, and seek to achieve in our lives. So, when we come across something truly authentic, we are faced with the dilemma of whether to share it or not. These rare gems and special discoveries are most sought after specifically because they are rare and undiscovered.

These beautiful people have remained unchanged for thousands of years, despite incredible difficulties and challenges. The wildlife they depend on and the land where they hunt face many threats. Pastoralists extending their range graze their herds on the hunting grounds, which influences the movement of the animals; and some of the land they have traditionally roamed has been set aside as the private hunting domain of the Abu Dhabi royal family. The Hadza have been kidnapped and sold as slaves. They have been forced out of their hunting areas and compelled to sow crops. And yet they always return to their simple hunter-gatherer way of life.

Birds are cooked and eaten straight after the hunt. The gutted dik-dik is taken back to share with the rest of the tribe. ©Greg Lederle

Their bows and arrows are still the same lengths as when they were first recorded, the height of the men and women are still the same, their favourite decorative colours, the methods they use to pacify bees with smoke and to collect the prized honey, and even the whistles and calls they share with the honeyguides, are all still the same. So little has changed in the Hadza’s wonderful way of life despite long contact with more powerful neighbours, but could the arrival of tourism lead to their downfall? Will the growth of ecotourism and cultural tourism be the Hadza people’s 21st-century challenge?

It’s a real possibility, and the irony is that it would be brought about by the very people who value their culture and want it to stay intact. With tourism comes money, gifts and (sometimes misplaced) generosity – and alcohol, which we know has a long history of destroying traditional cultures. The Hadza are quite aware of this from observing how some neighbouring tribes have changed – usually for the worse.

But perhaps it is tourism that may keep their traditions alive and thriving. It is, after all, largely due to the creation of neighbouring conservation areas, such as Ngorongoro, Serengeti, Lake Manyara, Maswa and Mwiba, that the Hadza can continue to subsist on hunting. These popular tourism destinations create a conservation core from which animals can move freely into and out of the Lake Eyasi region, ensuring a sustainable population of the animals so important to the Hadza’s survival and traditions.

I firmly believe that, with careful management, and with informed and educated guides, tourism can contribute to the Hadza’s survival. Is it not this sensitivity and restraint that has allowed for profound encounters with potentially vulnerable communities – both cultural and wildlife – in other parts of Africa? It would be a tragedy if an irresponsible increase in tourism leads to the destruction of a culture that has remained unaltered for the last several centuries, and for as long as their stories have been told. It’s happened before, and it can happen again. So my wish for the Hadza is that they resist negative outside influences, and continue to preserve their unique way of life.

ALSO READ: Hadza – a short history of an ancient tribe

Contributors

GREG LEDERLE is a multiple award-winning guide and the owner and co-founder of his own safari company – Lederle Safaris. Described by Forbes Life as “…a warm and effervescent personality”, Greg’s connection to and appreciation of Africa and travel is evident in his pursuit of off-the-beaten-track safari experiences.

Shelley’s crimsonwing – no photos in natural habitat

There is no known photograph of a live Shelley’s crimsonwing other than a few caught during biodiversity netting surveys. Cryptospiza shelleyi is a species of forest finch occurring in the highland forests of the Albertine Rift in East Africa. It is classified as ‘endangered’ by due to habitat loss and is likely to have a small, severely fragmented and declining population.

The world’s second known photograph of a Shelley’s crimsonwing. © Colin Jackson — Shelley’s crimsonwing. © Colin Jackson

We spoke to researcher Colin Jackson who photographed a Shelley’s crimsonwing during a biodiversity netting expedition in the Mt Tsiaberimu area, in the DRC, in 1997. The only other photo of this species, also of a netted bird, was taken in 2008, also photographed in the Mt Tsiaberimu area in the Virunga National Park, DRC.

Jackson said, “Very interesting to hear of the story behind the other image of the crimsonwing – that it also came from Tsiaberimu…. We caught ours in the heart of the forest not far from where we first camped in nets going through the edge of bamboo and bordering an open area that included some swampy vegetation. The expedition was one of National Museums of Kenya staff, funded by the Berggorilla and Regenwald Direkthilfte and the Atlanta Zoo. A key objective of the expedition was to survey the surviving gorillas and Titus Imboma (whose hand is holding the bird in the image) and myself were taken along to do bird surveys.”

About Shelley’s crimsonwing

Distribution: A narrow strip of highland forest sandwiched between Burundi, eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda and western Uganda.

Habitat: Inhabits closed moist understory in montane forest, low secondary growth at the forest edge, clearings with Sericostachys, mixed bamboo thickets; sometimes in more open areas near streams and forest clearings.

Habits: Occurs singly or in pairs. Forages on the ground for seeds, known to associate with dusky crimsonwings Cryptospiza jacksoni. Shy, elusive, seldom seen, when flushed, flies rapidly for a short distance, dives for cover and does not reappear.

Ever since 2008 this was the only known photograph of a Shelley’s crimsonwing in the world. © http://www.gorilla.org — Shelley’s crimsonwing © http://www.gorilla.org

A Namibian’s view on hunting in his home country

I was born in a village outside Sesfontein, one of the remotest parts of Namibia. I grew up experiencing daily encounters with wildlife, so I feel qualified to enter the Namibian hunting debate.

The side against hunting reminds me of the era when the colonial government used different means to prevent local people from benefitting from wildlife. The apartheid government regarded us as too irresponsible to look after the wildlife that we lived with. It had to be protected from us, and it belonged to the government. The anti-hunting lobby is behaving in exactly the same way: they, outsiders who want the privilege of seeing wildlife when it suits them, seem to think they are needed to protect our wildlife – from the independent Namibian government and local people because we believe in sustainable hunting. I cannot, right now, think of any explanation that will make me understand why these people are blowing hunting in Namibia out of proportion. Is this a plot by some groups to ensure that rural people do not benefit from sustainable utilisation?

It is very important for people to realise that in most of Namibia, wildlife is free-roaming, outside national parks, in communally-owned conservancies where the local communities have taken it upon themselves to live with wildlife, some of it extremely dangerous such as elephant, rhino and predators. This is in areas where these same people are farming to make a living. The Government of the Republic of Namibia has given its people in communal areas who so wish to live with wildlife the rights to also benefit from it as they would do with their livestock.

I do understand that there are people out there who don’t want to see wild animals being killed. To me, this is illogical as many animals worldwide are being killed every day – be it fish, cattle, pigs, sheep and chicken. And the way most of these animals are being killed is without any respect and crueller than we can imagine. Why are these people not shouting about this? Or are their mouths too full of beef, pork or mutton?

Hunting in our beloved Namibia is a carefully thought-through business by our politicians and our local environmental scientists. We do selective hunting only after an annual game count in conservancies. This is backed up by monitoring initiatives such as routine weekly and monthly wildlife patrols by conservancy staff.

So we do all we can to ensure our hunting initiatives are sustainable. We are not perfect and make mistakes, but our aim is good conservation done in an African way.

I would think if people were so much concerned about wildlife, the focus would be on how to curb the immense poaching activities that are happening in South Africa, Kenya and other countries. Why are they picking on Namibia, where we have found our own road to conserve and increase our wildlife populations while at the same time helping rural people to diversify their local economies?

The Namibian initiative is geared toward empowering our local people. If we did not see some benefits coming from wildlife, most of us would not be prepared to go on sharing our lands with wild animals. Let us not discourage practices that have ensured that today we can proudly say that our wildlife population have increased outside national parks to the point that we have more wildlife outside our parks than inside. This has happened only because ordinary citizens regard wildlife as theirs. Take away this sense of ownership and their right to benefit, and we will lose the ground we have gained. People out there who are shouting about hunting behave as if the wildlife belongs to them, not to us.

We have come a long way to get local people on board with wildlife conservation. Let us not take them backwards. It’s our Namibian communities who help us to do better conservation.

I am asking those against hunting to put yourselves in the shoes of the local people who have to bear the costs of living with elephants, lions and other dangerous animals daily. I am a serious conservationist, but I would not be happy to ask my children to walk to school, knowing that lions roared nearby last night. And what about elephants? Which one of the animal rightists would allow their children to play soccer when an elephant herd is passing? Do they know or care how many people were killed by elephants in Namibia last year?

Our people of Namibia are amazingly tolerant of wildlife. I know of many cases where families have had to stay without water for a day just because an elephant destroyed their water point the previous night. Yet they will continue to live with elephants, even in cases where someone they love has been trampled to death by an elephant. Hundreds of farming families tolerate stock losses to lions, leopards, cheetahs and hyenas. Yet we do our best to manage our predators, not merely kill them all. Hunting is a part of our strategy.

I can argue that Namibia is doing very well in protecting its wildlife, even if we hunt some animals. Please, those of you sitting in your comfortable houses, stop doing damage to conservation in our country. We who live with wildlife are just being realistic and seeing the big picture – we want wildlife to be around for our grandchildren and their children to enjoy.

I invite those concerned about hunting to join me in some rural villages – not a lodge – for three months. Let’s level the playing field. We can only really talk about this once we all have seen what it takes to live in rural areas and how it feels to share your land with wild animals. Only then has one earned the right to comment fairly on this topic.

Lastly, let us focus on the more crucial issue of rhino and elephant poaching, which is devastating populations of these key species. If people want to help with conservation, they could contact us for ideas on how they could support us.

ALSO READ: The link between hunting and tourism in Namibia

Satao – the Giant Who Will Never Die

The battle of David and Goliath was far from a fair fight. The minute the shepherd boy entered the fray, the giant was doomed. Goliath had prepared for hand-to-hand combat, encumbering himself with heavy armour, short-range weapons and a shield. But the nimble shepherd remained at a safe distance, slung a rock and potted the giant with the same practised aim he used to dispatch sheep predators. For David, killing Goliath was no triumph. This is the story of Satao.

There was a giant in Tsavo infinitely wiser and more resilient than Goliath. His name was Satao. When he finally succumbed to a poisoned arrow in late May, he was probably 50 – above the average age for a bull elephant in this highly poached region. Indeed, there was nothing average about him.

Given his age, Satao would have been born in the mid-1960s, when elephants wandered Tsavo in numbers never seen since. It was their era. His genetic makeup would have been the best possible. The herd would have been nurturing and protective of their little protégé. But it wouldn’t be easy for him.

Satao-7 — Satao, in his prime leads a group of elephants. ©Mark Muller

He grew up during one of the most devastating droughts the region had ever experienced. It decimated the herds, taking thousands of his kind – mainly females and juveniles like him. But the little trumpeter endured like the strong bulls that towered over him.

Soon after the drought, the poachers took to killing those bulls for their immense tusks. He would have seen it, smelt the carcasses, seen the remnants of their hacked skulls devoid of ivory, and perhaps he learned. And when the bulls became fewer, and those that remained hid deeper in the wild, the poachers targeted females and then the likes of him – small tuskers yet to pass on their good genes. For two decades, he survived. By the time Richard Leakey declared war on poaching in 1989, the Tsavo elephant population, which had been as large as 42 000 in 1969, had been reduced to 6 000. Satao was one of them.

The poaching onslaught intensified, and still, he endured for two decades more, through more droughts and more poaching despite his magnificent tusks that grew and grew and weighed him down with their sheer bloody value. And he may have known that these would be his downfall – that a human would try to bring him down with devious weapons. They tried and tried. They tried again in February this year. Their poisoned weapon pierced his thick skin, despite his armour of mud. And still, he survived. And when we thought Satao might just be invincible, he finally succumbed to an attack in which the odds were stacked against him.

We have lost a giant so grand that the soil encrusting his back was a world entire. His tusks were so glorious that they stretched back to the time of the mammoth. But his legacy needn’t die. In his time, Satao would have sired many more of his kind. His strong genes live on in the herds of Tsavo, and it’s up to us to ensure that his progeny reach his incredible stature. If we don’t, we will be left with nothing but a dusty legend.

ALSO READ: RIP, Satao 2 and Death of another iconic super tusker – Wide Satao

Satao 8March14 — There are few more imposing figures on earth than Satao. ©Richard Moller

Satao: what you can do:

Support The Tsavo Trust. One of the Trust’s core initiatives is their Large Elephant Monitoring Project set up to protect Tsavo’s magnificent ‘hundred pounders’. The Trust also adopts a holistic approach to Tsavo’s challenges by addressing wildlife and community issues. Click on the logo to visit the Tsavo Trust support page:

How Charcoal Fuels al-Shabaab’s Terror Campaign

Like a good deal of the illegal ivory trade, much of the illegal charcoal trade in Kenya is said to be controlled by Somali Islamist group al-Shabaab, who use the profits to fund terrorist activities. A March 2014 report by journalist Kagondu Njagi for Thomson Reuters Foundation says charcoal worth more than US$1.7 million is being smuggled out of Kenya every month. Kenyan authorities don’t appear to be doing much to curtail it. In fact the Kenyan military have even been accused of aiding it.

In 2012, UN Monitors accused Kenya troops of smoothing the trade through Kismayo in Somalia when they took control of the port as part of the African Union Mission in that country. This was despite a UN Security Council ban on trade. A Reuters report in July 2013 says that Kenya gave their reason for defying the UN ban as concern about angry Kismayo charcoal traders undermining the security of their troops. Not only did the exports continue despite the ban, but they saw a dramatic increase in charcoal exports, said the UN monitors. Given the trading connections and taxation systems, it is believed that much of the profit would have gone to al-Shabaab.

A recent report by the UN and Interpol estimates the revenue from illegal logging at US$30-100 billion worldwide, much of it going towards funding of terror groups. “Al Shabaab’s primary income appears to be from their involvement in the charcoal trade and informal taxation at road-block checkpoints and ports,” states the report. It goes on to say that at a single Somali roadblock in the Badhaadhe District which borders Kenya, al-Shabaab have been able to make up to US$8–18 million per year for taxing passing charcoal. Al Shabaab retains about one third of the income from charcoal exported from Kismayo and Baraawe Ports constituting US$38–56 million. The overall size of the illicit charcoal export from Somalia has been estimated at US$360–384 million per year.

al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for the 2013 Westgate mall attack in Nairobi in which 67 people lost their lives. They are implicated in the recent scourge of bus bombings in Mombasa and Nairobi, and claimed responsibility for a series of massacres in Lamu County and Tana County in Kenya’s north east in which over 89 people have lost their lives. No doubt the link between poaching and terrorist activity is the catalyst for the appointment of UK troops to train anti-poaching units in Kenya. But the loss of habitat through illicit logging is a potentially greater threat to wildlife than poaching. The scourge of terror attacks is also turning tourists – a vital source of income for conservation – away. Another thing Mike Chase counts as he flies over the savannah for the Great Elephant Census is the number of abandoned tourist lodges.

How to count elephants from a plane

The Tsavo Ecosystem is the most important area for elephants in Kenya and warrants concerted attention from wildlife organisations and conservationists. Before Elephants Without Borders’ plane took to the skies, a total aerial count covering 100% of Tsavo was performed by Kenya Wildlife Service using 16 planes from their organisation as well as NGOs such as The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, Tsavo Trust and Save The Elephants. This resulted in a preliminary count of 11 076 elephants – down from 12 573 in 2011.

EWB’s survey differed in that it was a sample count which flew 10% of Tsavo using just 1 plane. Chase estimated the number could be around 14 000 elephants at any one time, considering that elephants are seasonal migrants. EWB’s sample survey is a valuable complement to the larger, more comprehensive method. It also illustrates the efficacy of smaller surveys, which could be simpler and cheaper for governments and NGOs. A typical total aerial count covers 100% of the target area, flying strips spaced 1 kilometre apart. A sample count differs in that it flies strips spaced further apart and covers areas chosen by factors such as the concentration of elephants and natural habitat. The strip spacing varies accordingly.

count elephants — KWS analyst Joseph Mukeka and EWB’s Mike Chase measure the distance between wands while pilot Alexi Peltier sets up the camera in the plane.

To set up the plane for counting, wands are set at a precise, parallel distance apart to delineate the strip width. The plane flies at a certain altitude which keeps the area within a designated width of ground coverage, seen between the wands. The observer counts, and photos are taken of the wildlife seen between the wands. This is important for post-analysis for the population numbers to be extrapolated, considering ground coverage that could not be flown. The system is applied on both sides of the plane with at least 1 observer per side.

ALSO READ: Spotting elephants from space

Where the giant elephants still roam

A jetliner is a wondrous thing; a spaceship: stupendous. But an unsophisticated propeller plane is far more significant. Flying no higher than a bird, this machine gives us enviable perspective on the creatures below – things invisible from jetliners, and mere concepts from space. Looking down on our planet must be incredible, but seeing the big picture depends on looking much closer to home, and what could be more incredible than gazing upon elephants – Africa’s giants.

As you read this, Dr Mike Chase, founder of Elephants Without Borders, is in all likelihood perched in a little propeller plane searching for African elephants. Nobody is really sure how many are left. Speculation puts the number anywhere between 410 000 and 700 000 – down from an estimated 27 million in the early 19th century. Surveys in the past have been area-specific and fragmented in both time and space, and some key populations have not been surveyed in 10 years.

EWB conceptualised The Great Elephant Census. Funded by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, 18 planes and 46 scientists are racking up thousands of air miles performing approximately 19 000 transects covering 600 000km. This extensive aerial survey, conducted in the relatively short space of eight months, will give an incredibly detailed snapshot of the African continent – in essence, it will be the ultimate ‘Big Picture’.

“It’s far more significant than establishing the number of elephants,” explains Chase. “We’re recording data on all types of wildlife and ecosystems. We’re documenting the effects of human encroachment and poaching. There’s no other data on the status of Africa’s habitat on such an immense scale.”

Chase’s first flight took off in Kenya’s Tsavo National Park in February, and so far, he’s been encouraged by the number of elephants there. Kenya Wildlife Service considers the 41 660 square kilometre Tsavo Ecosystem – about the size of Switzerland – the most important area for elephants in Kenya.

“Given what we’ve read in the press, I was expecting to see a landscape strewn with freshly poached carcasses, but we didn’t see even one after nearly a hundred hours of flying.” The carcasses Chase did see were shown to him by the park warden. “They do indeed have a poaching problem in Tsavo, but it’s not of the magnitude portrayed, and I attribute that to the diligence and commitment of the KWS. Their policing and anti-poaching patrols are paying off.” A total aerial count by KWS gave a preliminary number of 11 076 elephants – down from 12 573 in 2011. They consider this a stable figure, given the poaching problem. EWB’s sample aerial count gave a reliable estimate of 14 000 elephants in the area at any time. Learn how the aerial counts were conducted.

Leakey ignited the world’s imagination by setting 12 tons of ivory alight

Tsavo National Park, established in 1948, has gone through many cycles of success and tragedy and is the embodiment of a typical African national park. Through concerted effort, it has played a key role in reviving elephant populations that were decimated by hunting for both ivory and ‘sport’. By the early 1960s, Tsavo had essentially reached elephant-carrying capacity. In 1969 the Tsavo ecosystem supported an estimated 42 000 elephants. Sadly, a prolonged drought in the early 1970s led to the death of some 6 000 – mainly female and juvenile – elephants. After the drought broke, many surviving large bulls for which Tsavo was renowned became the first poaching victims for their incredibly large tusks. As the remaining bulls became more and more difficult to find, large females were targeted. Then, as demand grew, smaller and younger elephants were slain for their paltry tusks. This, combined with the drought, severely hampered population recovery, and by 1979 there were as few as 12 000 elephants left in the Tsavo ecosystem. By 1989, what some consider to be the height of the east Africa poaching crisis, only around 6 000 remained.

At that time, Richard Leakey, the head of Kenya’s Wildlife Conservation and Management Department (soon changed to Kenya Wildlife Service), ignited worldwide recognition of the elephants’ plight by persuading Kenyan President, Arap Moi, to set alight a 12-ton stockpile of ivory. Leaky created crack anti-poaching units that were authorised to shoot poachers on sight, and more stringent limitations and bans were placed on the international ivory trade. Elephant numbers rose steadily in east Africa. But as ivory trading goes on largely uncontrolled in Asia, and as Chinese wealth grows, poaching continues to ravage Kenya’s elephant population. It has also increased drastically in other regions, such as southern Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Chad.

