Lion Guardians

Category: life in camp | Date: Sep 29 2007 | By: admin

Today, I spent part of my day hunting for a goat. Its destination –barbecue. Before our meeting tomorrow we have a few things to celebrate. One is the motorbike that has been added to our arsenal.

Second, and what we had been holding as a surprise, is a short film we had worked on with some of the Lion Guardians.

In the evening, the surprise was unleashed in style. We had several visitors from the neighbouring lodge attend the ‘launch’ of our small film.
I have to admit that all of us involved were very pleased with the result, and the response to the film. It boosted the morale of the Lion Guardians as they watched their role in the community portrayed in the film.
It was therefore no surprise that when we landed on the barbecued goat, everything that was edible was cleared with relish.

here is the link to the video if you would like to watch.

click HERE.

This one below is of Justus making soup, using the intestines. Its quite bitter but very healthy. Recipe available on request.

6 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Sep 29 2007 | By: admin

Things are a bit slow today. Lion Guardians are coming to the camp from their various stations for a meeting. The camp will be overcrowded for the next two days. We have some a surprise for them tomorrow.

No responses yet

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Sep 26 2007 | By: admin

Today, I am very happy. The good news! I have just received a brand new motorbike to assist me in the job of coordinating the Lion Guardian outfit. I can’t begin to tell you how pleased I am. Maybe the photo below speaks better.

I have waited for this a very long time and I am now newly energized to work, uh… and to ride! My work will be much much simpler. Lion Guardians are spread all over the group ranch and reaching all of them has been a headache. Now, I will be able to cover all the regions (zones) comprehensively.

3 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Sep 24 2007 | By: admin

We got a report of a person being attacked by a hyena while bathing at the river during the daytime. Its very unusual to even see a hyena here during the day, let alone be attacked by one. Apparently, the murran was washing after watering his livestock and was cooling his body to trek back to the Chyulu Hills where his animals were staying. He sustained head injuries a broken hand and finger, he was taken to a nearby mobile clinic and referred to St. Mary’s Hospital in Nairobi.

The story surrounding this incident is still unclear as each person gives an account of what happen and apparently leading to the death of the hyena. One story goes that it was killed by an elder while murran were running away from it by spearing. While others says that it died from a stab by the warrior while struggling to free himself.

Before getting killed the hyena had killed two domestic animals and chased a herder thereby leading the child (herder) to seek refuge in the nearby murrans (warriors). Stories led from one to another as a game scout from Kuku (adjacent ranch to the south) raised his concern over a person who has been poisoning livestock after birth leading to dearth of two dogs, on the same note some people reported seeing carcasses of African Civet Cat. In the morning of the 24th a lion Guardian saw a carcass of a vulture under some bushes almost 2-3weeks old and its death still remain unclear.

Here are two pictures. One is of two lion guardians (Koikai and Melubo) and myself, looking at the place where the murran was attacked. There is a piece of his clothing (shuka) on the rocks. The other picture shows Koikai and Melubo with the dead hyena.

Our job as lion guardians is to try to reduce conflict between all carnivores and people. So when someone is attacked like this we take it very seriously and spend lots of time talking to the community

2 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Sep 22 2007 | By: admin

Though not a board member of the Amboseli -Tsavo Game scouts Association, I was invited to one of their Annual General Meeting this year. It became clear that the game scouts are really doing a wonderful job. They are not only protecting our wildlife and environment but also curbing cattle rustling, motor vehicle crimes, and armed robbers on our roads. The report came as the District Officer for Loitokitok district asked why the game scouts needed to be considered as Police Reservists. The game scout board members explained that being police reservists would allow them to make arrests and to defend themselves using firearms

Well, these are some of the deliberations of the meeting I heard. In my view, should the game scouts be given the status of police reservists, it will be a great help in their attempts to reduce poaching and lion killing within the group ranches. As lion Guardians, we are always in constant touch with the game scouts and we work hand in hand. A stronger unit will mean less killing of lions, which is a plus to our mission.

