Lion Guardians

Category: Community work, lion research fieldwork | Date: Feb 03 2008 | By: admin

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for your comments; it is very nice to know there are lots of people out in the world sending support and well wishes to our beloved country. It is a tough time for Kenya.

I am very happy to report that I have safely returned to Mbirikani. We are still having computer issues, but are hoping we can sort them out shortly.

Lone mover in the night

It was around 9:30pm and we thought of going for a night drive to track some lions that might be near to our camp and the Ilmao hills (two identical hills located to the West of our camp, about ten kilometers away). Below is a picture of Ilmao hills.

The stealth of the night and a clear bright moon made our night exclusively beautiful. The only creatures on the move were Spotted Eagle-Owls and some night jars. These nocturnal feeders lay patiently on the dusty roads, waiting for prey to come along. It was after driving for about thirty minutes around the Ilmao hills that we spotted some shy yellow eyes on a tree; we thought “maybe it’s a leopard”. To our surprise, it was a bush baby, a small mammal that hops around on branches and looks like a squirrel, but is actually a very small primate with huge eyes.

After driving for about fifteen minutes, we saw a dark figure walking. Our first thinking was probably a wildebeest. We shone light in its direction, to our surprise it was a bull cow. We had to take care of the bull before carnivores, that are well known to reside on Ilmao hills, made the bull their late night snack. Using the car, we ‘herded’ the bull around the hills and back to the temporary boma where he belonged.

The smile on the face of the owner was as bright as the moon. We had brought back his precious cow that cost him over 30,000 shillings. The last thing he wanted was to have the bull killed by hyenas or lions. He was very willing to allow to us take photos of his boma and cows. As for our trip back to camp, we saw only an Aardwolf and got a faint signal from Lentim’s collar, far away in the hills. Perhaps our sole purpose of the trip was to save the life of the bull.

Here is the saved bull safely back at his boma, you can see the other cows looking out over the boma wall.

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