Apart from elephants, the team is counting conservation islands. With Kenya’s growing population of 42 million, wild animals are being squeezed into isolated islands of refuge. “Sitting at 300 feet, you get a broad sense of how small these islands are and how devastating the environmental aspect is as soon as you leave the national parks,” says Chase. “You look on the African map at the scattering of parks. You imagine that these sanctuaries are protected islands of pristine nature. But they’re not. The people on their periphery cannot live off the land outside of the parks. It’s been over-utilised, and denuded. They’re crossing over onto these islands to survive, and the islands will go the same way if it’s not stopped.”

They are counting people and livestock. “We saw high densities of wildlife living alongside people and domestic stock.” In Southern Kenya, the Maasai, who were once free to range, are effectively trapped between parks and conservancies. Here they are reliant on the parks to feed their cattle and themselves. As a result, Chase counted far more cattle in Tsavo than elephants. There is also the pressure of human/elephant conflict. As elephants threaten crops and villages it is not unusual for people to attack them in retribution or to scare them off, often using poison-tipped arrows or spears that can lead to slow, painful deaths. Then there is the issue of charcoal.

Elephants are second only to humans when it comes to the devastation they can wreak on woodlands

They are counting fires. On Tsavo’s horizon, Chase saw many plumes of smoke rising from rudimentary charcoal kilns. Getting closer, he saw how vast numbers of trees had been cut down and carried to central points where compact beds of wood were laid and covered with a thick layer of soil. “The wood is set alight, and slowly the compressed wood burns – producing briquettes of charcoal, which are packed into sacks for the market. It’s a laborious process,” Chase explained in a blog post on EWB’s website. “They are marvels of African architectural ingenuity and labour. You can see the influence of their work quite clearly from my vantage point. Massive areas of acacia woodland have been denuded. I gaze down on them and their work with respect and empathy. The hard-working people I see below me must be turning a good profit to struggle like this. The depressing scale of the charcoal trade is heightened by a landscape littered with temporary living quarters constructed from colourful plastic bags fluttering in the wind. What do these hard-working souls eat out here, how many trees are cut down to fill a bag with 50kg of charred wood?”

Elephants are second only to humans regarding the devastation they can wreak on woodlands. Culling and translocating elephants is an important part of wildlife management in southern Africa, where elephant populations are much larger and have a far greater impact on woodland. In Tsavo and other parts of East and central Africa, poaching has performed a cruel service by keeping elephant numbers down – and so culling is practised much less frequently. But as it has become harder for poachers to kill elephants in Kenya, many have turned their machetes, axes and chainsaws, once used to extract tusks from elephant skulls, onto trees to profit from the illegal manufacture of charcoal. What aggravates the problem is that the militant Islamic group al-Shabaab, supposedly drives much of this illegal trade. If it continues at the scale Chase indicates, it could be more detrimental to Tsavo’s elephants than poaching due to the destruction of their natural habitat and the pressure it will put on the entire ecosystem. Learn how charcoal fuels al-Shabaab’s terror campaigns.

In April, African Parks, an organisation determined enough to manage wildlife areas on the sharp end of poaching, flew Chad’s 3 000-km2 Zakouma National Park as part of the Pan-African survey. Zakouma’s elephant population has suffered terribly during the last decade under the poacher’s gun. The estimated 4 300 elephants in Zakouma in 2002 had been reduced to 450 in 2011. Preliminary reports after the latest count suggest this number is now stable, a credit to African Parks, who took over management of Zakouma in June 2010. They have greatly increased efforts to protect the remaining elephants that move in larger-than-normal herds, possibly as a survival strategy.

Well-armed poachers are now targeting Garamba National Park in north-eastern DRC, also managed by Africa Parks. The park is effectively a war zone, with ongoing firefights between park rangers and members of the terrorist group the Lord’s Resistance Army. Equally worrying is the implication that a Ugandan military helicopter has been used for poaching activities here.

A previously undiscovered herd of elephants in paradise

As I’ve had further contact with Chase, a typically upbeat man, I detect the gravity of these observations in his voice. Reporting from Ethiopia at the end of May, he was surprised to find that people dominated the 7 000-km2 Babile Elephant Sanctuary. It was supposedly home to the last remaining elephant population in the horn of Africa but of the 300 elephants believed to be there, he spotted only a few dozen after 60 hours of flying. In contrast, other animal counts were much higher. He estimated 40 000 camels, 200 000 head of cattle and 450 000 goats wandered the park. But his spirits pick up when he mentions “an elephant paradise, a habitat ideally suited to these giants.” And in it, an undiscovered herd. Understandably, he’s reluctant to divulge the location and the number of elephants he found there, but it’s significant. It lifts his voice as he describes the excitement of an Ethiopian elephant biologist they took up to count a herd. “You should have seen his reaction looking down on those elephants. You won’t believe it, but this biologist had never seen one before.”

All the while, the survey is engaging local scientists and conservationists, training them as much as possible, giving them access to the data, and allowing them to study their environments from the air. Chase stresses that, unlike many research programs, he does not leave a country without first sharing the raw data with the local conservation authorities.

As of writing, three planes and 18 team members from the Tanzanian government, several wildlife organisations, and the Frankfurt Zoological Society are coming to the end of a joint aerial census of the entire 30 000-km2 Serengeti Ecosystem in Tanzania. The Wildlife Conservation Society, which is conducting surveys over more countries than any other census partner, is due to begin surveying elephant populations in the Central Africa Republic and Mali.

After Ethiopia, Chase and his team will survey Namibia’s Caprivi Strip and parts of Botswana, together with some of neighbouring Angola, Zambia and Zimbabwe, to form the extensive 444 000-km2 Kavango–Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area. This part of Africa is supposedly home to more than half of the continent’s elephants. Over the next four months, a large number of planes will take to the southern Africa skies – including over the Kruger National Park.

“North of the Zambezi, more and more elephants are moving at night. Fear of poaching has changed their behaviour,” Chase says. They are far less threatened in the south. The success of the southern populations is not just a story of concerted conservation efforts. As Chase stresses, “it has to do with stable government and economy and recognising the value of tourism. The southern countries, even Zimbabwe, with all its challenges, have done a good job of protecting their natural heritage because they know that’s what people will want to come and see – that it provides income and jobs and that it must be sustained.

“The next part of the survey is going to be really interesting. There’s long been a dispute over whether Botswana is over-estimated (figures put the number at over 133 000 elephants – by far the highest of any country and more than the entire elephant population of East Africa). Angola will be an adventure of discovery. We’ll see what numbers have returned since the end of the civil war. There’s also southwest Zambia of which so little is known.” You can detect the excitement in Chase’s voice, the potential of a new discovery. A new elephant paradise, perhaps.

As busy as he is at 300 feet, Chase does have the chance to appreciate the beauty and diversity of the landscape and wildlife. In Tsavo, he was particularly struck by the sight of some of the legendary tuskers for which the park is renowned. It’s believed there are no more than 30 left on the continent. “Watching these majestic giants is a great opportunity to marvel over these behemoths with one hundred-pound tusks on either side. They are truly nature’s great masterpieces.” Chase was one of the last people to see the famous Satao alive – shortly before his carcass was discovered after poachers had killed him for his immense tusks.

In 2015 the work will continue to assess, compile and combine all the country reports into a single, impartial analysis for all conservation authorities and decision-makers to use. The story of elephants, and Africa, will become much clearer.

While these simple flying machines survey the rich earth below, we spend billions on sophisticated spacecraft to survey the dust on Mars. In doing so we deny our own terrestrial splendour and lose sight of our responsibility to preserve this planet. Paul Allen has spent a considerable amount of money funding ventures in space tourism. But while this might enable a privileged few to gaze down on the planet, this latest venture of his, conducted at just 300 feet, is far more noteworthy as it will help protect our planet’s wonders. You can’t see Africa’s giants from space.

Contributors

KELLY LANDEN threw down an anchor in 2002, abandoning a career on the oceans to dedicate herself to African conservation. Having a passion for wildlife and an affinity for photography, as Elephants Without Borders’ programme manager, she realized that she has the opportunity to use her skills to share the beauty and splendour of nature, while providing insights into the challenges of conservation. “To participate in The Great Elephant Census is a rare gift and a privilege that provides us a chance to paint a clearer picture on how we should focus on progressive solutions to conservation threats”.

RICHARD MOLLER is one of Kenya’s most respected hands-on conservation project managers. As co-founder of the Tsavo Trust, he supports wildlife, habitat and communities in the greater Tsavo ecosystem, Kenya’s largest protected area and home to most of the world’s surviving ‘hundred pounder tuskers’.

MARK MULLER was born & raised on a Coffee farm on the slopes of Kilimanjaro. He was schooled in Tanzania and Kenya and, immediately after school, came to Maun in Botswana, where he has spent the last 42 years. He has always had a passion for wildlife, with a particular love of elephants and birds. His love of photography was first sparked on a trip to Antarctica in 2006.

MICHAEL LORENTZ is passionate about wildlife, wilderness and elephants in particular. Born in South Africa, he knew early that his true vision and happiness would lie in Africa’s wild places. A passionate and award-winning photographer, Michael’s work has been featured in several publications, as well as at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington DC.

BEN NEALE and KYLIE BERTRAM are the Australian couple behind Gallery Earth. At their core is a deep respect for conservation and a love of adventure. Not everyone has the opportunity to fly or travel, but they believe everyone appreciates and is inspired by the beauty of nature. They aspire to capture this beauty on their journeys, most often suspended beneath the canopy of a paraglider.

ANTON CRONE quit the crazy-wonderful world of advertising to travel the world, sometimes working, sometimes drifting. Along the way, he unearthed a passion for Africa’s stories – not the sometimes hysterical news agency headlines we all feed off, but the real stories. Anton strongly empathises with Africa’s people and their need to meet daily requirements, often in remote, environmentally hostile areas cohabitated by Africa’s free-roaming animals.

Just hatched! One of South Africa’s rarest birds

I found out about blue swallows from the Percy Fitzpatrick Institute of African Ornithology where I completed my master’s in 2008. They put me in touch with Dr Ian Little and we tried to set up a shoot to photograph the critically endangered blue swallow, one of South Africa’s rarest birds with only 35 pairs remaining. By Zach Vincent

It was tricky as bad weather had plagued the midlands, and we had little hope of finding swallows on nests. There were only about four pairs around, and as we all know with nature that great footage and sightings are never, ever guaranteed. I wanted to cover the story as my main passion is extinction prevention and identifying and broadcasting the causes of population declines in species.

Several causes for the plight of the blue swallow are not unique to this species but are shared with other endangered grassland animals, such as the Oribi, a small antelope. Habitat loss and degradation are huge factors with the blue swallows and the tiny swallows are now described as an ‘island species’, searching for decent natural habitat amongst a sea of degraded hilltops, planted with pine for paper and maize for the beef industry.

We decided to go ahead with the shoot regardless. I had a two-day window in which to shoot, where all the relevant parties could contribute. On our first day, we did nest checks on private lands, including a Buddhist retreat and a dairy farm. We found a fresh aardvark hole at the first site, which is great as the swallows use these burrows to build their nests underground. At the dairy farm, we caught glimpses of a nesting pair making a second breeding attempt (blue swallows can parent more than one clutch of eggs per season).

I knew that this was no easy animal to film, but I had no idea how difficult it would be: they are tiny! Little metallic blue birds become black spots in a viewfinder, and they dart up and down, moving speedily, capturing their prey of flying insects.

At Impendle Nature Reserve, at our last stop for the day, the officer on duty climbed into the darkness of a sinkhole and inspected a nest. The next second we heard him say, “There are 3 eggs, there is movement, and I think one egg is in the process of hatching!”

Needless to say, my cinematographic nerves began a rattle and hum, and I was down the hole in seconds with a GoPro and a failing camera light (Murphy’s law!). Luckily I managed, in the subterranean darkness, to get a few seconds of the hatching. It was very special and beautiful to see a critically endangered species emerging from its little shell throwing all of its tiny energy reserves into getting out of its egg and into life.

We didn’t stay long, we didn’t want to cause any unnecessary disturbance, but the moment was captured, albeit a bit rough. I wanted to etch the species into the consciousness of the South African community, giving it a presence and character. This connection with the audience could save it from extinction as the community not only takes “ownership” of an indigenous species but feels connected to it and less likely to brush it aside.

I really hope that my work touches enough people and that they mobilise themselves to contribute to the conservation and protection of blue swallows and this planet’s wonderful and breathtaking biodiversity.

Read about Africa’s rarest parrot – the Cape Parrot

5 things to do in Coffee Bay

While on a backpacking trip that saw me exploring South Africa from Cape Town to Durban I simply had to make a stop along the Wild Coast. From what fellow travellers told me the Eastern Cape sounded simply incredible and boy, oh boy, did Coffee Bay come to the party.

Here are five activities you’ll definitely want to try when travelling to Coffee Bay:

1. Learn to surf

Jeffrey’s Bay may be South Africa’s most-loved surf spot, but Coffee Bay has incredibly warm water and offers surf lessons at a fraction of the price. Coffee Bay is quite small and if you’re staying at the popular Coffee Shack backpackers then your surf lessons are going to cost you a meagre R50 per hour…. or two (they’re so chilled there they don’t really watch the clock religiously). The equipment is great too – the boards are looked after and there is the option of borrowing a second skin or wetsuit if you wish. The lessons start off on the sand, firstly with a safety chat before they teach you the sequence of moves to follow for catching a wave. Then it’s time to hit the water. The instructor gives you one-on-one attention, offering pointers to correct your technique. After my fourth wave-catching attempt I was up, riding my first wave, feeling more alive than ever.

2. Take a drumming lesson

Jah Drums is a backpacker hostel and a space where travellers can sit among locals and learn their way around an African beat on a djembe drum. The evening session I joined in on carried an electric atmosphere with a few regulars treating us to a show where they whacked out trance-inducing rhythms with their mad skills.

3. Hike to Mapuzi Caves

Hike through fields, scale a cliff face on a narrow path, pass cows, dogs and small children. The jagged cliffs drop straight into the ocean where the fast-paced, angry sea folds its waves as if it were kneading dough. Depending on the tide, if you’re the kind of person who loves a good thrill, you’ll have the opportunity to jump off a cliff above the caves and plunge into the water below. Another opportunity to throw yourself off a wall of rocks presents itself later in the day on the hike back where you’ll come across a river you can bomb-drop into. Find yourself a shady tree and eat lunch under it. Take at least two litres of water, a small bottle just isn’t going to cut it on this hike.

4. Hike to Hole in the Wall

This is a three hour hike that takes you on a scenic trek through the region and delivers you to the area’s favourite natural attraction – the Hole in the Wall. The Hole in the Wall is an archway that’s punched out of a wall of Ecca shale and sandstone that’s capped with hard volcanic dolerite. After the hike to this landmark you simply cannot resist diving into the ocean and sharing the water with the rocky formation you came all this way to see.

5. Eat mussels

Every now and again Coffee Shack organises a free sundowner experience for its backpacker guests. I was lucky enough to be staying there when their staff had picked us a massive pot’s worth of fresh mussels to carry up to a view point and enjoy with a drink. Two of the fellas carried the steaming pot of mussels to the top of a nearby hill that’s green curves looked like it came from the Microsoft Windows background. We gathered around and tucked into our fresh delight with Tobasco and Worcestershire sauce close at hand. With seafood-filled bellies we all sat back and watched the choppy sea in front of us, drink in hand. The next thing we knew, we were all watching two pods of dolphins cruising their way through the rough seas below. Spectacular.

A trip to Coffee Bay is definitely recommended. Just be sure to take sunblock and an open mind.

Proteas threatened by climate change

Global warming is coming to your living room, your dining room, your kitchen, anywhere you decorate with cut flowers. And maybe to your medicine chest. Changes in climate and land use are snuffing out plants critical to the worldwide floral trade, and perhaps to new treatments for diseases: proteas.

Proteas such as the king protea, which measures 12 inches across and is the national flower of South Africa, are under fire. Researchers conducting a study of proteas near Cape Town estimate that the plants’ abundance will decrease by more than 60 percent by 2050. Some protea species will become extinct. Others already have.

Winter rains will soon fall over Cape Town. But when August and September arrive, proteas bloom in riotous color. On steep, rocky slopes strewn with lichen-covered chunks of granite, the flame-red and magenta-pink flowers dot the hillsides. They attract hordes of tourists and provide jobs for thousands of South Africans who gather proteas for the worldwide cut-flower industry.

Visitors and florists are joined in the lab if not the field by biochemists like Johannes van Staden of the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Van Staden has conducted initial studies of proteas’ anti-inflammatory and antimicrobial effects. “It’s amazing that so little is known about proteas’ potential to produce new drugs,” he says. The results to date, however, echo what traditional healers have believed for centuries: protea extracts may be helpful in treating intestinal inflammation, food poisoning and related illnesses.

With their vase-shaped bracts surrounding pencil-thin flowers, proteas resemble nothing so much as sea anemones. The plants are named for the Greek sea god, Proteus, who could change his form at will. Indeed, there’s a protea in almost any shape you can imagine. For now.

In a region where average temperatures have significantly warmed over the past 30 years and suburbs are sprawling up hillsides, Cape Town’s most unusual flowers are besieged, says ecologist Lee Hannah of Conservation International. “In response, proteas are moving uphill themselves, to cooler spots with less development,” says Hannah, lead scientist on the Cape Town protea study.

Many species have such tiny ranges that plowing a field or building a single house can wipe out the global population. More than half the world’s several hundred protea species are threatened. Most live in South Africa. Several are found in Australia, and some have been transplanted to Hawaii’s steep-sided volcanic slopes.

Proteas are the keystone species of South Africa’s Cape Floral Kingdom, the smallest but richest of Earth’s six floral kingdoms. The Cape Floral Kingdom, Hannah says, “is the size of a postage stamp, comparatively speaking. But it has the highest plant biodiversity anywhere on the planet.” Some 9 000 plant species, 6 000 of which live nowhere else in the world, are found there. Table Mountain in Cape Town, for example, supports some 2 200 species, more than the entire United Kingdom.

Earth’s six floral kingdoms © Wikimedia/Dietzel

Evergreen, leathery-leaved plants in what’s called the fynbos ecosystem cover mountains, valleys and coastal plains near the Cape of Good Hope. “Amazingly, proteas thrive in the nutrient-poor soils and high winds,” Hannah says. For a short summer season, proteas are laden with flowers that look like they might have arrived from a faraway galaxy. In fact, proteas came not from another place, but another time. They’re remnants of the distant past, when Africa, Australia, India, South America and Antarctica existed as one landmass: Gondwana. Proteas once thrived on Gondwana. Today members of the protea family live oceans apart.

The last of Earth’s proteas grow in places known as hot spots. “Hot spots are regions with large numbers of plants and animals found nowhere else in the world, and that have had more than 70 percent of their habitat destroyed,” Hannah says. “The last thing these species-rich, high-habitat-loss areas need is another threat, but that’s what climate change presents.” As Earth’s climate warms, species will try to keep pace, moving to their preferred temperature ranges. Protea seeds are carried on the wind to new locations. Those that root in cooler areas will survive.

Of the more than 300 species of proteas near Cape Town, nearly all will have to shift their ranges by 2050, Hannah believes. Conservation plans that allow species to relocate may be an answer. “Most of our efforts focus on parks, which are fixed in place,” says Hannah. “However, when a species starts to move, we need a ‘park’ not only where that species is today, but where it will be in the future.”

As part of the Protea Atlas Project at the South African National Biodiversity Institute, biologists Guy Midgley and Tony Rebelo, with the help of dozens of field volunteers, have collected extensive information on Cape Town’s proteas. “So far, we’ve discovered eight new species in the protea family,” Midgley says, “and one-third of protea species well outside their previously known distribution ranges.” New proteas include the Palmiet River sceptre, clandestine spiderhead, and Laingsburg conebush. The large-leaf sugarbush, already familiar to botanists, was found 160 kilometers beyond its formerly documented range, “and the waterlily sugarbush a stunning 400 kilometers farther afield,” says Midgley. “Proteas are full of surprises.”

The Greek god Proteus could predict the future. However, Proteus did not willingly part with the information. He simply changed his shape and escaped. Midgley says that vigilance is needed so the fynbos doesn’t witness more proteas vanish.

Sherry Moretti, a floral designer for an international hotel group, agrees. “I once wanted something breathtakingly gorgeous for a special hotel opening,” she says. “On that evening, proteas lined the entrance, bedecked the foyer, and graced every table. I can’t imagine a planet without proteas. They welcome you through the portal, and into another world.”