No responses yet

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Sep 21 2007 | By: admin

This week there seems to be lion problems everywhere. After a long period of calm and tranquility, lions have begun harassing herders. As if by cue, they have been causing trouble to the southeast of the group ranch. Two lions were around the same area on Wednesday stalking livestock at night and causing panic among them. One lion killed two calves in broad daylight on Thursday the 20th while the research group was trying to track him on the other side of the hill. Near Olosira another one broke into a boma and critically injured a donkey on the night of the 20th.

These guys have turned up the pressure on us and now, we hardly stop for a rest. Day or night we are constantly on the run, especially because of the uncollared lions whose movements we are not yet able to track very closely.

8 responses so far

Category: lion research fieldwork | Date: Sep 20 2007 | By: admin

Yesterday, lion guardians Ritei and Melubo reported that two lions had been sighted near some bomas to the southeast of the group ranch. The researchers went and camped there in the hope that they will be able to see them. They set out bait and played sounds all night to attract the lions. By morning, however, no lions had cooperated and they had to break camp. We had hoped they would be able to see lions and maybe collar them soon to help us in the tracking and monitoring. Better luck to them next time around. Seamus and Ernest gave me this picture of the place where they spent the night. Its very mountainous there and difficult to drive off the tracks.

2 responses so far

Category: lion biology | Date: Sep 19 2007 | By: admin

Cats love chicken. You didn’t know that! Anyway, cats love the taste of birds. It is just that birds are too alert, agile, and therefore difficult to catch. One of the lions we are tracking, Nosero, was lucky to catch a bird the other day.

She caught herself a male ostrich! She tried to eat it but perhaps the ostrich was too big. She ate one drumstick, part of the breast, and most of the insides. Once full, she went into some rocky lava flows to sleep, maybe, to return the next day to finish up the rest. The guy in the picture next to the dead ostrich is Ernest. Ernest is part of the research team that works with the lion guardians.

4 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Sep 18 2007 | By: admin

Today, we were tracking lions, and came across this scene. The people in the ranch are very tolerant of wildlife. I think this kind of co-existence with wildlife has been inherited from time immemorial. The Kenya Wildlife Service estimates that 75% of Kenyan wildlife live outside protected areas. We live and work on a piece of land known as a group ranch. This land is communally-owned by several hundred Maasai families. Group ranches such as ours provide the dispersal areas for both the herbivore and carnivore populations that grace the Amboseli National Park and Tsavo National Park.

The Maasai culture of depending only on livestock, hence neither cultivating nor hunting is probably the main reason why wildlife persists in these areas.

2 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Sep 17 2007 | By: admin

Hi everyone! I’m Anthony Kasanga, the coordinator Lion Guardian Program. Lion Guardians is a joint project of the ‘Living with lions’ initiative and the Ol Donyo Wuas Trust, based in Mbirikani Group Ranch in southern Kenya. . Our work, as the name suggests is to harmonize the existence of lions with that of the pastoral Maasai people living within the group ranch.

As lion guardians, our work involves:
1. Daily contact with the general community where we are involved in activities such as helping out in construction of new ‘bomas’ (thorn branch cattle enclosures), herding, and reporting of livestock predation cases. During such contact we are able to educate people on better boma construction and better herding techniques, all with the aim of reducing the incidence of Carnivore predation.
2. Lion tracking to help in monitoring the predators in the wild. This, we do in conjunction with the Kilimanjaro Lion Conservation Project, a lion research project which is carrying out collaring of lions and researching better and more scientific management of lion-pastoralist interactions.
There are 9 lion guardians employed on this ranch. Each lion guardian lives in his home community and operates from there. All of them are Murrans (warriors). Most of them have participated in traditional lion-hunts (armed with spears) before they were employed as lion guardians.

In the course of our daily activities, we encounter lots of interesting events. The prospect of putting our activities in a blog that other people can view and share our experience is very exciting, especially fellow conservationists who undergo similar experiences.

4 responses so far