Drongo mimics alarm calls to steal food

The drongo deceives other species, including meerkats, by mimicking their alarm calls to scare them away and steal their abandoned food, according to a new study published in the 2 May 2014 Journal Science. Information provided by: UCT Communication and Marketing Department

However, as in Aesop’s fable about the boy who cried wolf, the drongo can make too many false alarms and cause members of the exploited species to wise up. But when one false alarm call stops working, drongos mimic a different one, keeping up the deception racket and their access to stolen food.

Author Dr Tom Flower, a researcher in the Percy Fitzpatrick Institute of African Ornithology at the University of Cape Town, walked 5-15km a day, six days a week for six months every year since 2008, to observe and record drongo behaviour in the Kuruman River Reserve, which is part of the South African Kalahari Desert, close to the Botswana border. Temperatures ranged from -11ºC on cold winter mornings to 42ºC in the summer sun. Dr Flower said, “I dread to think how many sand dunes I’ve climbed, but it was worth it to get the data I needed.”

The Kuruman River Reserve is the home of a huge long-term study on meerkats that began in 1993 and was documented in the popular TV series Meerkat Manor. The meerkat project studies the behaviour of about 14 meerkat groups, all of which are completely habituated to humans walking in and among them. Dr Flower said, “The project has been running for so long that the first thing a baby meerkat is likely to see when it emerges from its birth burrow is a researcher waiting to watch its behaviour; as far as they’re concerned, we’re part of their environment and little different from a tree. Few people realise that perhaps the world’s most important field research project studying the evolution of cooperative societies is located in South Africa.”

Other species in the area are also habituated to people watching them at distances of less than five metres, including the drongos and another important species from which they steal food, a bird called the pied babbler. Dr Flower said, “That means that other researchers and I can get right into the thick of the action. We can unravel the interactions between all these animals because different individuals are identifiable by coloured leg bands (in the case of the birds), or L’Oreal hair dye marks on the fur of the meerkats (don’t worry, it’s been tested on humans).”

During his research on drongos, Dr Flower has habituated and colour-ringed about 200 birds living in 40 territories which overlap with those of the meerkats and babblers. He said, “I’ve trained the drongos to come to a call. So if I want to find drongo ‘Dave’, for example, I can walk into his territory, give a call, and he’ll come flying over to me in return for a mealworm reward. He’ll rapidly return to his natural behaviour, hawking flies or following meerkats and babblers to steal their food, allowing me to tag along and watch what happens.”

Dr Flower describes pied babblers as “the bird equivalent of meerkats, with mum and dad doing all the breeding while their offspring stay home to help raise their younger siblings”. A co-author on the Drongo manuscript, Dr Amanda Ridley, began studying babblers on the reserve in 2003, observing as many as 14 groups of babblers that are completely tolerant of people walking with them and watching their behaviour.

Dr Flower worked on the Kuruman meerkat research project in 2003 and became the meerkat research and reserve manager from 2004 to 2007. He started work on the drongo project in 2008. He said, “This kind of access to so many different animals is unrivalled anywhere in the world and was key to the observations and experiments underpinning my findings.” Dr Flower is now following juvenile drongos during their development to learn more about how they learn the mimicking behaviour.

A baby black zebra

Earlier this month a traveller came across this newborn black zebra in the north-western area of the Okavango Delta. The rather unusual dark colour is due to a small genetic abnormality linked to the amount of melanin affecting the pigmentation of the fur.

There have been at least three other dark zebras born like this in the area; however, none of them has reached more than six months old, with the last foal born of this kind facing its demise to hyenas within a few months.

Unfortunately, if you stand out from the crowd, you are a target. Due to other abnormalities of this nature some scientist’s claim that zebra’s stripes are formed from the inhibition of melanin and that the “default” colour of a zebra is black. In other words, a zebra is black with white stripes.

This black zebra is an example of what is known as ‘malinism’, which results in excess of dark pigmentation. Melanism is found in many different species, including amphibians, reptiles, and mammals – but not in humans. Pseudo-melanism, also called abundism, is another variant of pigmentation, characterised by dark spots or enlarged stripes, which cover a large part of the body of the animal, making it appear melanistic. One example of abundism is the ‘king’ cheetah.

Also read The black and white of African wildlife explained

Looking after orphan elephants

As the call of the bush baby fades and the first rays of the morning light start to dance, Suni has her foot soaked and cleaned, and the shift changeover begins at the Elephant Nursery Facility at Lilayi Game Reserve in Lusaka. Working as a team of four, the keepers briefly meet with the night shift to find out how the orphan elephants have been during the night. With all things well, two of the keepers begin to walk off into the bush followed by six orphaned elephants bubbling with the enthusiasm of life.

The two remaining keepers begin an intensive period of activity. Oliver, the deputy head keeper, begins milk prep, creating concoctions of goodness to supplement the orphans with what they would have received from their mothers. These feeds occur eight times a day.

Meanwhile, Elvis, the newest member of the keeper team, is busy mucking out the stables; elephants tend to go to the toilet every one to three hours! There is plenty to clean after ten hours spent in their stables as they rested through the night.

As the day approaches the radio crackles, and the location of the baby herd comes through to Oliver. With milk in hand, he starts his meandering walk, with Elvis cheerfully singing alongside. After about twenty minutes of walking, the quietness of the bush is interrupted by the high-pitched trumpeting of excited little elephants. Seeming chaos becomes order as the keepers take control, and the milk is guzzled with sounds of pleasure vibrating through the crisp morning air. Cheeky attempts by quicker-drinking older elephants to steal milk are quickly dealt with, and they return to browsing.

The keepers again part company as they lead the elephants back into the bush, however, Maramba, the eldest of the herd, is happy to play his role in deciding which direction the best browsing area will be found. Elephants will eat over one hundred different food sources in the wild.

The youngest Nkala, sticks close to Kavala, often sucking on her ear for comfort as they move.

By now, Oliver and Elvis have returned, and the milk prep begins again, as the bottles are cleaned. Food is also collected, and medical treatments are prepared for the elephants’ return.

At midday, the six excited orphan elephants return from the bush. Undecided on whether the water or the milk is more appealing, they hesitate before Suni leads the way, choosing the milk option. While the others continue to drink, Suni makes her way to the boma with her unique swagger due the amazing boot that has been designed to help her in her recovery from the horrific axe injuries she endured from poachers two years ago. Once at the boma, she settles down for the second of her three treatment sessions. Her boot is removed, and the wounds are tenderly treated by Louise and Oliver. Meanwhile, the rest of the elephants enjoy the water, but they never forget Suni, each taking a turn to check on her in the boma.

Back at the boma, the keepers each take their lunch in turn and prepare for a health check. Pulses are checked, Suni has her boot back on, and the herd make their way back to the bush to browse, bumping into warthogs and giraffes as they travel.

As the afternoon comes and goes, another milk feed is given, and food for the night is collected. Four of the team then turn their attention to Suni, and her wounds are treated again before she receives a neuro-skeletal integration massage to help stimulate her nervous system as she drifts off to sleep. By now, twelve hours have passed, and the night team has taken over. They continue to monitor from the boma observation deck, feeding the young orphans every three hours through the night as they snooze peacefully.

During this twenty-four hour period of care and support, ninety-six litres of milk will be drunk by the orphan elephants, three bandages, twelve swabs, three litres of foot soak, three syringes, one metre of tape and three hundred millilitres of iodine will have been used, oh and approximately six kilometres will have been walked by the elephants and their keepers.

If you would like to know more about the project and how to support: www.gamerangersinternational.org

Also read: The elephant orphans of Zambia

Water lilies of the Delta

I must admit with a certain degree of embarrassment that I once believed that water lilies were just part of the Delta’s ‘décor’. However, during a recent walking safari in the area, I was fortunate enough to be led by a trail guide who shared his knowledge of these precious plants.

Anyone who has been to the Okavango Delta will have noticed that water lilies crop up everywhere. You may even have nearly toppled over your mekoro trying to take the quintessential picture of this gorgeous bloom. Few holiday settings are more evocative and relaxing than a water lily-filled lagoon, and whilst slicing through this heavenly bloomscape with all the time in the world, I began to ask a question. “Why are the lilies either purple or white? Are they two different species?”

Witnessing all this beautiful diversity, my good guide, who had already sensed my new surge of curiosity, had pre-empted the situation and steadied the mokoro as I wriggled and turned to face him to let rip another volley of queries regarding the more intimate details of sexual encounters of the water lily kind. Fascinated by my curiosity, he continued to dish out reels of fascinating information about pollination in water lilies.

In the case of the water lily I was admiring, the pollen does not get released the day that the flower blooms. Instead, first, a fluid is secreted that covers the centre of the flower and its female parts. Insects, lured by the plant’s fragrance, land on the smooth angled petals, and slide into the fluid below. If the visiting insect had already visited a mature plant and come bearing pollen from another water lily then the visiting pollen dissolves into the fluid, and the water lily is fertilised. The fluid is absorbed and the visiting insect is free to go, carrying new pollen from this now fertilised water lily. It is during this transition that the colouration of the water lily changes from white to purple.

After pollination, the stem of the water lily starts recoiling slowly, pulling the flower underwater. Here, away from nibbling insects, the fruit starts developing into a spongy berry that contains masses of seeds – up to 2,000 seeds may be stored in each fruit.

When the seeds are ripe and ready to disperse, the fruit opens and releases its contents into the water current. Seeds float away aided by an aril (a rather clever floating device that contains air pockets to keep them buoyant). They can travel for miles in the current or reach even further if they are eaten and digested by a pigmy goose. Either way, they eventually become waterlogged, find a muddy bank and germinate into a new plant.

The leaves shade the water below, keeping water temperatures cool and thus allowing for a more oxygenated water environment underneath them. This is an environment that many critters enjoy and exploit.

Water lilies also grow and spread vegetatively by means of an ever-growing creeping rhizome. These rhizome makes delicious and flavoursome flour when dried and pounded. The flour, when baked, makes crispy delicious pancakes. The young leaves and flower buds, if well prepared, make a scrumptious vegetable side dish, and the seeds may be eaten fried or raw.

Later that day, as I sit under an ancient nyala berry tree and stare into the coals of a fire and dinner aromas fill the air, I cannot help but think about the magic and beauty of Africa. Those able to set off into the Delta in a mokoro, consciously leaving behind our woes, should spend time to wonder at the unpretentious as a water lily.

First photos of Liuwa’s lion cubs

Liuwa Park manager, Raquel Filgueiras, has captured the first clear images of three lion cubs born four months ago in Liuwa National Park. Liuwa’s lion cubs are the first to be born in Liuwa in a decade. The father of the cubs has been named Nakawa (which means the one who gives something back) and the mother has been named Sepo, which means hope.

Liuwa's lion cubs — © African Parks/Raquel Filgueiras

For nine years, the matriarch of the pride, the world-famous Lady Liuwa, roamed the expansive plains alone after massive poaching and illegal trophy hunting had wiped out her fellow felines. This led to African Parks’ strategy to re-introduce lions to the park, using Lady Liuwa as the founding prode member. The birth of cubs means that Liuwa now boasts a lion population of six.

The names of the two adults were chosen jointly by members of the Lozi people in consultation with Frans Schepers, previously International Programme Manager at WWF – The Netherlands, and longstanding donor Casper ter Kuile.

Both commented on the relevance of the names: “Nakawa has helped re-established this keystone species in Liuwa. It is a beautiful Lozi name for a superb male lion,” said Frans Schepers. “Sepo provides hope for the future of the entire national park,” said Caspar ter Kuile, a sentiment echoed by Area Chief, Induna Mundandwe. “The birth of the lion cubs has restored the dignity of Liuwa and highlighted the potential to increase tourism revenue and the living standards of local communities,” he said.

Although four months old, the cubs remain vulnerable to attacks by other predators, as they are not yet old enough to accompany their mother when hunting. Conservationists agree that their mother, Sepo, would leave Liuwa’s lion cubs in a good hiding place while she is out hunting. Given the absence of other adult male lions in the park, Nakawa is spending more time than usual with his three offspring. He tolerates the cubs’ exuberant behaviour and would protect them in the event a hyena strayed too close. The sex of the three cubs has not yet been established.

As with humans, play is an important part of the learning process for lion cubs which they are currently doing by enthusiastically exploring their environment, smelling and chewing on sticks and bark. They also recently started nibbling on large carcasses provided by their mother.

To bee or not to bee

Where there are farms along the perimeter of Serengeti National Park, there are elephants – and all manner of attempts to prevent crops from being trampled. Farmers have tried various elephant-deterring techniques, from beating tin cans to lighting fires, most of which haven’t appeared to work. Could bee colonies do the job?

Now officials in Tanzania’s Mara Region have asked authorities to construct fences to keep elephants away from villages and agricultural holdings. The Mara Regional Commissioner, John Tuppa, told the Tanzanian newspaper, The Citizen, that the move would help end the destruction of crops by stray elephants. Tuppa is asking for fences to be built as soon as possible.

The ultimate dilemma, however, may be finding ways for humans and elephants to live side-by-side. Biologist Eivin Røskaft, at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology thinks there may be several answers. “The elephant-villager conflict didn’t just start,” he says. “Now there are more open discussions about it. Fortunately, elephant poaching hasn’t really reached the Serengeti, so its elephant numbers seem to be slowly growing.”

But the region’s human population has grown much faster, doubling over the last 18 to 20 years. “Elephants are raiding crops during the night,” says Røskaft. “These crops are mostly close to the park border, so elephants return to the Serengeti as soon it’s light in the morning.” Elephants are stressed when they leave the park, he says, but the crops are too tempting. “The fact that elephants are more stressed outside the park doesn’t mean they won’t take such risks.”

How to end the stalemate? Biologist Lucy King, leader of Save the Elephants’ Elephants and Bees Project, may have an answer: “beehive fences.”

Beehive fences are simple and cheap, according to King, and are made with locally sourced materials. Hives are hung every thirty feet and linked together. If an elephant touches one of the hives, or the interconnecting wire, the beehives all along the fence swing and release the stinging insects inside.

In most areas, King says, beehive fences are easily adopted. Keeping bee colonies is an age-old activity, one in which the majority of African communities already participate. Traditional communities often harvest honey from wild hives and use it as a natural food source and sweetener. Although modern beekeeping is sometimes new to farmers, they adapt quickly, says King, to the skills needed to keep hives.

With her assistance, researchers in Kenya and other African countries are testing the beehive fence concept. Biologists at the Serengeti Development Research and Environmental Conservation Centre have conducted trials of beehive fences in villages on the border of Serengeti National Park. Elephants were chased from farms and left to wander toward the beehive fences. When the elephants reached the rows of swinging hives, they diverged around them, and then continued on their way – on the other side of the villages. Since then, the scientists say, there have been no elephant crop-raiding incidents reported along those routes.

“Bees do not like elephants,” Røskaft confirms. The feeling, it appears, is mutual. A tiny bee may have more strength than a thundering herd of pachyderms.

Biggest tusker elephant in Southern Africa dies

“Isilo” is the Zulu word for king. Isilo was a king elephant in the Tembe Transfrontier Park on the South Africa/Mozambique Border – the biggest tusker in Southern Africa.

It is with deep sadness and regret that Tembe Elephant Park has announced the death of Isilo the tusker elephant. Isilo died a natural death of old age in the southwest section of the park in an area known to be his home range.

He is thought to have died in January this year; however, dense foliage and few roads through this lesser-known game reserve resulted in his carcass only being discovered about two weeks ago. Unfortunately, his magnificent tusks had already been stolen by suspected rhino poachers.

Inkosi(Chief) Mi Tembe is offering a reward of R100 000 for returning the stolen ivory/tusks to the authorities at Tembe Elephant Park.

This is a very sad and tragic time. His presence will be deeply missed.

Tuskers are elephants with tusks that reach the ground. According to Rowland Ward’s records, the heaviest tusk of an African tusker weighed an astonishing 226lb (102.5kg), the heaviest tusk of a woolly mammoth weighed 201lb (91.2kg) and the heaviest tusk of an Asiatic elephant weighed 161lb (73kg). However, it is essential to note that the longest tusks are not always the heaviest, as weight also depends on the circumference of the tusks.

Lengthwise, the longest African tusk measured around 3.5m, the longest woolly mammoth tusk measured around 4m and the longest Asiatic tusk measured around 3m.

Unfortunately, hunters very much prize the so-called “hundred pounders” – whose tusks weigh at least 45kg each. As a combined result of trophy hunting, large-scale exploitation of ivory for consumer goods in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and devastating poaching, big tuskers have almost been wiped off the African continent. Once a common sight, roaming far and wide across East, Central and Southern Africa, now there are very few big tuskers left on the whole continent.

Rhino horn – To trade or not to trade: Does it really matter?

I had yet another interesting hour or so ‘to trade or not to trade rhino horn’ debate with an avid conservationist I respect. It was an interesting discussion, however we each seemed to have retorts for one another’s views, and after a while, we realised that we needed to agree to disagree. We had both heard each other’s arguments before, and the debate was getting a bit circular – as it has become in the conservation circles in the last year. Written by: Dr. Simon Morgan

Trading is being punted as an option with the hope that we can use the ‘if it pays, it stays’ philosophy to ensure the perpetuation of a species in ‘man’s world’. This has been seen repeatedly with many aspects of the conservation of species and habitats – for example, quantifying ecosystem services and giving a value to a catchment area or calculating the carbon credits we can sell for an area of rainforest. All worthwhile approaches with resulting successes, yet perhaps not as intricate and complicated matters as selling rhino horn, it holds weight as a rhino conservation strategy.

The counterargument is that we don’t understand the market, making it difficult to play with. We would be signing the death warrant for those rhino in countries outside of South Africa that were not trading and, therefore, perhaps not able to protect them with as much metal as the South Africans could with the new-found rhino horn wealth. Ultimately should we not draw a line in the sand and ask the question, why in this day and age, should a species have to pay to stay – surely, it has the right regardless. Does man pay to stay or make a habit of taking to stay?

Each is a compelling argument in its own right.

Ultimately we divide our forces, divide our efforts and divide the rhino population while we do so.

The truth of the matter is, if a decision is made at the next CITES COP16 that South Africa gets to trade in rhino horn, we will probably have at least another two years to go before that even happens (we have to convince the Chinese state to change its laws again so that trade is actually legal there…) and even then the money will only be able to be rolled out and spent within the next year or so. So we are looking at about the end of 2017 or 2018 before we will see the income from this trade coming into effect on the ground. That’s in four years’ time.

What’s going to happen in those four years that we are sitting around debating, arguing, dividing our forces and our efforts and not applying them how we could and should be?

This is what will happen: at a rate of 66% increase in poaching from one year to the next, which is what we have seen in the last two years, we will lose 1 666 rhinos this year and then 767 rhinos the next until finally in 2017 the figure is 7 624… that’s a total of 16 650 rhino – which as you know is not far from what we have got at the moment. I know that the conservationists in the know will jump around and say that the current rate of increase will have to drop as rhino numbers decrease and the rhino densities will decrease, making it harder and harder to poach the rhino. But seriously – had we even thought what is happening now would be possible or conceivable back in 2007? We just can’t tell and just don’t know, but again – does it matter?

The point is, we need to start all talking in the same language about what we can do NOW and not what is possible in four years’ time because in four years, it might just not matter.

So let’s stop the debating and time wasting and division. Let us join forces again and forge a path to develop a stronger political will to stop this. It doesn’t help just doing that in South Africa; we need it to include the Asian states and every entity out there. Let the world, holding summits and symposiums, see that we are standing together and appreciating their efforts. We must show them our support and would like their support to help us increase the political will in this regard.

ALSO READ: Why are rhinos so important for ecosystems?

Diving with dinosaurs

Just off the Cape peninsula, close to the pretty bay of Simon’s Town, lies an innocuous short stretch of ocean. Like much of the seascape here, kelp sprouts from the kryptonite-green water lapping at boulders straight out of The Flintstones. It looks a lot like the rest of this spectacular coastline. Yet this body of water harbours a prehistoric secret: just a short hop, skip and a dive away from the shore you’ll find living, breathing dinosaurs.

The name of this astonishing creature is the broadnose sevengill shark. Yet I prefer their more palatable, less adjective heavy name: cow shark. These fish have glided through our oceans for hundreds of million of years, unblemished by Mother Nature’s marauding fingers.

All sharks originally possessed seven pairs of gill slits. A period of tweaking and refining commenced and most species drop a couple of pairs. For some reason the cow sharks kept theirs. In fact, cow sharks have very few modern adaptations, which is why they remain one of the closest links we have to dinosaurs.

For some unknown reason, the cow sharks just love this tiny stretch of water and congregate here en masse, just metres offshore. I’d read about this extraordinary site, yet before now had never had the opportunity to dive here. Shore diving remains one of my favourite methods of exploring the deep blue; there are no boats with their thumping motors, no launches, no travelling out for miles to sea. A shore dive simply features you, your breathing apparatus, your buddies, and a gradual descent into an underwater world packed full of goodies.

Unfortunately, these goodies come wrapped in a bitterly cold packaging. Even 10mm of neoprene, hoodies, gloves and boots do little to mask the freezing water. Our dive guide was free diver and photographer, Jacques de Vos. Jacques has spent countless hours underwater interacting with the cow sharks. He has built up an intimate knowledge of their behaviour and habits. He stressed that whilst the cow sharks may appear docile, we must maintain eye contact and not touch them. Attacks on divers are rare, yet it’s important to remain vigilant when dealing with toothy predators like sharks. Especially ones that can grow to four metres in length and have been found with human remains in their stomachs.

We entered the water via the rocks. The Cape waters welcomed us with an icy blast, jolting our systems, priming our senses. My first encounter with a two metre male put me at ease. In fact, I could have sworn it was smiling at me. Much like dolphins, cow sharks’ stubby faces are etched with perma-smiles. Depending on your point of view, this is either quite cute, or freakishly sinister. Either way, it’s as unusual as it is mesmerising.

The other notable thing about these sharks is their curious, bold nature. Most sharks, despite their fearsome reputations, remain skittish when encountering humans. Cow sharks, on the other hand, will boldly check divers out, flash a wicked smile and then glide off momentarily, before returning for a second look. They move as if in slow motion, their stout bodies propelled by long, elegant sweeps of the tail. The sharks are a photographer’s dream; willing posers for the camera and enveloped by the most spectacular studio imaginable.

Sadly, the fate of the cow sharks is a familiar one. They are being fished extensively in these waters. Whilst I was diving there, reports began to surface of cow sharks being used as bait for great whites by several of the operators in Gansbaai. Sharks, yet again, are falling prey to the greatest predator to ever walk the earth; man. Every year, we are responsible for the deaths of up to 100 million sharks. We kill sharks for their jaws and teeth which make tacky souvenirs. We kill them for the oil in their liver, their cartilage, flesh and fins. Now, unimaginably, we are killing them to feed their own, by those who pass themselves off as shark conservationists.

I left this magical stretch of water full of wonder at the amazing smiling cow sharks of Cape Town, yet appalled at how, once again, we are changing the face of our oceans. Cow sharks have survived five mass extinctions and due to man’s shortsightedness and greed, they now face a sixth.

Diving with Dinosaurs: The Cow Sharks of Cape Town HD from Moz Images on Vimeo.

Contact Mike at Pisces Divers for more information on diving with the cow sharks.

Rhino horn – Will supporters of trade make their case?

Organisers of a key conference about rhino conservation and the merits or otherwise of introducing a legal trade in rhino horn, scheduled for early April, claim that advocates of trade are threatening to boycott the conference because their point of view will not be represented.

But OSCAP (Outraged SA Citizens Against Poaching), the South African NGO hosting the conference, believes that their potential absence is of their own making as they have been invited to present their case. “We have never disguised the fact that the principal objective of this conference is to allow the South African public to hear, in detail, the reasons why so many conservationists oppose the legalization of rhino horn trade. Typically, their voices get drowned out in this country ” said OSCAP Director Allison Thomson. “There is no question that it is also a great opportunity for those who favour a legal trade to make their case. We don’t want to avoid debate, which is what has happened in the past, and this is why the pro-trade lobby have been invited to attend,” she added.

Commercial trade in high-value wildlife products is one of the most controversial subjects in wildlife conservation. South Africa has long implemented a policy of ‘sustainable utilisation’, which promotes the principle of using wildlife to fulfill current needs, but without jeopardising the benefits for future generations.

However, OSCAP warns of the danger of using the sustainable utilisation principle as a ‘one-size-fits-all’ concept, as this may well have detrimental long term impacts on the environment.

For example, there is a strong probability that the one-off sales of ivory sanctioned in 1999 and 2008 have significantly contributed to the devastating surge in elephant poaching across Africa, and the organization wants to ensure the same mistakes are not made with rhino.

It is public knowledge that the South African government and numerous private sector conservationists and economists, as well as many rhino owners believe that legalising trade is the solution to the rhino poaching crisis. However, this is a viewpoint that is not widely shared and is being questioned both domestically and internationally. Rhino horn trade economics is increasingly being criticised for being based on useless and discredited economic modeling methods.

Given this level of opposition, “We are offering people a perfect opportunity, on an open platform and with media exposure, to argue their case for trade,” says Thomson. “And it’s somewhat contradictory to complain that you are not being represented, but then choosing to boycott when invited” she added.

The conference entitled Assessing the risks of rhino horn trade takes place on the 8th and 9th of April at 2014, and will have a cast of well-known international and local speakers, including some from other rhino range states. Included is Peter Knights of WildAid, Mary Rice of the Environmental Investigation Agency, Francisco Aguayo an independent consultant and Ian Michler. They will address the challenges involved in rhino conservation, the risks associated with the pro-trade policy option, and actions that could help stem the current wave of poaching which has already breached the 150 mark for 2014.

Thomson confirms that her offer to those in favour of trade, including the South African government, the Private Rhino Owners Association and pro-trade economists, remains on the table. “I hope they will take this unique opportunity to challenge those who oppose trade and make their case,” she concluded.

For details of the conference and to reserve tickets please go to www.oscap.co.za or www.oscapconference.co.za.

Satellite tag could reveal more about mysterious coelacanths

The “Biology, Behaviour, Evolution and Conservation of the Coelacanth Population from iSimangaliso Wetland Park” is a project that includes the satellite tagging and monitoring of coelacanths in the world heritage site; that extremely rare and remarkable species of fish found in the deepest offshore canyons of the Sodwana Bay section of the park. The coelacanth, previously thought to have gone extinct, was discovered at iSimangaliso in 2000. Written by: Dr Kerry Sink

On the 8th of February 2014, a data-logging satellite tag was recovered offshore at Sodwana Bay. The tag released itself, as programmed, nine months after attachment and is identified as having been attached to ‘Individual 26’, fondly known as “Eric Eyelashes” after the diver who first photographed it, and referring to the eyelash-like white markings around its eye. The coelacanth, the 26th of 32 known individuals, had been tagged by a team of divers during a six week collaborative coelacanth research expedition on the 13th of May 2013.

The tag emerged about 12km north of the position where it was placed onto the fish, extending the known range of coelacanth distribution in the iSimangaliso Wetland Park by approximately 7km to a total range of approximately 60km. According to iSimangaliso CEO Andrew Zaloumis, the recovery of the tag and subsequent data retrieval is “exciting news for the park and its researchers, as this will add a tremendous amount to what we know about this elusive denizen of iSimangaliso. This tagging study is the first time that longer term data on coelacanth movement has ever been collected. The tag transmits summarised data via satellite and stores scientific information, the retrieval of which is critical to access the full set of scientific data.”

The tag is designed to continuously collect environmental data that can inform scientists about depth, position and temperature. Once the full set of data is retrieved detailed information on the behaviour and habitat of this coelacanth should be available. Scientists and divers are particularly excited to see the depth data to assess whether coelacanths move into deeper water particularly when temperature increases. Coelacanths have a relatively small gill surface area for their large body size and their blood physiology is reported to be adapted to cooler water.

Coelacanths are considered critically endangered and consequently iSimangaliso only permitted the tagging of only one animal. The tagging was an experimental move as there was a high possibility that the tag would release in a cave and not reach the surface or that it would release into the open water but not be found.

The tag will offer new insights into the movement, activity periods and diving behaviour of this coelacanth. Each coelacanth is uniquely marked and recorded in a Catalogue of Living Coelacanths of the iSimangaliso Wetland Park. Pressure, light intensity and sea temperature data will help determine when the coelacanth entered and left caves, diving behaviour or movement inshore and along shore movements over longer distances. This is the very first time that such data has been collected over such a long period and may reveal tidal, lunar or seasonal patterns in behaviour. More information on the thermal range and maximum and minimum depth of iSimangaliso’s coelacanths is also expected. This data can be used to guide coelacanth searches in the future.

The coelacanth has a history of surprise from its initial discovery after millions of years of presumed extinction to new insights into reproduction, evolution and distribution. There is likely at least one new coelacanth secret stored in the little grey tag.

The Lower Zambezi beneath a copper sky

Three weeks ago Zambia’s government gave the go ahead for Australian mining and exploration company, Zambezi Resources, to mine Lower Zambezi National Park for copper. Environmental groups challenged the decision and for now it is under review. When I phoned Zambezi Resources for comment I shouldn’t have been surprised to hear a voice recording saying: “访问被阻止请稍后重试.”

The Zambezi Valley at sunrise ©Morkel Erasmus

Zambia’s main export partner is China accounting for most of its copper, cobalt, tobacco and cotton. Chinese investment in the country is considerable at over US$ 2.5 billion – not enough to afford Whatsapp, but that would require Zambia’s entire GDP with only a billion left to spare.

Chinese companies run more than 2 000 enterprises in Africa and 500 of them are in Zambia. It’s estimated that more than 80 000 Chinese immigrants live in Zambia encouraged by a 2008 development in which a tax free zone was established for Chinese investors.

The ministry of education has introduced Chinese language in some schools and Chinese culture permeates life in the capital of Lusaka, a notable architectural feature being a large Pagoda housing The Great Wall Casino. The gambling overflow heads to the nearby New Buffalo Casino and as African as the name sounds the punters are mainly from the country once referred to as the Sleeping Dragon. But what does an Australian mining company have to do with all this?

Despite the recession in 2008 mining experienced a boom fuelled by Chinese and Indian growth. Not only have Australian companies benefitted from mining on their own continent, but they have increased their expansion into Africa in order to capitalise on the demand. China often invests in Africa without the conditions attached to Western finance and if foreign companies collaborate with the Chinese in Africa it smooths development. It helps especially if the minerals are heading to China.

The hills behind this elephant mark the place where the mine is planned to be located © Morkel Erasmus

Negative environmental impact assessment

“Access is currently blocked, please try again later,” was the English translation that followed the Zambezi Resources telephone recording. I was angling for a comment from company chairman, David Vilensky, on the injunction prohibiting his company from developing the mine. I wasn’t surprised the line was blocked and assumed they had been inundated with calls.

It was a very different affair three weeks previously when Zambia’s Ministry of Lands, Natural Resources and Environmental Protection made the questionable decision to overturn a negative Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) of the proposed mining project known as the Kangaluwi Copper Project.

One of the critics of the mining project is Zambia’s Tourism and Arts Minister, Slyvia Masebo. She said her Ministry feels that the project should not go ahead because it will put the existence of the Lower Zambezi National Park at risk. Breaking it down in monetary terms, she said, “Government risks losing safari fees amounting to over K84 million and photographic revenue amounting to over K9 million if the mine is allowed to exist.” She is on shaky ground as this amounts to just US$16 million when the Australian company plans to invest more than US$450 million in the project. And as we all know, money tends to cloud any issues in Africa.

The key issue is the potential environmental impact. Lower Zambezi National Park ranks as Zambia’s third most renowned national park after South Luangwa and Kafue. It covers an area of 4 000 square kilometres with it’s southern boundary along the Zambezi River. On the opposite bank is the famous World Heritage Site, Mana Pools National Park and Lower Zambezi is itself in consideration for World Heritage status. Chances are this would fall away if mining commenced.

“Protecting – and indeed enhancing flora and fauna,” Vilensky

Lower Zambezi is a relatively underdeveloped park with limited access. Most of the lodges are located along the Zambezi shore. But this underdevelopment means the flora and fauna remain largely undisturbed, a distinct advantage in terms of environmental preservation.

An open pit copper mine would seriously affect this. Advocates of the mining operation argue that it would take up just 6% of the park and actually increase tourism because of improved access by road. “We share the concerns of those who have so vocally expressed their opposition to the project,” said David Vilensky in a statement. “For this reason, we are keen to engage with local environmentalists to ensure we can achieve a win-win situation: bringing jobs and prosperity to local communities while protecting – and indeed enhancing – the flora and fauna of the area.”

Vilensky must take environmentalists for fools. How they could possibly enhance and protect flora and fauna is a mystery that is counter to the very concept of mining. One can only imagine improved road access and subsequent increase in tourist revenue is where the proposed enhancement would come from. If so Vilensky is glossing over the negative factors.

Better road access for tourists also means better access for poachers and people from marginalised communities who turn Zambian trees into charcoal in order to eke out an existence. Deforestation due to charcoal manufacture is a major problem in Zambia. Thousands of poor communities can be found along Zambian roads which they use to access woodland and get charcoal to buyers. They bare testament to the misappropriation of Zambian revenue and negate any promise of money from this copper mine benefitting the Zambian people.

Bags of charcoal on the way to market – a common sight on Zambian roads © Anton Crone

Vilensky issued the statement. “Kangaluwi Copper Project will be the cleanest, greenest and safest copper mine ever built, probably anywhere in the world, applying the world’s best practices and technology. Zambezi Resources is a responsible Australian company and understands the importance of conserving the environment, particularly in a sensitive area such as the Lower Zambezi National Park.”

But this can been brought into question. Where developers say the mine will be located on an escarpment 35 kilometers away from the Zambezi, scientist Dr Kellie Leigh, who worked in the area for seven years, says the site is actually 19 kilometres from the river and inside the river’s catchment area. “More importantly, that 19 kilometre distance is meaningless since the identified General Mining Activity Area, in their EIS (Environmental Impact Statement), is less than 1 kilometre from the Chakwenga river and Kangaluwi stream, both of which they identify in their EIS as draining the project site and both of which flow into the Zambezi,” says Leigh.

Australian mining record sullied

Advocates of the project say Australian mining practices are among the most ethical in the world, but their record in Africa and on their own continent is sullied. The very principle of mining in a national park might seem inexplicable to many, but Australia’s Kakadu National Park is also home to the Ranger uranium mine where more than 150 leaks, spills and licence breaches have been reported since it opened in 1981.

A result of Australia’s Asian inspired mining boom is the expansion of the Abbot Point shipping port for exporting coal. To expand the port, millions of tons of sediment are to be dredged and dumped inside the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. The dredging project has been given the green light by the Australian government.

One of the most significant recent developments in coal production is in the Tete province of Mozambique. The area is reputed to have the largest reserves of coal in the world estimated at almost 7 billion tons. You only need travel along the province’s roads to see the devastation mining has on the environment and communities.

Practices by foreign mining companies in Tete, including Anglo-Australian giant, Rio Tinto, have been brought into question. NGO Southern African Resource Watch highlighted concerns about the way they were relocating Mozambican communities to make way for coal projects – sometimes over 40km from the main road. Among the concerns was insufficient land allocated to communities for sustainable farming and the sometimes requisition of land already claimed by communities.

Underdeveloped and corrupt governance

Ultimately the influences of foreign industry on communities and environment in Africa should be policed by local governments. But its hard to do that with underdeveloped and corrupt governance and the communities affected lack the knowledge and access to information that can help them decide what’s in their best interest and what action to take.

We should applaud foreign development in Africa, it’s just that so much of it is stacked on trucks heading for sea ports. Newly built Chinese roads in Zambia, Tanzania and Mozambique are giving way under the weight of copper and coal and the trees on either side are vanishing as the people who are meant to benefit can do little more than watch the promises disappear, and scavenge wood for charcoal.

Money talks, and so do African governments. They talk of great benefits to nations. These voices reach the people, but the benefits seldom do. The only voice I hear right now is a Chinese recording. Let’s hope the voice that emerges from the injunction is one of sound judgement and reason.

Click here to sign the petition against mining in Lower Zambezi National Park.

Fight for the fynbos fish

The sun reaches its apex as the faint familiar gurgle of water over rock greets my ears. It has been a hot and thorny hike up the kloof through pathless fynbos. Before that, a long and sweaty drive through townships and farmlands, and before that, the incessant clockwork hum of modern-day city life. But now, having finally arrived at the water’s edge and the home of special fish, a different kind of rhythm starts to take over.

I pause for long enough to breathe it in and then allow my body to free fall. A thunderous splash, and then silence. I open my eyes and peer through the goggles, swimming deeper down, down into darkness. I grab hold of a rock the size of a rugby ball, flip over onto my back and peer up at the silhouette that starts to take shape above. Just the cool swirling of water at first, but as the debris settles the shapes begin to move. Appearing from nowhere and from everywhere, clusters then swarms of them start dancing, weaving and frolicking through the strings of silvery bubbles. They are the redfin minnows, the spirits of these mountains. I close my eyes, let go and savour the weightlessness that lifts me gently up, up back towards the light.

fish — Redfin minnows swimming freely in their natural habitat

This river is not like other rivers. This is one of the last large rivers in the Cape Floristic Region (CFR), at the south-western tip of Africa, where native fish still swim free and untroubled, as they have done for millions and millions of years. A few hundred meters downstream there is a small waterfall, and below that there are no minnows, only introduced bass. Brought here from the northern hemisphere a century ago to provide fishermen with a respectable quarry, predatory non-native fishes like bass and trout have invaded countless rivers and pose the single greatest threat to remaining indigenous fish populations in the CFR.

All of the 12 species of redfin minnow, the most widespread group of freshwater fishes in the CFR, are endemic, and nine of these species face a serious risk of extinction. Redfin minnows evolved in the absence of large predatory fish and consequently have not developed adaptations necessary to cope with this new predatory threat. It appears that their naiveté in the presence of invasive predators renders them especially vulnerable to predation and has contributed to their rapid disappearance from many of the region’s streams.

The fate of the fynbos fish now lies in our hands. We need to focus on safeguarding the remaining populations against further devastation. To achieve this there must be a concerted effort to prevent new alien fish introductions above the waterfalls and weirs that function as barriers, especially in places where critically endangered species occur upstream. To this end, there is an urgent need to boost education and awareness around the issue of freshwater fish conservation in the CFR, and the recently launched Cape Critical Rivers project is an encouraging step in the right direction. Supported by the international Save Our Species campaign, the CCR project is working with land owners and other stake holders to protect two of the CFR’s most threatened freshwater fishes – the Clanwilliam sandfish and the Barrydale redfin.

In some cases native species have been reduced to such small sections of river that they will unlikely be able to cope with future environmental changes. In such situations the chances of a species surviving can be greatly improved by increasing habitat through the clearing of alien fishes from a section of river. A recent and exciting project coordinated by local conservation agency CapeNature has demonstrated that alien fish can be successfully eradicated, and that this conservation tool can be extremely effective in reeling our threatened fish species back from the edge of extinction. Unfortunately, management interventions like this do not come cheap, and with several species still on shaky ground, our work in this area is far from done.

Professors Peter Ryan and Graeme Cumming form the Percy FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology (University of Cape Town) marvelling at swarms of redfin in the Witte River, Bainskloof

In just one lifetime our freshwater fishes have disappeared from the vast majority of their natural habitat, but the damage has been done underwater in remote mountainous areas that fall out of site of the public eye. It is now time for us to stand up, take notice and fight on behalf of these ancient, silent creatures of the streams.

REDFIN // a conservation story from Otto Whitehead.

Rhinos: It’s time for Plan B

We do not get a second chance. If we get the economics of rhino trading wrong all the rhinos in the wild will be gone. We have to get our policies right, and there’s no room for experiments; viewing rhinos in small secure breeding farms is no substitute. The tragedy of the horn debate is that South Africa’s highly respected rhino custodians (park authorities, field rangers, anti-poaching, monitoring teams) and even politicians have embraced a failed, pro-trade economic model as the answer to the rhino crisis.

Let’s look at the economics. Pro-traders argue that the supply of rhino horn can equal demand through free-trade pricing. This may work for large, visible items like Ferraris, but it has not worked for other consumer goods where counterfeiters thrive and expand markets by attracting new buyers by selling goods at discounted prices.

With the real cost of obtaining a rhino horn being a little above the cost of a bullet and a hacksaw, there will always be too much of a price difference between the legal selling price of rhino horn and the cost of poaching that horn. To assume that free-trade pricing economics will stem demand and solve the poaching crisis is nonsense when criminal syndicates can expand markets by supplying discounted goods and perverting the legal market.

The pro-trade price theory simply has not been proven – it is pure conjecture – nor does it take into account the massive potential size of the market. What if the demand for rhino horn is much greater than the supply? With close to a billion potential Asian consumers, this could easily become a reality, especially when criminal syndicates can induce increased demand by selling at prices below those set by the central selling organisation. Then what? The horns of just 25 000 rhinos simply cannot satisfy the demand from just a few million Asian consumers.

Pro-traders cite examples of ostriches, crocodiles, and vicuñas as successes that rhino policies must copy to ensure rhino survival. These are not comparable examples as ostriches etc., breed quickly, and none show the same scarcity levels based on values attached to body parts. Tigers and elephants do, and we’ve seen what trade in their parts has done to wild populations. If trading was the simple answer for all wildlife crises, why don’t we breed and trade tigers (or wild dogs) out of their critical status?

The pro-traders propose that the way to conduct rhino sales is via a De Beers-type Central Selling Organisation (CSO). Many economists out there’ll tell you how cartels serve only their own narrow interests (rhino breeders?) rather than the majority of stakeholders. The De Beers CSO made money for their vested interests but, in the process, certainly didn’t stop ‘blood diamonds’ or illegal parallel markets. Well-organised criminal syndicates will find loopholes around a rhino-horn CSO, providing a legal platform to launder illegal horn. And, will our authorities really be able to run a sophisticated CSO system?

But here’s the crux of the matter. Current international legislation clearly states that there can be no trade in rhino horn. The onus, therefore, must be on the pro-trade lobby to prove that rhino horn trading will unequivocally work, that changing the laws will not be detrimental to rhino populations and will largely do away with poaching and illegal trade. This has not yet been proven, and current pro-trade modelling glosses over these vital areas by making basic assumptions.

We also need to factor in that South Africa has little chance of getting any application for approved seller status through CITES in the foreseeable future. The earliest SA can submit such a proposal for change is 2016, and this merely sets in motion a whole range of bureaucratic procedures and legislative measures. Any change then requires a 75% majority – highly unlikely considering our current administrative malaise – and many more years will be wasted to implement.

With this protracted process in mind, I’m surprised that SA has no ‘Plan B’ because it will need one. My suggestion is that all sides get together and create a strategy that’s a wide-ranging, multi-faceted approach covering the entire scope of the crisis to ensure that rhinos have a chance of surviving in the wild. Here are suggestions (over and above those that are already work in progress):

• To stem the poaching avalanche, we declare all forms of trade in rhino products illegal. This means we must switch mindsets from creating value from rhinos to minimising or, even better, taking away all their value to save them in the wild. It’s a big ask for pro-traders to change mindsets, but the horn must become worthless for rhinos to survive in the wild.

• Very little has been done to target the middleman. They’re the poaching syndicate’s weakest link. Middlemen pay poachers to kill rhinos, and they export the horns. There can’t be too many of them, and some are not hard to spot. Without them, the whole poaching chain would start to implode. Communities will give information if the rewards for poaching information are greater than what they earn from poaching. Lifestyle audits etc will assist. There are laws in Mozambique that allow assets to be confiscated. There are reputable people with the necessary skills, expertise and contacts who are prepared to tackle this problem if given the go-ahead and budget.

• South Africa’s tourism and wildlife policies have often not sufficiently included rural communities living alongside national parks in their business models, and it is from these communities that many poachers emerge. Our wildlife areas are surrounded by rapidly increasing rural populations and extreme poverty. Innovative policies and plans must be put into place to integrate communities into the tourism and wildlife industry’s business models. So long as these neighbouring communities remain marginalised, they’ll seek to claim wildlife, either in their cooking pots or through illicit activities.

To redress this, I propose the creation of a “Natural Capital Fund” to:

1. bolster conservation and anti-poaching work,

2. remunerate and uplift communities who live alongside parks and reserves

3. pay for information leading to the arrest of the middlemen and poachers.

• The South African tourism industry generates well over R100 billion a year. I propose that a 1% levy is charged on all tourism accommodation and related services to support this “Natural Capital Fund”. This could generate as much as R1 billion a year. Getting tourism industry buy-in would take some persuasion, but it’s possible if there was leadership. In my experience, tourists do not mind paying a small levy if they know it’s going to a worthy cause. The funds could be distributed through an impartial and respectable NGO so that the money is spent wisely and accounted for.

• Elevate the crisis to a presidential priority level with Mozambique, Vietnam and China to speed up agreements and implement effective policies.

• We need an Elon Musk/Steve Jobs type of left-field thinking to ensure technology is created to help monitor and protect vast wildernesses such as Kruger.

Some pro-traders concede that their policies may result in rhinos becoming extinct in the wild and only found on small, well-protected farms. Is this what we all want?

The bottom line is: which is the safer bet – testing the insatiability of market demand, or creating an effective Plan B with no trade, ensuring that rhinos survive in the wild? We cannot risk rhinos becoming extinct in the wild and South Africa becoming merely a “Big 4” tourism destination through high-risk economic policies. How many jobs will be lost if that happens?

ALSO READ: Rhino horn trade = extinction in the wild

Parrots and people

The lives of parrots and people have been intimately entwined for centuries, if not millennia. Given the familiarity of many of us with some of Africa’s parrots, it may come as a surprise that we still know so little about their lives in the wild. The World Parrot Trust is working hard to improve the understanding and conservation of these very special birds, and 2014 sees a ramping up of their Africa Conservation Programme, but they need your support.

Globally parrots are one of the most threatened of all bird families. Their popularity as pets and tendency to roost and feed together in large groups has left them vulnerable to trapping. In addition, the reliance of many species on large mature trees in which they roost, feed and nest makes them highly susceptible to forest loss. Rates of forest loss in parts of Africa are among the world’s highest.

Some of Africa’s parrots have the dubious distinction of having been among the most traded of all bird species listed under CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Fauna and Flora). Africa’s lovebirds and species, such as African grey and Senegal parrots, are among the most popular pet birds. Many of us have been up close to these parrots in captivity and have been enchanted by their personalities. They feature prominently in popular culture and are among the first birds many children encounter in storybooks. Indeed, it was an African grey parrot that taught Dr Doolittle how to talk to the animals!

Given our fascination with these birds and the threats they face, the dearth of information on wild populations is surprising. Some species trapped in the highest numbers have not been the focus of a single field study, and no long-term monitoring initiatives exist. The unenviable task of determining whether trapping could be sustainable can be little better than educated guesswork. Recent efforts to address this shortfall have begun to fill in some of the knowledge gaps, but there remains much to be done.

Over the past decade or so, there has been a large increase in the number of field studies on African parrots, with projects focused on Lillian’s lovebirds in Malawi, black-cheeked lovebirds in Zambia, Rüppell’s parrots in Namibia, Meyer’s parrots in Botswana, grey parrots in Cameroon and brown-necked, grey-headed and Cape parrots as well as rosy-faced lovebirds in South Africa. We now know much more about the ecology of these parrots, with information on the nest characteristics, diets, flocking behaviour and vocalisations of many. Despite these advances, there has been a strong geographical bias in research efforts, with parrots outside southern Africa receiving little attention.

Some species, such as Niam-niam parrots and Swindern’s lovebirds, are almost unknown, and our knowledge of their distribution remains little more than loosely drawn circles on a map. For other species, we know enough to be concerned. More research should go hand-in-hand with conservation actions to address likely threats. Yellow-fronted parrots, for example, are restricted to Ethiopia’s remaining fragments of Afromontane forests. Actions to address the degradation of their habitat should be complemented by research into limits on populations and current distribution. While more research and monitoring will enable conservation actions to be refined and improved, waiting until we have all the answers may mean we wait too long.

The World Parrot Trust has been supporting parrot conservation in Africa for many years and has been involved in landmark projects across the continent, such as the recent release by Jane Goodall of a group of African grey parrots back into the wild in Uganda. 2014 marks an increased focus on the special parrots of Africa, with new projects starting in Guinea-Bissau, Senegal, South Africa, Zambia and Uganda. The World Parrot Trust is currently raising funds to support these efforts, with all donations made up until the 31st of January being matched by some very generous donors. Visit their website to find out more about the work of the World Parrot Trust and what you can do to help.

Orange-bellied parrot © Jimmy Vangenechten

Baboon spiders: hairy monsters or furry friends?

Baboon spider! The name conjures up images of giant, hairy, eight-legged creatures that could be the stuff of nightmares or cheesy Hollywood horror movies. But to the contrary, baboon spiders are placid, enigmatic animals that would rather keep to themselves than risk an encounter with human beings. And believe it or not, some people are fascinated by them…

Baboon spiders are African tarantulas. They belong to a primitive group of spiders called the mygalomorphs, which also includes trapdoor spiders and several other families. The group is characterised by possessing downward striking fangs and two pairs of lungs. The spiders that most of us are familiar with; rain spiders, wolf spiders, jumping spiders, and crab spiders, belong to the more advanced group, the araneomorphs, which have opposing, pincer-like fangs and one pair of book lungs.

The distinguishing characteristic of baboon spiders is their size. They can reach a leg span of 12-15cm. Some other spiders, such as rain spiders or tropical wolf spiders, can rival this but baboon spiders are much stockier heavier animals. It is uncertain how they got their name, but it probably relates to their large, hairy appearance. The other theory is that the soft, sticky pads they have on their legs, which they use to climb smooth surfaces and grip prey, resemble the pads on a baboon’s fingers.

Baboon spiders will feed on anything they can kill. This includes a range of insects and other invertebrates, such as beetles, grasshoppers and crickets, millipedes, and even scorpions. They will also occasionally take small vertebrates like geckos or even rodents. They are the prey for a range of animals, including birds, lizards and mongooses. They have developed several interesting defence mechanisms to protect themselves. When threatened, they will raise up their front legs and body and strike aggressively at an antagonist. Many species possess special feathery structures on their mouthparts, called scopulae, which they rub together to produce a hissing sound. A hissing, striking spider can be a formidable sight.

Despite their posturing, baboon spiders are harmless to humans. They have long fangs, and they do possess large venom glands, but the bite is only painful; it causes no systemic symptoms. Furthermore, encounters with baboon spiders are rare. They prefer to live in natural habitats and rarely come into people’s gardens and houses.

So why a blog post about baboon spiders? The answer is simple, we want you, the reader, to help with baboon spider research and conservation. Last year the Animal Demography Unit launched SpiderMAP; a new Virtual Museum project to gather photographic records of African spiders, and baboon spiders in particular. Knowing the geographic distribution range of a species is critical to understanding its conservation status, habitat requirements, and impacts by humans and climate change. But for many animals, and particularly invertebrates like insects and spiders, we often only have a vague idea of the species’ geographic range. The Virtual Museum allows members of the general public to contribute to discovering species’ geographic ranges by submitting photographs of animals they see in the wild, along with precise GPS coordinates of where the animal was seen, to an online database. These records accumulate over time and gradually build a picture of the geographic range. The Animal Demography Unit has had great success with initiatives, producing authoritative publications on distributions for birds, reptiles, frogs, and butterflies. We hope to do the same for baboon spiders.

Baboon spiders are long-lived animals, with females living for as long as 15 years in the wild. They are threatened by habitat destruction and over-collecting for the pet trade. If you see a baboon spider in the wild, take a photo and submit it to the Virtual Museum. You can visit the Virtual Museum here or click here to learn more about baboon spiders.

ALSO READ Fishing spiders – small but deadly predators

A quarter of the world’s sharks and rays face extinction

Information provided by: Save Our Seas Conservation Media Unit

A quarter of the world’s sharks, rays and chimaeras are threatened with extinction according to the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, with ray species found to be at a higher risk than sharks. The findings are part of the first-ever global analysis for these species carried out by the IUCN Shark Specialist Group (SSG).

The study was published in the journal eLife. It is the culmination of years of collaboration between 306 experts from 64 countries around the world who volunteered their time and expertise at numerous workshops and by correspondence to analyse the conservation status of all 1 041 shark, ray and chimaera species. This has never been done before for any complete major marine taxonomic group.

The results paint an ominous picture for the chondrichthyan fishes (sharks, rays, and chimaeras) around the world. Only 23% of these species are considered safe from extinction. This makes them the most threatened group of vertebrate animals. This is particularly alarming considering the huge ecological value of these predators, which play a crucial role in the functioning of marine food webs.

“Sharks, rays, and chimaeras tend to grow slowly and produce few young, which leaves them particularly vulnerable to over-fishing,” says Sonja Fordham, President of the Washington, DC-based Shark Advocates International, a project sponsored by the Save Our Seas Foundation. “Significant policy strides have been made over the last two decades but effective conservation requires a dramatic acceleration in pace as well as an expansion of scope to include all shapes and sizes of these exceptional species. Our analysis clearly demonstrates that the need for such action is urgent.”

The paper also highlights the urgent need for the protection of skates and rays, which has previously been overlooked by conservation groups.

“Surprisingly, we have found that the rays, including sawfish, guitarfish, stingrays, and wedgefish, are generally worse off than the sharks, with five out of the seven most threatened families made up of rays,” says Dr. Colin Simpfendorfer, IUCN SSG Co-Chair. “While public, media and government attention to the plight of sharks is growing, the widespread depletion of rays is largely unnoticed. Conservation action for rays is lagging far behind, which only heightens our concern for this species group.”

Globally, the regions of most concern are the Indo-Pacific biodiversity triangle, as well as the Red and Mediterranean Seas, which border the African continent. In general, chondrichthyans found off the coast of Africa are faring badly. 24% of African species are threatened, compared with the global average of 17.4%. 18% are near threatened, which is 5.3% higher than the global figure.

The good news is that we are reasonably well informed about African chondrichthyans. Data deficient species are relatively low, at 38%, compared with the global total of 46.8%. This means that most African nations are better placed to make informed management decisions in an especially species-rich region. The Mozambique Channel, is one of the world’s most important biodiversity hotspots for many coastal and pelagic species.

Of particular concern is the high number of threatened endemic species in African waters. These animals have a very restricted distribution range and, once lost, cannot be replaced by immigration from populations elsewhere. The critically endangered ornate sleeper ray for example, was first named in 2007 and has only been spotted a handful of times, along a 310km short stretch of coast between KwaZulu Natal and the Eastern Cape.

“Threatened endemics pose a serious management challenge, particularly when they occupy a very limited habitat and depth range,” says Sarah Fowler, Save Our Seas Foundation Principal Scientist (and past IUCN Shark Specialist Group Chair and leader of the Shark Red List Assessment). Several of the southern African endemics, mostly small colourful species of sharks and rays, are threatened with extinction because their entire distribution is fished intensively, but have received very little conservation attention.”

In November last year, the South African National Plan of Action for the Conservation and Management of Sharks was announced. This is essentially the national shark conservation guidebook. It provides information on the status of chondrichthyans in South Africa and examines how best to manage shark fishing and the trade of shark products in the South African context. Conservation plans like these, informed by Red List assessments, are crucial for the continued existence of sharks, rays and chimaeras and healthy functioning of marine ecosystems.

“If we keep going as we are, then there is a real risk that sharks and rays will be as mythical as krakens and seamonsters to our grandchildren. Declines can be, and have been arrested; sharks and rays can be saved. We know what to do, and this is laid out in the paper and the reports of the Shark Specialist Group,” says Dr Nick Dulvy, Save Our Seas Foundation Funded Researcher and IUCN SSG Co-Chair.

Two lion cubs born in Liuwa

Two lion cubs have been sighted in Liuwa Plain National Park in Zambia, significantly marking the first birth of lion cubs in the park for well over 10 years. They were born to the protégé of the park’s famous lioness known as Lady Liuwa.

It is believed that this is the lioness’s second set of cubs and that she probably lost her first set due to inexperience. The father of the cubs is the park’s only male lion. The lioness has hidden her new cubs in thick bush, making it difficult to photograph them.

For more than nine years Lady Liuwa was a solitary, lonely lioness roaming the grassy plains of the park in search of fellow felines with whom to mate and hunt, the sole survivor after massive poaching and illegal trophy hunting wiped out the species in the park in the 1990s. The extraordinary story of how she turned to humans for companionship and how the conservation team at Liuwa Plain National Park helped to find her a family became one of the most moving wildlife films of all time.

The lioness in the front is Lady Liuwa and the lioness to the back is the new mother © African Parks/Paul Godard — The lioness in the front is Lady Liuwa, and the lioness in the back is the new mother © African Parks/Paul Godard

Lady Liuwa has dedicated social media profiles and has also featured prominently in the international media. Lady Liuwa’s protégé, the mother of the two newly born cubs, was one of two young females introduced from Kafue National Park in 2011. Her sister was killed by a snare in 2012, and she, probably traumatised by this event, ran away towards Angola. In a dramatic rescue mission, she was darted, airlifted back to the park, and placed in a fenced boma.

African Parks then decided to place Lady Liuwa in the boma to encourage the two lionesses to bond. After two months, the two lionesses were released back into the wilds and have since been inseparable.

Two male lions, which were introduced to Liuwa from Kafue in 2009, also headed towards Angola in mid-2012, and one was reportedly shot dead by villagers in Angola. His companion, who made it safely back to Liuwa, is now the resident male in the pride and father of the two new cubs.

“We are overjoyed to have sighted the cubs and will closely monitor the new offspring to minimise threats to them,” said Liuwa Park manager, Raquel Filgueiras. “The birth of the cubs will help safeguard the future of lions in Liuwa and strengthen the park’s tourism offering. It is an event in which all stakeholders including ZAWA, the BRE (Barotse Royal Establishment), the Liuwa communities and the park itself, can be proud.”

How the engagement ring proves that we shouldn’t trade rhino horn

Most Westerners know that the medicinal properties of rhino horn are nothing but an ancient Eastern myth. But poachers are decimating the rhino population as Asia’s demand for horn grows and illegal trade expands. There’s now pressure to legalise the trade and farm rhinos. The argument is that by saturating the market with rhino horn, value and demand will fall. On the surface, this might appear sensible, but there are lessons we can learn from a Western myth fabricated just eighty years ago.

Once the privilege of royalty and aristocrats, by the 1930s, diamonds were being sold to those of far more modest means thanks to De Beers diamond company and their advertising agency, N.W Ayer & Son. As the USA emerged from the depression, De Beers approached Ayer to create demand for their product. Based on a few examples set by European royalty, the advertising persuaded average Americans that a worthy man should give a diamond ring to his betrothed.

Diamonds had never harboured romantic connotations; they had always been considered symbols of privilege and wealth. Yet the campaign caught the American imagination, and the diamond’s association with romance grew. They exploited the exciting new medium of film by weaving diamonds into romantic Hollywood scenes and flaunting them on the fingers of the stars. The slogan Diamonds are Forever was spawned, instilling a sense of lasting romance while dissuading people from selling the rocks and flooding the market. To top it off, they proposed grooms spend no less than two months’ salary on an engagement ring and, as the campaign spread worldwide, British men were compelled to spend one month’s salary and Japanese men, three.

Many people reading this will have a diamond ring on their finger or will have spent a great deal of money buying one. It’s probably the greatest marketing trick of all time. So what would it take to dispel the myth about the engagement ring? At the very least, it would take an advertising campaign of equal proportion to the one that manufactured it and require funding only the likes of a diamond company could afford. Of course, diamond companies would counter with a campaign to reinforce the myth, and they have an eighty-year head start.

Now imagine how much time and money it would take to dispel the far more ancient and elaborate myth of the medical efficacy of the rhino horn. Imagine the backlash that would ensue from deeply entrenched players. In the face of this, it might appear the only course is to throw up our hands, legalise the trade and farm rhinos for their horn. In South Africa, there is a great deal of pressure to put just such a proposal before the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) in 2016. But then we need to look at other aspects of the diamond trade:

Diamond supplies are carefully controlled. Competing companies realise that dropping prices might kill the market, therefore, a certain amount is stockpiled to avoid saturating the market and keep demand and price at an optimum level.

The price of diamonds is so inflated that a vast criminal market operates in its shadow. We are generally aware of this, yet the bodies and abuse left in its wake do little to deter us. The film Blood Diamond opened millions of eyes to the horrors of the illicit trade, yet there was no apparent drop in sales after its release.

Reports of Zimbabwe’s recently found Marange diamond fields, reputed to be one of the greatest reserves in history, points to corruption and human rights abuse. But while the US refuses to deal in Zimbabwean diamonds, sanctions have just been lifted in Antwerp, the centre of diamond trading.

Of the legitimate mining operations on South Africa and Namibia’s west coast, estimates are that between fifteen and thirty percent of rough diamonds exit the mines illegally. But De Beers seeks out and buys up as many of these illicit diamonds as they can to control the supply, thus encouraging an illegal market.

Given the example of the diamond market, what would happen if we legalised the trade in rhino horn? The market would also be at risk of saturation (the stated goal of the pro-rhino horn trade lobby), but it’s doubtful that the already established suppliers, with their criminal roots, would let that happen. They would want prices to remain high, and the only way to ensure that would be to limit supply by hoarding stockpiles and controlling the rhino population. As demand increases, there could be as much, if not more, poaching to meet the demand and the illicit trade in rhino horn would still flourish and compete with the legitimate trade.

Conversely, if the price were to drop, it is highly unlikely it would deter poachers. At present, the price hovers between US$60 000 and US$100 000 per kilogram. Drop that to a tenth of the price or even less, and poachers would still gun them down to make a living.

A legal market would not discourage sophisticated terrorist organisations, already poaching to fund their exploits, from continuing. A legal market would, in fact, add a convenient smokescreen for their and other poaching operations.

The market for rhino horn is growing fast and will continue to grow with Asia’s booming economy. The current rise in rhino poaching is driven, to a great degree, by Vietnam’s economic rise. Here, the wealthy sprinkle horn on their food and snort it like cocaine – a sign of prestige because it is more expensive than the drug. They use it to cure hangovers and enhance hard-ons – all modern, manufactured myths.

As the demand rises, imagine the surge that would occur with legalisation. Just 1 million consumers consuming just 10g per month = 120 tons per year. At an average of 4kg per horn, that’s 30 000 rhinos per year, more than the total number of rhinos alive today. Now imagine 2 million consumers, 3 million….

A major influence would be marketing. A rumour started a few years ago claimed that a respected Vietnamese politician cured his cancer by ingesting powdered rhino horn. Such a cure has no foundation in traditional Chinese medicine; the politician was not even named, but the rumour spread rapidly. Many see it as an underground marketing campaign to drive up the value of rhino horn. If it was, it worked; measure for measure, rhino horn is now more valuable than gold.

Legalising the trade means marketers need not use the rumour mill because they can advertise in popular media. And we know how crafty advertisers can be; we fell for the diamond myth, after all.

Perhaps the greatest myth is that legalising the rhino horn trade is about conservation. But it is far more significant than that. By legalising the trade, we validate a fallacy. We legitimise the death of every single rhino slain illegally for its horn. We put this and other endangered species at greater risk by setting a precedent that could open avenues for trade in ivory, lion bone, leopard skin and more. We legitimise the corruption of African officials who are complicit in the illegal trade of endangered species and we set a terrible precedent for Africa’s future.

ALSO READ: Farmed vs wild rhino horn – what the research tells us

21 elephant calves a testimony to anti-poaching efforts

Twenty-one new elephant calves have been sighted at Zakouma National Park in the Republic of Chad, marking a significant anti-poaching turnaround in the fortune of the park’s beleaguered elephant herds decimated in recent years.

anti-poaching efforts — © African Parks/Lorna Labuschagne

The devastating poaching onslaught reduced Zakouma’s elephant population from 4 000 to 450 between 2006 and 2010, leaving the decimated herd too stressed to breed. Whilst African Parks has stabilised the elephant population since assuming management of Zakouma in 2010, only five calves were born between 2010 and 2013.

African Parks’ conservation director Dr Anthony Hall-Martin says the stress caused by the traumatic, mass killings by mounted poachers between 2005 and 2010 is the most likely reason why the surviving elephants stopped reproducing. Rian Labuschagne, Zakouma’s Park Manager, said that a lion study carried out around 2005 found that elephant calves made up an astounding 23 per cent of the diet of lions at that time. “It was a direct result of the then rampant poaching that left substantial numbers of calves orphaned and easy prey for the lions,” he said.

The flush of elephant calves sighted by Labuschagne and his team shortly before Christmas changes the status of Zakouma’s elephant population from “stable” to a “definite increase in numbers” and is testimony to the success of the intensive anti-poaching strategy implemented by African Parks since late 2010.

Anti-poaching measures have included the year-round deployment of patrols in the extended elephant range, aerial support for patrols along with the construction of eight regional airstrips, the fitting of satellite collars to individual elephants, establishing a park-wide radio communication system and central radio control room, increased intelligence-gathering and a reward system for information, advanced training for park guards, the establishment of a dedicated Rapid Response Unit and the deployment of specialised anti-poaching technology and equipment. As a result of these measures there has been no poaching of elephants in Zakouma for more than two years.

African Parks entered into a public-private partnership with the Chadian Government at the end of 2010 to manage Zakouma, one of the last strongholds for migratory herds of savannah elephants in the central African region. Given that the gestation period for elephants is 22 months, Zakouma’s elephants had settled down enough to start breeding within a year of African Parks assuming management of the park.

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Labuschagne concludes, “We are thrilled that Zakouma’s elephant numbers are now growing but are mindful of the continual challenges that we face. At the moment we are implementing major new anti-poaching initiatives to combat ongoing threats that now include the deteriorating situation in the Central African Republic to the south of us.”

Last year the Government of Chad launched a national programme to combat elephant poaching and protect Chad’s remaining elephant populations. This national initiative is a first for the Central African region where elephant numbers have declined by 62% in just 10 years. A National Elephant Monitoring Centre in the capital city of N’Djamena has been set up by African Parks and is run under the auspices of the Ministry of the Environment. It includes the satellite tracking of collared elephants throughout Chad.

Scientists call for critically endangered listing for West Africa’s lions

The living dead, scientists call them: populations of animals so small their extinction is all but inevitable. At the top of the list may be West Africa’s lions, according to a paper published in the scientific journal PLOS ONE.

Scientist Philipp Henschel of the conservation organisation Panthera is calling for the listing of West Africa’s lions as critically endangered.

Lions in West Africa are few and far between and isolated from their Central African neighbours. As a result, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) currently classifies them as regionally endangered, while lions in Central, East and Southern Africa are listed as vulnerable.

“Although the status of African lions everywhere is concerning,” says Henschel, “the situation is particularly alarming in West Africa.” Only 406 lions may remain there, according to surveys the research team conducted. The species now roams in just one percent of its historical range.

An inventory of the region’s lions conducted in 2001 and 2002 revealed that 450 to 1 300 lions remained. In response to those findings, Henschel undertook a new survey from 2006 to 2012 in West Africa’s savannas and woodlands. Working alongside Panthera researchers were biologists with the Wildlife Conservation Society and the Nigeria National Park Service, among others.

The scientists searched high and low for lions, padding along dry riverbeds, old park roads and game trails, and through lowland tropical rainforests. They faced the same risks as the lions they sought to find. Henschel negotiated with rebel leaders for access to lands and invited poachers to work with the team.

Among the objectives was looking for spoor – tracks, trails, scents, droppings – in 21 West African protected areas that once harboured lions. “We could confirm extant lions in only four,” says Henschel. In many of the areas, lion populations have almost bled out. Disease, poaching and habitat loss are leading to lion deaths.

The stakes are high. West Africa’s Lions differ from those in East and Southern Africa. Studies have shown that West and Central African lions are smaller in size and weight, have smaller manes, live in smaller groups, and eat smaller prey than lions elsewhere on the African continent. The differences are also reflected in their genes. If lions disappear from West Africa, according to Henschel, unique populations found nowhere else in the world will be lost.

The IUCN now manages two subspecies of lions: Panthera leo leo across Africa, and Panthera leo persica in India. But the main subdivision of lions genetically is within Africa, scientists believe, between the lions in East and Southern Africa versus all others. The two groups in Africa, the researchers say, should be listed and managed separately. If that happened, West (and Central) African lions would possibly be called Panthera leo senegalensis.

The last best hope for Panthera leo senegalensis may lie where the buffalo and antelope still roam; in Pendjari National Park in northwestern Benin, which adjoins Arly National Park in Burkina Faso. Along with W Transborder Park, which spans Niger, Burkina Faso, and Benin, the three parks form the WAP (W-Arly-Pendjari) complex. WAP is the largest protected ecosystem in West Africa.

From March 19 to May 22, 2012, Henschel and others surveyed more than 75 percent of the WAP complex. The total lion population there was estimated at 356 lions. Lions were also confirmed in three other West African protected areas; Kainji Lake National Park, Nigeria (an estimated 32 lions), Yankari Game Reserve, Nigeria (2 lions), and Niokolo-Koba National Park, Senegal (16 lions).

Lions have disappeared across Africa as human populations have overtaken the landscape, competing with wildlife for habitat. Savannas have been converted into farms and fields for agriculture and livestock. Uncontrolled logging and burning have led to deforestation, desertification, and declining water quality. Some places in West Africa have become near deserts.

“Weak management of lions’ habitat due to a lack of funds has led to a collapse in lion prey populations and lions,” says Henschel. One West African park’s management budget is, he says, “roughly US $20 per square kilometre; incredibly low. To reverse the declines and stabilize populations of lions and their prey, we need a huge increase in financial backing for protected areas.” He points out that the WAP complex has received sustained assistance from Germany and the European Union. Hence, there be lions.

The empty forest, or empty savanna, syndrome it’s called. Habitats that echo only silence, their lifeblood drained by a gamut of environmental problems. The savannas and forests of West Africa grow quieter with each passing year, and their lion roars fainter. Soon the only voices we hear may be our own.

New population of critically endangered riverine rabbits found

CapeNature and the Endangered Wildlife Trust are excited to announce the discovery of a population of the critically endangered riverine rabbit in the Anysberg Nature Reserve. These rabbits represent the first population to be discovered in a formally protected area.

Until now, this critically endangered species occurred exclusively on privately owned farmland or private reserves, where landowners have been working with conservation authorities and NGOs to ensure their survival.

Riverine rabbits have occurred along the seasonal rivers in the Nama Karoo since the turn of the last century but were only discovered in the Western Cape’s Succulent Karoo in 2004. While much work has been done on the Nama Karoo population, little is known about the rabbit’s habitat preferences and biology in the Succulent Karoo.

Corné Claassen, CapeNature’s Conservation Service Manager and Marius Brand, Anysberg Reserve Manager, led a determined search in Anysberg for this species on the night of 5 December 2013. Their persistence paid off, and a young riverine rabbit was captured, thus not only confirming the presence of riverine rabbits in the reserve and that the population is reproductively active. Following the collection of genetic samples, the rabbit was safely released.

Christy Bragg, Manager of the Endangered Wildlife Trust’s Drylands Conservation Programme, was ecstatic upon receiving the news. Bragg said the Endangered Wildlife Trust and CapeNature have been working closely together in the Western Cape to learn more about this iconic Karoo species, and it is wonderful to find these elusive rabbits in new territory.

Anysberg lies in the Klein Karoo and is just over 81 000 ha in size. The reserve was established in 1987 to conserve the local veld type and to re-introduce game species that historically occurred in this region. The Anys, Touws, Prins, and Buffels rivers and tributaries of the Gourits river system flow through the reserve.

The Drylands Conservation Programme has trialled the use of camera traps to census riverine rabbit populations and will be launching a full-scale study in 2014. Ultimately the cameras will be used to not only detect the presence of this shy species but to provide sufficient data to determine population densities and trends in population numbers over time. This species is endemic to the Nama and Succulent Karoo areas and serves as an important indicator species for riverine habitat health.

Members of the public are requested to report possible sightings of riverine rabbits to Christy Bragg or Corné Claassen.

The Endangered Wildlife Trust’s riverine rabbit project is supported by the Altron Group, Lindt Chocolatiers, Mazda Wildlife Fund, Rand Merchant Bank, Mohamed bin Zayed Species Conservation Fund, Koos and Rona Rupert Opvoedkundige Trust, National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund, Zoological Society for the Conservation of Species and Populations, Sean Williams Living Creatures Trust, and many individuals, farmers and partners.

ALSO READ about a population of the riverine rabbit found in Baviaanskloof

Wild dogs collared in the name of research

An alpha female has been re-collared and two young wild dogs collared for the first time in the 13 member-strong pack at Liuwa Plain National Park in Zambia, in anticipation of a natural split in the group.

ZCP project leader, Egil Dröge, and Liuwa Plain scout, Armstrong Chinga, attach a VHF collar to one of the wild dogs.

The VHF collars fitted to the three dogs will enable researchers from African Parks and the Zambian Carnivore Programme (ZCP) to track them within the 3 660 km² expanse of Liuwa Plain. Wild dogs typically cover between 5 to 10 kilometres per hunting period, hunting twice a day early morning and late afternoon into the night. Without collars it is difficult for researchers to keep abreast of their movements. The satellite collars fitted to the dogs will function for three years.

In order for the collars to be attached the dogs were first sedated. The tranquilising darts were fired at close range by an experienced wildlife veterinarian and took the standard 5 to 10 minutes to take effect. The closer the darter to the animal, the less velocity required which ultimately means a softer impact for the animal. The collar was attached on each animal while it was unconscious. Once the collar had been fitted and a health examination completed, a reversal drug was administered to induce consciousness. During the procedures each of the dogs was carefully monitored and a check kept on their vital signs by the veterinary and research teams. Water was also applied regularly to their coats to help keep them cool.

The entire process from the initial darting to recovery took approximately 30 minutes per wild dog. The veterinary and research teams remained with each dog while it emerged from its “wobbly” stage, until it was evident it had made a total recovery.

One of the reasons wild dogs are efficient hunters and eaters.

Pack members “check up” on their fellow wild dog as the reversal drug takes effect.

The Liuwa research team, led by Jassiel M’soka and Egil Dröge from ZCP, is studying a range of wild dog characteristics and trends including their birth and mortality rates, their hunting efforts and successes, and kleptoparasitism (a form of feeding in which one animal takes prey from another) by hyena and lion. The ZCP team is also investigating the behavioural impact wild dogs (and other predators) have on their prey species.

“At Liuwa our study of wild dogs is researching their effect on their main prey, namely wildebeest, zebra and oribi. From other studies it is known that predators can affect the body condition, including the fertility rates, of their prey,” said Dröge.

Egil Dröge and his team are convinced that the pack will split. “They have to” he said, “Currently there is no breeding potential within the pack as it consists of the alpha female and her offspring from 2012. The offspring from 2010 all left earlier this year in three different groups while the offspring from 2011 sadly died in a natural fire at their den. The alpha male died last year during the denning period.” He believes that the current pack of 13 will probably split into three to five groups and pair with other wild dogs in Liuwa to form new packs.

Research of Liuwa’s wild dogs began in 2010 and is on-going.

Lions return to iSimangaliso in memory of Mandela

Information provided by iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority

In 2001, Mandela said “iSimangaliso must be the only place on the globe where the world’s oldest land mammal (the rhinoceros) and the world’s biggest terrestrial mammal (the elephant) share an ecosystem with the world’s oldest fish (the coelacanth) and the world’s biggest marine mammal (the whale).” Today, after 44 years of absence, iSimangaliso also has lions.

The addition of lions affords the park Big 7 status, with all of the key terrestrial animals present plus whales and sharks in the marine section. The marine section also includes turtles and the myriad of life on the coral reefs, making iSimangaliso (previously known as the Greater St. Lucia Wetland Park) one of the most diverse parks in Africa.

“The iSimangaliso Authority dedicates the historic reintroductions of lion into iSimangaliso, to the memory of our leader and former President Tata Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela,” said Mavuso Msimang, iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority board chairman.

In 1999 iSimangaliso Wetland Park was listed as a world heritage site and South Africa’s foremost natural wonder, along with Robben Island and the Cradle of Humankind, during the time of Mandela’s Presidency.

“Before becoming South Africa’s first democratically elected President, Mandela and half a million other South Africans had signed the petition opposing the mining of Lake St Lucia’s dunes. This was followed by the most important decision in the establishment of iSimangaliso and its listing as South Africa’s first world heritage site – the vision and decision in 1996 by President Mandela and his cabinet to disallow mining in favour of conservation and eco-tourism,” said iSimangaliso CEO Andrew Zaloumis.

Under the park’s mandate of ‘development to conserve’, iSimangaliso is providing significant and sustained employment and community upliftment. Under iSimangaliso’s watch tourism businesses in and around the park have grown by over 80% in the last 10 year, creating thousands of jobs.

In his speech at the release of elephants into iSimangaliso after 100 years of absence, Mandela said: “There can be no better icon for the holistic approach we are taking to conservation and development of the iSimangaliso Wetland Park. This re-introduction is an almost spiritual form of restitution. It is an attempt to recreate the wholeness of nature so that we can live in harmony with its creator’s magnificence… so that the descendants of the elders of Maputaland, the generations of the future, too can experience this grandeur.” Now, many years later, this sentiment could be repeated as lions re-enter the Park.

The first family of four lions, of a planned three groups, were released to the uMkhuze section of the iSimangaliso Wetland Park. An adult female and three sub-adult offspring (a male and two females), are the first of a total of eight planned for this section of the park. The lions were trans-located from Tembe Elephant Park and had spent five weeks in a purpose-built boma to acclimatise them to their new environment before being released.

Lions were last seen in uMkhuze some 44 years ago. Two more females and a coalition of two males (brothers) will follow to form the base of the new iSimangaliso lion population.

Adult lions are fitted with satellite collars to monitor their movements for biological and safety reasons.

“This historic introduction of lions brings iSimangaliso closer to achieving its conservation vision – the full restoration of functioning eco-systems , and the re-establishment of the migratory patterns of historically occurring animal populations from the top of the Lebombo mountains to the sea as they occurred in the times of Shaka and before fencing fragmented the landscape and constrained animal movements”, commented Andrew Zaloumis during the release.

Several thousand heads of game have been trans-located into iSimangaliso since 2000. All the game that historically occurred in the region (including oribi, tsessebe, black and white rhino, elephant, wild dog, cheetah, buffalo, waterbuck and blue wildebeest) with the exception of eland, have now been re-introduced. Eland are currently being sourced for an April/May 2014 introduction. Hyaena and jackal have returned on their own and populations are flourishing.

This is the result of 13 years of hard work by iSimangaliso staff settling land claims, removing thousands of hectares of plantations and erecting over 350 km of “Big 5” fencing. Much of this work has been undertaken by community enterprises creating significant employment in an area marked by unemployment and poverty. Fencing was done with the support of communities, involving negotiated agreements with seven traditional council chiefs. Community leadership see the introduction of lions as a boost to tourism and along with this, more opportunities for their residents.

Renowned conservationist Dr Ian Player is also highly supportive of the iSimangaliso’s efforts at restoration of the original animal populations and biodiversity. “This is a great day for conservation. iSimangaliso has shown us that at a time when conservation budgets are at their lowest and there are so many other priorities globally, parks can still prevail.” he said.

Top 10 Ugandan birds

Uganda is Africa’s premier birding destination, with the list of birds found in the country topping 1 000! Many of these birds live only in these tropical forests, with rare sightings being described as “mythical” while it is believed that some of the birds living in the remote forests of Uganda may not even be classified as of yet!

This beautiful country must be on any birders bucket list, and this is our list of the top 10 birds to see in Uganda.

1. Shoebill

The shoebill is endemic to Africa, and birders from around the globe flock to Uganda to catch a rare glimpse of this clumsy giant. For a long time, this bird was not protected and its eggs were frequently stolen from nests until the Uganda Bird Guide Club’s efforts made it illegal to trap these birds and steal their eggs.

2. Green-breasted pitta

The green-breasted pitta is a difficult bird to find despite its relatively common status in central African countries. It lives well camouflaged in the lowland tropical forests, and photographing one of these little guys is a bird lover’s dream.

3. African green broadbill

The vivid colours of this eye-catching bird can only be seen in two places in the world – The Itombwe Mountains in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda’s Bwindi Forest. The species is declining due to the loss of its habitat from forest clearing and degradation.

4. Great blue turaco

The great blue turaco and white-crested turaco are some of the largest, most exquisite birds found in Uganda. These birds are actively hunted as their meat and feathers are highly sought-after commodities.

5. Shelley’s crimsonwing

One of the world’s rarest birds, Shelley’s crimsonwing can be found on most bird-bucket lists. They live in a thin strip of mountains and volcanoes – known as the Albertine Rift – that borders Uganda, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Photos of these beauties in the wild are almost non-existent – the only known images are of birds netted (and released) during biodiversity surveys.

6. Standard-winged nightjar

This picturesque bird is characterised by the central flight feathers that appear during the breeding season on the males. Raised vertically during display, it is a dream come true to see these birds during this short time span when their feathers can stretch up to 38cm.

7. Short-tailed warbler

The short-tailed warbler can be found primarily in Uganda’s forest undergrowth, while the forests of the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda are also home to this camouflaged species.

8. Doherty’s bushshrike

Found in the subtropical montane forests and moist shrublands of central Africa, these brightly-coloured birds are one of the more common birds seen in Uganda. Thankfully, their population levels seem to be stable for the most part.

9. Bar-tailed trogon

This beautiful medium-sized bird lives in high-altitude forests and has a large range throughout central and southern Africa, although it is rarely seen.

10. Black-breasted barbet

The giant black-breasted barbet has been seen by very few individuals and is highly sought after by bird watchers. Unfortunately, it tends to live in areas of human conflict, and so it is rarely seen by tourists. Uganda is one of the safest regions to catch a glimpse of this magnificent bird.

What’s a camel worth?

For the Maasai and Samburu people of East Africa, cows have always been their most important possessions. Cows represent wealth – the more a person has (some have 500 cows), the wealthier they are. To the Maasai and Samburu, cows are currency. But this story is about the camel.

Most tribal families raise cows for blood and milk, but the bovines’ monetary value lies in the fact that they can be sold and traded for goods and services. Other livestock, such as goats and sheep, are kept for meat and milk, whereas donkeys are used for carrying things, such as water containers to and from the river.

Maasai cow and a camel — To the Maasai, cattle represent wealth. The more cows one owns, the greater respect one is due. Camels have the potential to be of more value than cattle to the Maasai people.

Several years ago, I was invited by Heifer International to visit their Maasai Camel Project in Tanzania. The organisation had realised that camels had the potential to be more valuable than cows – they produce more milk, are more tolerant of drought, feed on plants that aren’t attractive to wildlife (therefore do not compete for food), and have hooves that don’t cause soil erosion. Heifer International offered a number of the humped beasts to some Maasai pastorals who agreed to give them a try. As one of the project members told me, “Camels don’t need a lot of looking after. You can let them loose at night without fear of losing them to lions.”

The more I learned about camels, the more they seemed to me an obvious and sensible alternative to cows. I was sure the practice of owning them would spread quickly. With all their benefits, how could anyone not want them?

Eight years after my Heifer International visit, I am now in Kenya and Tanzania, trying to understand why owning camels is still such an anomaly. I ask some Maasai and Samburu men what they think about owning camels instead of cows. “We have always had cows,” they tell me, “the Maasai will never use camels.”

“But there are some Maasai in northern Tanzania who have camels now,” I tell Edward, the guide at the safari lodge I’m visiting. He doesn’t believe me, telling me he knows nothing about that. “Cows are what we have always had. We aren’t changing,” he adds, shrugging his shoulders.

“We don’t like the taste of camel meat or milk,” another Maasai warrior tells me. Few of his countrymen seem interested in discussing camels, let alone learning more about their advantages over cattle. When I tell a group of 20-something Samburu men that the Maasai are not interested in camels, one of them explains; “the Samburu have had more experience and interest in camels because the Somalians have been bringing them across the border into Samburu for years.”

“So why don’t more of you have camels instead of cows?” I ask.

“My family wants to have camels, but we can’t afford them,” says one young man. Another agrees. ‘They are good, but they are very expensive.”

“How much does a camel cost?” I ask.

“One camel costs 36 goats or sheep. One camel costs three donkeys or 12 cows,” he answers. Later I find out a camel costs 60 000 Kenyan shillings, around US$ 700/R 6 700.

Maasai along the banks of a river and with their cattle — For the Maasai, the traditional beast of burden is a donkey. For the group of Samburu men with their goats, they would have to trade 36 goats to acquire just one camel.

“But camels are good for milk, meat, blood, and to carry things,” I tell them. “‘ They can replace cows, sheep, goats and donkeys. It makes so much sense to trade in your other animals for them, no?’

Trading the animals for camels is not something they have ever thought about, the boys tell me. Then it hits me. The camel vs cow debate has nothing to do with practicality and everything to do with tradition. The Maasai are well known for holding onto their traditions despite the encroaching modern world, and I admire them for that. For example, young Maasai and Samburu men use their cows to attract a wife. The more cows they own, the higher their chance of finding the pick of the girls. “No girl is going to choose someone with one camel over another who owns 12 cows.” I am told. Everyone seems to agree that quantity is what matters most in matters of the heart.

I visit another Maasai group. While talking to a 7-year-old boy who is the goat herd for his family, I ask, “When you grow up, do you want to have cows or camels?”

“Camels,” he says without hesitation.

I won’t tell Edward. Even if I did mention it, he wouldn’t believe me.

Maasai guide with author — With a Maasai guide in Tanzania © Judith Rossiter

Surprisingly, camels are also great companions, as I wrote about in A Desert Romance.

The sand men of Mali

I have heard several times that Bamako, the capital of Mali, is the one of the world’s fastest growing cities.

With concrete forming the basis of most buildings in Bamako, the city has an insatiable hunger for cement and sand. Even though the Sahara Desert swallows up half of the northern part of the country the sand from the desert is too fine for use in constructing concrete buildings. The coarse sand dredged from the bottom of the Niger River is far better to make a strong, long-lasting concrete.

Even in this age of dredging machines and mechanical loaders the “sand men” of Mali are collecting the sand in a far more labour intensive way. I suppose you could say in a traditional way but the need for collecting sand further up river has only come into play in the last twenty years so although it seems like they may have done this for centuries it is only a recent development.

They have designed special boats that are far wider than the traditional Pinasse and then they tie 15 to 20 of them together and push them upriver to collect the sand. Only one boat has an engine and they place the powerful mother ship at the rear of the flotilla; propelling the fleet forward as it functions as the main point of steering. The other boats are steered by pushing away from obstacles with long bamboo poles.

Every afternoon at about 4pm the group assembles at the port at Kalaban Coro to push the boats out into the river with their long bamboo poles to meet up with the mother ship. They then quickly tie the boats together before beginning the 60km punt up river. They arrive at the sand bank at about 10 pm and then it is time to jump into the water and start filling the boats.

On arrival the pilot of the mother ship starts yelling for everyone to wake up, get in the water and get to work. Chest deep water, they completely submerge themselves every ten seconds or so for the next 3 hours. With their only tool being a bucket they painstakingly collect their quota, responsible for filling up their own boat with sand. They work without lights and all around you can hear the sound of the men as they duck under the water to collect a bucket full of sand before announcing their arrival back above the surface of the water with a loud exhalation of breath.

The boats arrive back in the port at about 8am and then there is another team of men waiting to unload the boats and transfer the sand to the waiting trucks which quickly race off and deliver it all over Bamako. There is a heap of shows on TV that love to show the viewers the worlds worst, hardest, most dangerous and dirtiest jobs and no doubt this could probably get a run on most of them but these guys are tough and they go about their work quietly. They earn $10.00 a day and work 6 days a week with Friday traditionally being the day when the “sand men” of Mali can have a well-earned break.

Trophy hunting in the context of community conservation

Trophy hunting is often the subject of heated debates. The hunting of predators is a particularly sensitive topic, often described as a cruel, needless practice that has no conservation value for the species concerned. Trophy hunters, on the other hand, claim that hunting predators is an essential part of conservation outside of national parks.

Here then, is an example of how trophy hunting can be of benefit to conservation if formulated properly and managed strictly. The notes in this blog post refer to a particular area in Namibia (Kunene) and do not speak to trophy hunting operations elsewhere.

As with most hotly contested issues, trophy hunting is more complex than it first appears.

Typically, two main questions regarding trophy hunting arise: 1) is trophy hunting beneficial for conservation? 2) Is it providing substantial benefits for local people? I believe that the Namibian government has a good trophy hunting system in place, which keeps corruption to a minimum and provides direct benefits to local people. I therefore use the Namibian system as an example of how trophy hunting can benefit conservation and local communities in Africa.

There are two distinct types of farmland in Namibia – communal and commercial farms. In the commercial farming areas, land is parceled up into privately owned farms that may be used for livestock, game farming, hunting or ecotourism. In the communal areas, the land is owned by the state, but inhabited by people who farm with cattle, sheep and goats. Although trophy hunting on commercial farms in Namibia is worthy of consideration as part of the hunting debate, I will focus here on communal farmlands.

Although Namibia is currently hailed as an outstanding example of conservation in Africa, this was not always the case. In the 1980s, illegal hunting by foreigners and locals was rife in the communal lands now known as the Kunene and Caprivi/Zambezi regions. Poaching was rife, and the very idea of conservation was met with hostility, as it was seen as yet another means of oppression by the apartheid government.

This situation changed with new legislation by the independent Namibian government in 1996. The essence of this legislation was to give Namibians living in communal areas rights to utilise their wildlife sustainably and to benefit directly from ecotourism in their regions. The main prerequisite for these rights was that the people formed local institutions to manage and conserve wildlife within self-defined areas; these institutions are known as conservancies. Democratically elected committees run the conservancies to manage the wildlife and money from wildlife-related activities within their boundaries. Through their conservancies, local people can now charge trophy hunters and ecotourism operators for using the peoples’ natural resources.

Today, community conservation in Namibia can be compared to a three-legged pot (or ‘potjie’), which has three supporting ‘legs’. These legs are local ownership, ecotourism and sustainable use. Local ownership of wildlife is the most important of these legs, providing the foundation for the other two legs. Ecotourism and sustainable use (including, but not limited to, trophy hunting) are the two main income-generating avenues for Kunene conservancies. The relative importance of these two legs varies from one conservancy to another.

Three of the five conservancies in the southern Kunene sub-region, with whom I work closely, have a stable income from hunting and ecotourism; the fourth relies only on hunting, and the fifth relies solely on ecotourism. The first three indicated that roughly one-third of their income (R120 000-150 000 per year) is derived from trophy hunting, the rest coming from ecotourism and other forms of wildlife hunting (e.g. for meat). Together, these conservancies manage 10 835 km2, home to approximately 5 900 people.

The conservancy which currently relies exclusively on trophy hunting generates R100 000 annually but is in the process of building an ecotourism lodge to increase its income-generating potential. One of the main reasons this conservancy has been slow to realise its ecotourism potential is that it is not as scenic as the other conservancies in the region. Thus, investors have started with the more spectacular conservancies, leaving this one to depend on hunting. Without trophy hunting, this conservancy – covering 2 290 km2, home to 1 300 people – would simply not exist.

Finally, one conservancy has chosen to rely solely on income from ecotourism and not to allow any kind of hunting in their area. The reasons for this decision are multiple, but it is important to note that the local people decided to use only ecotourism. This is the smallest of the five conservancies (286 km2, home to 230 people), yet it is a hotspot for ecotourism, as it has a famous rock art site within its boundary. Several lodges and a campsite operate within this relatively small area, and there is simply not enough space to include trophy hunting – most eco-tourists do not appreciate gunshots! Simply put, it made more sense for this conservancy to rely on ecotourism alone.

The main species hunted in all conservancies are antelope. As illogical as it may sound, allowing conservancies to kill antelope has been the primary reason for the recent increase in the range and population numbers of antelope species in the region. Hunting in the Kunene region has shifted from being an uncontrolled, illegal past-time for many local people to being a controlled, legal form of income generation from a small number of foreign hunters. After recovering from severe drought and intense poaching in the 1980s, wildlife populations increased and started stabilising after the establishment of communal conservancies. From 2003-2011, annual road-based game counts have shown that the main prey species in the Kunene region (springbok, gemsbok and mountain zebra) have either maintained their population numbers or increased.

The number of springbok seen on annual game counts in the Kunene region of Namibia. Photograph courtesy of ≠Khoadi-//Hoas Conservancy. Data used with permission from the Namibian Association of CBNRM Support Organisations (NACSO).

Each conservancy is granted a hunting quota of game animals by the government; they then reach a bilateral agreement with a trophy-hunting operator. In this agreement, the trophy hunter agrees to pay a certain amount for each antelope shot in the conservancy (amongst other conditions). The conservancy sends one or more of its employees with the hunting operator and client when on safari to ensure that they comply with the terms of the agreement. The conservancy then records the number of animals shot by the hunter and ensures that he pays them for what he shoots and that he does not shoot more than the agreed quota.

So what does trophy hunting in the context of community conservation mean for conservation, especially for carnivore conservation? As outlined above, controlled trophy hunting of prey species has led to an increase and stabilisation in their populations, which support the predator populations. The lion population, which is well studied and monitored by the Desert Lion Conservation and Research project, has increased from approximately 20 individuals to over 130 during the time that conservancies have operated in the region.

One of the lions monitored by Desert Lion Conservation and Research project.

Conservancy game guards regularly patrol their conservancies and report all sightings of predators and incidents of livestock losses to predators. The data they have produced indicate that other predator populations have responded positively to conservation in the Kunene conservancies. Although these data do not indicate absolute numbers of predators, one can confidently say that predator sightings are increasing in the region.

The number of cheetah, spotted hyaena and black-backed jackal sightings recorded by conservancies in the Kunene region of Namibia. Data used with permission from the Namibian Association of CBNRM Support Organisations (NACSO).

The number of caracal, leopard and lion sightings recorded by conservancies in the Kunene region of Namibia. Data used with permission from the Namibian Association of CBNRM Support Organisations (NACSO).

Besides the fact that predators now have more to eat in communal conservancies than previously, they have also been directly conserved through the conservancy system. Conservancies are allowed to sell a limited number of predator species as trophies each year, with the quota once again determined by the government. Two of the abovementioned conservancies support lion populations and may thus be granted one lion as a trophy per year. Trophy hunters pay US$ 8000 and US$ 9000 per lion, per their agreements with the respective conservancies. Similarly, four conservancies charge their hunters US$ 2000 – US$ 4000 for a leopard and US$ 1300 – US$ 2000 for a cheetah. These two species are not always successfully hunted, so there may be several years where no leopards or cheetahs are shot in these conservancies, even though they are provided quotas for them.

Trophy hunting carnivores is more complex than hunting their prey species, and it may be argued that the species considered above are worth more than the ‘price tag’ they are given by trophy hunting. Carnivore populations are also sensitive to overhunting and may thus decline if trophy hunting is not strictly controlled and monitored. However, the situation with carnivores is further complicated by human-predator conflict. As most of the conservancies’ occupants are livestock farmers, the presence of a healthy predator population represents the potential for loss of income. Conservancies in the Kunene region have reported increasing livestock losses, which match the increase of predators shown above.

The number of livestock losses reported by farming communities living in conservancies in the Kunene region of Namibia. Data used with permission from the Namibian Association of CBNRM Support Organisations (NACSO).

In two conservancies, I investigated the livestock losses in more detail for 2010-2012. Farmers lost livestock (cattle, donkeys, horses, sheep and goats) to the value of N$ 91 000 per year in one conservancy and N$ 196 600 per year in the other. Both conservancies support the full gamut of predator species (i.e. all cat species, hyenas, jackals and baboons). They have thus occasionally sold lion, leopard and cheetah to their respective trophy hunters. The fact that these predators have a direct value is thus a primary argument that conservancy managers use to pacify their members who regularly lose valuable livestock to these species. Furthermore, the value given to predators by trophy hunters is much easier to explain to local farmers than the nebulous concept that eco-tourists enjoy seeing these species.

Although the value of lions as trophies is an important argument for their conservation, the conservationists in the region are continually working to find other ways to place a tangible value on the species. These ideas include charging tourists to the region per lion sighting and/or employing local people to act as ‘lion guides’. Replacing lion trophy hunting with strategies depending solely on ecotourism may be in the pipeline, but these ideas will only be realised if the ecotourism industry fully supports them. In the meantime, however, we continue to use the lion’s trophy ‘price tag’ as an incentive for their conservation. If a blanket ban were to be placed on hunting the species, or if the hunting market were reduced (i.e. if the U.S.A. places lions on their list of endangered species), we would lose this bargaining chip.

The consequences of not responding to human-predator conflict in an immediate, tangible way can be severe for farmers and predators. Showing that predators have real value to rural livestock farmers is not an easy task, even within a working system. In cases where predators cause severe or continued losses, farmers may destroy the ‘problem animals’ themselves without waiting for government-approved hunting permits. These are lose-lose situations where farmers lose many livestock and predators are destroyed in retaliation, with no financial gain. Curbing the number of these incidents is the real challenge for carnivore conservationists in Africa.

A lioness and cub killed for cattle predation (cow leg in foreground). Photograph courtesy of ≠Khoadi-//Hoas Conservancy.

Moving beyond the conservation of carnivores, we must remember that conservancies cover portions of a larger ecosystem. The existence of conservancies means that species such as elephant and rhino threatened with poaching across the rest of Africa find a haven in Namibia. This protection is based entirely on the principle of local ownership – the communities living in conservancies are the legal owners of the wildlife they live with. As legal owners, they can use many species through sustainable trophy hunting. Creating laws that dismiss these ownership rights will undermine the best example of community conservation in Africa.

Also read: A Namibian’s view on hunting in his home country

The birth of a pangolin

This is Roxy, the most amazing mama pangolin in the whole world. She was wild-caught and taken around a local town in a box, to be sold on the black market. A shop owner felt sorry for her and bought her. He then called a local wildlife organisation which in turn called the Pangolins International (PI).

This rescued Cape pangolin took a liking for Maria Diekmann (founder and director of PI). The unexpected bond was such that Maria was allowed to join this most whacky and enigmatic creature in her wanders and nocturnal foraging.

However, as the PI team prepared Roxy for her release, Maria went in for a final check, and Roxy crawled slowly towards her and sat in her lap.

Maria saw what appeared to be a snake coiled up around her stomach; however, she quickly realised that Roxy had given birth, and its umbilical cord was still attached to the baby.

© Rare & Endangered Species Trust — © Dave Lowth

Maria slowly got her back into the corner she had been using as a den and watched how she broke the cord and curled around the baby. She had just witnessed the first captive birth of a Cape pangolin in history.

For the following two months, Roxy raised her baby pangolin in the most surprisingly calm and relaxed manner, allowing Maria and other volunteers or visitors to take the odd peak and photo of her little miracle.

Then, unexpectedly, one night, Roxy vanished, her spoor untraceable, leaving behind her nameless baby to be reared by the PI team.

The team believes that she may have come into heat, and the call of the wild may have overcome her maternal instincts.

It is thought that wild pangolins usually leave their young at about this time, so they believe what she did was natural.

PI will keep caring for their new baby, but they desperately need to find funding. This year they have already been contacted several times to collect and release five Cape pangolins back into the wild.

Never under any circumstance are Cape pangolins purchased from their captors to avoid stimulating trade; instead, long and expensive cell phone negotiations ensue until a handover is agreed.

Every rescued Cape pangolin sets PI back a handsome N$10,000 on its tight budget. But the reality is if they don’t do it, who will? Find out more here about sponsoring a pangolin.

It’s a bird-eat-bird world

I witnessed something that was both unsettling and enthralling in my garden in Windhoek, Namibia. One bird taking on another is nothing unusual, but on this occasion, a tiny owl killing and decapitating a sweet, colourful lovebird was a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

A young pearl-spotted owlet had been frequenting our garden and had become quite used to my presence. Early one morning, I was alerted to a commotion at the birdbath. So I grabbed my camera and investigated, only to find that the owlet had pinned a rosy-faced lovebird to the ground!

The hapless lovebird was still feebly flapping its wings when I arrived, but soon gave up the struggle. The owlet kept peering about as if deciding on the next course of action and eventually flew – with the lovebird trailing behind – onto the birdbath.

It then proceeded to fly into a tree a few metres away, perched briefly before flying into a palm tree before reaching its final destination – a large jacaranda tree.

Wedging the lovebird into a secure position proved no easy task, and eventually – after much fluttering and hopping about with its prey – the owlet proceeded to decapitate the fated lovebird and to swallow its head – beak and all!

It seized the rest of the carcass later that afternoon and thus had a very productive day, all in all.

This, incidentally, is the same pearl-spotted owlet which my rottweiler swallowed on a previous occasion. I will never forget the sight of two yellow feet sticking out of either side of its mouth and me galloping after dog and bird – on crutches and moon boot (I had a broken foot after clumsily falling down the stairs). I think the entire neighbourhood heard me as I screamed for the dog to let go and eventually managed to wrestle him down to the ground and prise his mouth open. The wet and bedraggled owl plopped to the ground – alive and unhurt!

The tiny bird squawked indignantly and flew off into the nearest tree – but has amazingly not packed its bags and left for good. Read more about Africa’s tiny owls here

11 Interesting Facts about Sociable Weavers

1. There are four subspecies of sociable weavers:

– Philetairus socius eremnus, living in the Orange River Valley;
– Philetairus socius socius, inhabiting the S. Kalahari in NW Northern Cape and S. Namibia;
– Philetairus socius xericus, roughing it in the Namibian escarpments;
– Philetairus socius geminus, isolated from all other sub-species and thriving in Etosha and S. Owambo areas in N. Namibia.

2. Unlike other weavers who build their nests in the breeding season, Sociable Weavers use and maintain the nests throughout the year. They nest in colonies as small as 10 individuals and up to 400-500 birds. Their nests are instantly recognizable, massive and resembling huge apartment blocks. The nest structures can reach heights of up to 4 m. From a distance the nest may typically look like a haystack stuck up on a large tree or telephone pole.

3. Preferred nesting sites are generally long, smooth, poles or sparsely-branched trees to deter predators such as Cape Cobras, Black Mambas, Boomslangs, baboons, rats or genets are always after weaver chicks and so preferred nesting sites are generally long, smooth, poles or sparsely-branched trees.

4. Different materials are utilized for different sections of the nest, each material choice being purposefully selected. Large twigs and stems, placed at an angle and pointing downwards, cover the roof of the nest. Grasses are shoved into the structure until firmly secured. It is believed that the crown of sharp grass spikes picket-fencing the tunnel entrances may be designed as protection from predators.

5. Telephonic and Electrical Power companies have battled for years with the design of telephonic poles and power line structures able to cope with the weight of these nests, especially during the rainy season when they become somewhat waterlogged and become so heavy (several tons) that they drag down the supporting poles.

6. Photographic evidence has proven that some of these nest structures are over 100 years old.

7. Access to the nest core is via a smattering of galleries that lead to the breeding chambers, the tunnels leading to such chambers average 25 cm long and 7 cm wide, and the breeding chambers themselves are often 10 to 15 cm in diameter. The nesting chambers are lined with soft materials, such as feathers, fluff, wool, or hair.

8. Protection in numbers seems the favoured strategy, hence why colonies often resemble multispecies “ghettos”- often allowing other “guests” to breed and roost in the nest – including African Pigmy Falcons, Pied Barbets, Rosy-faced Lovebirds, Familiar Chats, finches, sparrows, tits, and opportunistic White-backed and Lappet-faced Vultures, Verreaux’s and Spotted Eagle Owl, as well as several Eagle species roosting and nesting on the top of the nest.

9. The nest has proven itself to be an effective temperature buffer, against the cold temperatures at night (especially in winter), and high temperatures during the day, reducing temperature variability in nest chambers. The extent of this buffering effect depends significantly on the position of nest chambers within the communal structure, and on the depth to which chambers are embedded within the nest mass. Not, surprisingly older and more veteran pairs tend to occupy chambers with the highest thermoregulatory benefits.

10. In winter this temperature insulation translates into significant energetic savings for its inhabitants, reducing their food intake demand and enhancing their ability to survive in the leanest months of southern Africa’s harshest semi-arid environments. In the heat of the day, or the chill of winter nights individuals ride the thermal challenge by roosting alone when hot, or together when cold.

11. Energetically rested and physiologically unstressed, Sociable Weavers live a poised existence ready to react to any unpredictable rainfall event. A mere 20mm downpour, even if out of season, may trigger the entire colony into breeding mode, and depending on how the environment reacts to the rain, breeding pairs may be able to churn out up to four broods (4-5 chicks each), with the offspring of the first brood helping their parents raise subsequent broods, and even attracting totally unrelated “helpers” eager to ensure that enough food is found for the last broods as resources wane and dwindle away.

See below for photographs of the Sociable weaver’s nest, taken in the Kalahari Desert, South Africa.

These images were found at thisiscolossal.com. Photographer Unkown

Is walking with lions good conservation? Probably not.

Close encounters with Africa’s megafauna are an irresistible magnet for many tourists in Africa, and for some, the closer the encounter, the greater the thrill. Walking with lions is now a popular tourism activity.

So when a tourism operator offers the chance, for a fee, to ‘walk with lions’, it is no surprise that there is a steady flow of punters eager to do it. And when it is claimed that the money goes towards an elaborate project purporting to rewild lions, it seems, superficially at least, to be a Good Thing.

After all, Africa’s wild lion population is in bad shape. A half-century ago, some 100,000 lions ranged across Africa’s savannas, but lion habitat is only a quarter of what it was then, and today lion numbers are fewer than 30,000. Forty per cent of these live in Tanzania, and only nine countries can claim to have more than 1,000 wild living lions. To say that lions in the wild are on a one-way ticket to extinction is arguably no overstatement. So, where could there be a problem with any attempt to reverse the trend?

Well, controversy and conservation are well-acquainted and pretty well constant companions. And around the operations of Antelope Park in Gweru, Zimbabwe, and their sister operations called Lion Encounter at Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe and Zambia, where ‘hands-on’ interaction with these great felines is promoted, the controversy is well and truly raging. Walking with lions is their major tourist attraction – and questions are being asked about how lions are sourced and where they disappear to when too big to walk with humans.

Antelope Park, as stated on its website, is “home to the world-famous ALERT lion rehabilitation programme, as seen in the major UK TV documentary series Lion Country.” ALERT, it would seem, is the umbrella organisation in a network of subgroups: ALERT is a non-profit body, but the subgroups are not.

The nub of the issue is the ALERT’ vision’, which is founded on a four-stage rewilding strategy, with stage four being the successful release of lions into true conservation areas. One understands that grand ideas are not always realised overnight, but ALERT was founded in 2005 and has yet to release any lions into the wild. But lions, true to the basic strategy of all life, reproduce. Cubs taken from their pride groups to walk with tourists soon outgrow their purpose and are moved up a stage, and ‘new’ walking specimens are brought in. The lions in the middle stages of the rehabilitation model will mature and will breed. And as the breeding cycle continues, the number of contained lions grows. Unless lions are legally released into a wild area, the ‘captive’ population has to balloon. It’s simple arithmetic. Figures provided to Africa Geographic by ALERT show a significant build-up of baby lions (where the money is made), a significant death rate in the middle stages and no successful final stage releases to date. After eight years, those numbers speak for themselves. And yet ALERT persists with its conservation claims, and volunteers and tourists flock to their operations. Let me be clear on this; I am all for successful tourism operations – but not when they redirect money from genuine conservation activities and not when the promises of conservation impact are nothing more than a thin marketing veneer.

The ‘excess’ lions from these breeding operations will have to go somewhere to relieve the bottleneck, and if that destination is not a legitimate conservation area, where will that somewhere be?

The fear and, in some quarters, strongly held suspicion is that via some form of wildlife laundering system lions will find their way into one or more of the many lion breeding farms that serve canned lion hunting operations.

This would certainly not be conservation in any shape or form. In fact, it would mean quite cynically that conservation money from volunteer internships, fees to walk with lions and donations is being diverted from excellent conservation projects into operations of questionable ethical standing.

If this is not the case, then only complete transparency and accountability for all the lions involved from cradle to grave will allay the growing disquiet of the conservation world. And even if such transparency is forthcoming, is it, in the first place, sensible to offer ultra-close encounters with big, dangerous animals? Attacks on humans and maulings have already occurred at Lion Encounter, and quite possibly, a real tragedy awaits. But that is another story.

I asked Dereck Joubert, conservationist, National Geographic Explorer in Residence and wildlife documentary filmmaker extraordinaire for his views, so I sign off with his wise words:

“There has been a proliferation of these walking with lions operations, not just in Africa. I also saw them in Mauritius. In my opinion, the activity is fundamentally flawed. A lion is a potentially dangerous animal, and walking with it not only exposes guests to an accident that will result in the lion needing to be killed but also erodes the wildness, the mystique and the very essence of what a wild lion is by taming it.

It is the respect for that vitality and wildness that drives our conservation of wild lions. If you consider that there are probably 6,000 lions in captivity but that we never include those lions into the overall figure of between 20,000 and 30,000 in the wild, its because the conservation of lions is not based on the total number of lions there are in the world, but those in the wild. As such, captive lions have little to do with conservation.

The fact that the captive lions simply confuse the conversation about lion conservation is one thing, but I worry about what happens when the lions get old, injured, sick or a little less cute to walk with. Do they feed a canned lion hunting scheme? Probably.

And canned lion hunting is one of the greatest misguided uses of an icon of Africa. It damages the reputation of South Africa, it is spurred by greed alone, and it has stimulated a market that could be responsible for the collapse of not just wild lions but tigers as well, via its evil cousin the bone trade.”

All photos were taken by an Africa Geographic representative on assignment.

The mighty springbok migration

Gert van der Merwe’s personal account of the great springbok migration is told in Lawrence G. Green’s book Karoo. Towards the end of the 19th century, Gert’s family moved their sheep and cattle between decent grazing lands, helped by their shepherds and a San wagon leader who must have previously experienced the migration. “The trek buck are on their way, and we’ll be trampled to death if we stay in the riverbed,” he warned when only a cloud of dust was visible in the distance.

The party heeded his advice. They cut down thorn trees and arranged a barrier of piercing spears around the wagon and oxen, hoping the thorn rampart would divert the springbok’s course. Pyres of dry grass and green sticks were prepared. The fire and smoke would act as a further line of defence against the charging horde. The springbok were around three miles (five kilometres) away when Gert heard the stampede for the first time. Until then, he’d only been able to see the plume of dust caused by the throng of tiny feet. Small animals like meerkat, jackal and other species were already instinctively seeking refuge. Gert’s party lit the fires and waited as the terrifying yet awe-inspiring sight approached.

The frontrunners veered around the hill, avoiding the thorn and fire defences, but the springbok tsunami could only be held off for so long. Soon they collided with the defences, and the injured and fallen were often trampled by others. When the barrier could take it no longer, the springbok ran among the cattle that joined the rampage.

Gert claims that the dust cloud was so thick it became hard to breathe. His wife covered their children with blankets in a desperate attempt to prevent them from being smothered. It took around an hour for the bulk of the herd to pass. Stragglers and wounded animals tried to catch up for some time afterwards. Gullies in the veld filled with the carcasses of dead springbok. It sounds impressive, but ‘majestically’ doesn’t sound like the correct word to describe the way they swept across the plains.

A disturbing reality

The most recent migration took place in 1896. Since then, hunting, roads, fences, urbanisation, farming and other human developments have wiped it out. It is doubtful whether Gert and his group would have dreamed that the springbok migration would be totally annihilated within a few years of their experience. Perhaps the collapse of the sardine run in our lifetime might appear as unlikely to us as the demise of the springbok migration would have to Gert.

We’ll never know the full biological intricacies behind this migration as it was never scientifically studied. Today, it’s neither practically possible to reconnect the immense tracts of land that have been bisected by roads and fences, nor to recreate the springbok’s complex natural behaviour.

Conservation strategies need to move within the realities of human land use. The Mountain Zebra–Camdeboo Corridor Project realises that fact. The project’s aim is not to drop fences, dig up roads or change land use, but to preserve the veld. Early indications are that this unique partnership between landowners and national parks could be a model project for the future.

The front line of lion conservation

The radio crackles, a dusty message. Not good news – the Maasai are hunting a lion.

The cats have reportedly broken into a boma overnight and killed 40 shoats (sheep/goats) and a cow. The loss is devastating to the family involved. In anticipation, Big Life, a local conservation organisation, has already sent rangers to the spot to monitor the mood. The latest message ignites a flurry of action at the headquarters.

I join the small group on the back of a Land Cruiser, a team of rangers involved in a fight with deep emotional triggers. In this pastoralist society, livestock represents wealth, and predators can wreck livelihoods. Retribution can be swift. The rangers joke nervously, the information is vague, and the outcome is unpredictable. We race through the dense bush on the lower slopes of the Chyulu Hills and accelerate as we hit the vast yellow plains below. After an hour of bum-bashing travel, someone spots a distant human silhouette on a hill. Soggy black cotton soil is an impenetrable barrier between us, and from here, we walk.

The bush is quiet after the roar of the car engine, and boots crunch on volcanic soil. The rangers fan out over a gentle slope, no sign of life, human or animal. Eventually, a shout from below, and a sad find. A young lion killed by Maasai spears. Her claws, tail and ears are gone, prizes for those most instrumental in her death. To the men involved, this killing is a form of revenge, but it also represents one less lion threatening their livestock. There is no right or wrong here, and as we turn, the only hope is that the death of one lion will end this incident. But movement in the distance signals that this is not over. A line of forty Maasai men marching across the dry land, heading in the direction in which the rest of the pride had fled.

We head back to the vehicles, and the rangers move off in the same direction as the advancing men, parallel but maintaining distance. In the meantime Richard Bonham (head of Big Life) has arrived in his small plane and is swooping low over the plain, pretending to chase the lions and thus lure the hunting party in the wrong direction. We park on a nearby rise and watch as the scene unfolds. The hunters have skirted one side of a hill, and the rangers are on the other. Both move in the same direction but are invisible to each other, and we realise that a meeting is inevitable. I am with Sambu, a senior staff member of Big Life and an excellent negotiator with an in-depth understanding of both sides of this story. We leave the vehicles and begin to climb the gentle slope. Suddenly, the silence is burst by a loud wail, followed by the collective voice of fifty men chanting and hollering. The few rangers I am with take off at a run, and I follow behind. We can’t see anything, but the volume speaks of a serious confrontation. I stay below the ridge, not wanting to introduce the potential complication of my presence, and to be completely honest, also not desperate to run into a melee of angry Maasai. Minutes clunk by. Slowly things seem to cool off. I risk joining the outskirts. The scene is awfully real; this is what conservation is about here. Forty Maasai people, adorned in everything from Manchester United jerseys to full traditional regalia, face off with the green fatigues of thirteen Big Life rangers. Every man on both sides is from the area. Sambu’s voice battles the presence of these proud men. I understand nothing, but the body language needs no interpreting. He talks for the lives of the four remaining lions, and slowly I observe the tide begin to turn. As the ugly mess breaks up, faces emerge. I realise this is not a group of testosterone-driven young men but a diverse group spanning teens to old men. This hunt was not for pride or bragging rights; it was a response to a terrible loss. Some of the hunters have moved off to the side, and the vocal core begins to shrink. Slowly, men start to walk away; some return to pull their friends with them. Finally, they are all turned. The landscape breathes out.

Here, as across Africa, lines are emerging in the fight to conserve ecosystems – people that derive benefits from wildlife versus those that don’t. This is no longer a romantic story of African people holding onto their traditional way of life and coexisting with predators. Livestock was traditionally valued, but these days school fees and cell phone bills need to be paid, and the local definition of value is swimming out of focus. No matter how much you might like having a lion roaring in the distance or are prepared to coexist with it, there is only so much loss that you will tolerate before it becomes too much. And then you retaliate. I challenge anyone to look me in the eye and tell me they would do differently. It’s the age-old mantra – cost versus benefit. This is not some abstract western economic concept to be bandied about by greybeards; it is the universal trade-off that drives decision-making, conscious or otherwise, in every living human. The notion that local communities need to derive value from wildlife is not new, but successful attainment of this goal appears elusive across the continent. Until each person sees the actual benefit of having wildlife around them, you cannot expect them to act other than in their own best interests. If that means killing a lion, then this should not come as a shock to our western conservationist sensitivities.

Scientists discover new giant mole-rat in Africa

Source: focusingonwildlife.com

Although the term “giant mole-rat” may not immediately inspire love, the mole-rats of Africa are a fascinating bunch.

They spend practically their entire lives underground building elaborate tunnel systems and feeding on plant stems. This underground lifestyle has led them to evolve small ears, tiny eyes, forward-pointing teeth for digging, and nostrils they can shut at will while digging. Some species are exceptionally social, such as the most famous, the naked mole-rat (Heterocephalus glaber), while others live mostly solitary lives. If that’s not enough, the family of mole rats, dubbed Blesmols, may even help us find a cure for cancer.

“They are long-lived rodents (Fukomys more than 20 years [and] the naked mole-rat more than 30 years) and have become a focus in cancer research as they don’t seem to develop cancers,” Paul Van Daele an expert on Blesmols with the University of Ghent told mongabay.com.

In 2002, Van Daele and his team noticed a distinct-looking mole-rat in Zambia, although similar to giant mole-rat (Fukomys mechowii) it was noticeably smaller. It took several years to confirm their hypothesis that they had uncovered a new species, but a recent study by Van Daele and his team in Zootaxa describes the world’s newest mole-rat: Caroline’s mole-rat (Fukomys vandewoestijneae), distinguished by a distinct skull shape and confirmed by DNA and chromosome tests.

The new mole-rat was found in the Ikelenge pedicle, a geographic area that covers portions of Zambia, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Angola. Although little research has been conducted in the Ikelenge pedicle, scientists believe it is a hotspot for animals found nowhere else, i.e. endemic species. Already scientists have discovered 28 endemic species: one amphibian, five mammals, three butterflies, and 19 dragonflies. This unique region is made up of gallery forests along rivers and wetlands (known locally as mushitus) and woodlands dominated by miombo trees, where the new mole-rat was discovered. But, like most forests in the world, these are imperilled.

“As both gallery forest and miombo woodland are turned into cropland at an ever-increasing rate, the maintenance of such an evolutionary theatre will presumably only be possible through conservation of wider protected areas such as the proposed two-pedicles transfrontier conservation area,” Van Daele and colleagues write in their paper.

Caroline’s mole-rat likely faces additional threats from pest control and hunting as mole-rats are commonly targeted by hunters, providing an important protein source to local populations.

Van Daele named the new species after his late wife, Caroline Van De Woestijne, who helped discover it.

“She produced the first karyotype [description of chromosomes] of this species,” he says. “She died of malaria while we were living in Africa, on the very day we were together for 16 years. She was at that moment involved in an environmental education pilot project, ultimately resulting in the infusion of [environmental education] in the primary curriculum in Zambia.”

Every year scientists discover nearly 20,000 new species, around half of which are insects. Finding new mammals is particularly rare. For example, in 2009 out of 19,232 new species described, only 41 were mammals (or 0.2 per cent). Usually, new mammals are small and belong to either the rodent or bat families.

10 ways to say ‘hello’ to a South African

Even though many South Africans speak English, that doesn’t mean you’ll always understand us. With a lot of local slang, South African English has a flavour of its own, borrowing from Afrikaans and the country’s eleven official languages. Even the greeting hello has many layers to it. By MzansiGirl.

Here are 10 ways to say Hello, South African style:

1. Howzit – A traditional South African greeting that translates roughly as “How are you?” or simply “Hello”.

2. Heita – An urban and rural greeting used by South Africans. A cheery slang form of saying “Hello”.

3. Aweh – A South African slang word used to acknowledge something or greet someone and is mainly used in the coloured community.

4. Sawubona (First person singular) – If you meet a South African and you would like to greet them in isiZulu, you can say “Sawubona” meaning “greetings”.

5. Molo – You can also try to greet a South African in Xhosa by saying “Molo” which means “How are you doing?”

6. Unjani – This is another way you can greet someone in isiZulu meaning “Hello”.

7. Thobela – Thobela means “How are you?” which is a formal way of greeting someone in Pedi.

8. Dumela (Setswana) – Mainly used with the Tswana people, this can also be used to greet a South African.

9. Hoe gaan dit? – Taken from Afrikaans, which means “How are you?”

10. Sharp Fede – South African township greeting meaning “Hello, how are you?”

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