Lion Guardians

Category: Lion Guardian reports | Date: Jul 31 2008 | By: lionguardians

Lion Guardian Olubi spent the whole of the day yesterday and most of the evening looking for six lost animals - three calves and their mothers. The livestock belonged to one of his neighbors, who left them outside the boma in the bush overnight. Here is Olubi looking for tracks.

Unfortunately for the owner of the livestock, this lead to the calves being killed and their mothers being injured by hyenas. This illustrates very well the reason the Lion Guardians advise all herders to bring their animals into bomas overnight, like the ones below. Calves especially are easy prey for a hyena.

The owner was extremely unhappy about this incident, but he has no one to blame but himself and his herder, since it was him that left them out overnight.

I would like to thank blog readers for their recent donations - Hashi, Kit, Sporting T, Jessica, Pirjo, Ellen, Kim, Loki, Peter and Alison have all donated to the Lion Guardians in July. Thank you!

We would also like to send our special thanks to Jia and Richard for their sponsorship of Lion Guardians. If anyone feels they would like to donate a smaller monthly amount and join another reader or two to sponsor a Guardian please get in touch below!

Thank you!

Tags: attacks, carnivore, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, Livestock, lost, Maasai, masai

2 responses so far

Category: Lion Guardian reports | Date: Jul 29 2008 | By: lionguardians

Guardian Ritei was extremely surprised when he woke up yesterday morning to find lion tracks right outside his boma gate. There have not been any lions around his area for the last two months!

I drove the lion tracking equipment over to Ritei straight away, so he could find out whether the tracks belonged to one of our collared lions, or some new lions that have moved into the area.   

He will be reporting his findings to us once he confirms whether they have collars or not. If not, maybe these lions could join our other collared animals for monitoring.

If you have any questions for the Lion Guardians please add your comments below!

Tags: Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, Maasai, masai, tracks

2 responses so far

Category: Meet the Lion Guardians | Date: Jul 28 2008 | By: lionguardians

As usual at the end of this month we will be holding our Lion Guardians monthly meeting. This is where all the Guardians come to camp and discuss what has happened in their area over the past month - if there have been any problems with carnivores, and what they have done about it, how they have helped their communities to prevent conflict and any other news from their zone.

It is also a chance for the Guardians to raise any points they may have about the program - they are involved in all the decisions that are made about how the program is run. They also get really excited about looking at the blog and all the comments and donations that have been made over the month.

This month, we would also like to interview a few of the Guardians and post the video clips on the blog. We thought it would be a great idea to ask you, the blog readers, if you have any questions you would like us to ask the Guardians, now that you have met them all.

If you have any questions for the Guardians please leave your comments below. If you have a specific Guardian in mind for your question make sure you tell us too! We are looking forward to hearing your questions!

Tags: interview, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, Maasai, masai

8 responses so far

Category: Donations received | Date: Jul 27 2008 | By: lionguardians

The Lion Guardians would like to thank Africa Alive! an African focused visitor attraction in the UK for making a donation of £2300 to the program. They chose lion conservation as the focus of their fundraising efforts this year, which is great news for the lions here, and the Lion Guardians too.

We are very grateful for this donation, which will be extremely useful for us, particularly at this time when we are trying to find enough funds to continue the program on this ranch, before thinking of expanding to other areas, to continue the good work of the Lion Guardians in the wider area of unprotected Maasailand.

Asante sana from all the Lion Guardians!

Tags: africa alive, donations, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, Maasai, masai

3 responses so far

Category: Community work | Date: Jul 26 2008 | By: lionguardians

Lion Guardian Mokoi was out in the bush tracking lions late yesterday, when he came across more than 18 calves on their own without a herder. He recognized the owner of the calves by their ear notches (every livestock owner has a different one to identify which cows belong to whom), so he managed to round them up and took them back to the owner.

One of the roles of the Lion Guardians is to help prevent conflict between people and wildlife in their communities, and one way they do this is to find lost livestock, left out in the bush. Lost livestock is often attacked by predators, which could lead to retaliatory attacks against the carnivores.

It is to be expected that more livestock will get lost around this time of year, due to lack of rains. This means that grazing pastures become scarcer and animals must wander further to find food.

However, the communities also have a role to play by making sure that their animals are safe. If this number of livestock were left out in the bush overnight, the owner might have found nothing left in the morning.

Tags: attacks, carnivore, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, Livestock, lost, Maasai, masai

4 responses so far

Category: ways you can help | Date: Jul 25 2008 | By: lionguardians

I hope you enjoyed finding out about each Lion Guardian, their personalities and backgrounds, and how dedicated they are to helping save the remaining lions here. The Guardians are really happy that they have all been introduced, and that you were interested in reading about them.

 

What is so great about the Lion Guardians, is that they have all been on lion hunts, and most of them have killed lions before, but now they have changed their attitudes completely and are trying to do everything they can to save the lions here and to change the attitudes of their communities towards wildlife too. Here are Nemasi’s cubs - some of the lions they protect.

And the fantastic thing is that they are so successful! Even elders who used to hate carnivores with a passion are listening to the Lion Guardians and have stopped killing carnivores. It is such great news for the wildlife here in this un-protected area.

The project has done so well here on Mbirikani that we hope to start it up in neighbouring areas too. The lions here don’t know that there are boundaries between ranches, and when they move to other areas there is a chance they will be killed. Recently a lion was speared to death on the neighbouring ranch where we hope to start the program. Here is another one of our collared lions - a male called Kesayou.

But first we really need to raise funds. This is where you come in! We are hoping that we can get all our Guardians on Mbirikani group ranch sponsored, before we try to start the program up elsewhere. So far we have 2 Guardians out of the 9 sponsored. We understand that sponsoring a Guardian is a lot to ask. Any one-off donations you can give will help the Lion Guardians too.

If you know anyone else who you think might be able to help, please pass the blog address on to them and tell them about the program. You can also join the facebook cause and invite all your friends to join too. The more people that know about the Lion Guardians, the more chance we have of raising funds to help the program go on. Please spread the word!

Maybe you could start a syndicate among your friends or colleagues where you get together and each donate a smaller monthly amount to sponsor a Guardian? These are just some suggestions! We are grateful for any size of donation you can give us. Thank you so much for your support. All the Lion Guardians pass on their thanks to the blog readers!

Tags: donate, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, Maasai, masai, sponsor

7 responses so far

Category: Meet the Lion Guardians | Date: Jul 24 2008 | By: lionguardians

Olubi is one of those people you could describe as full of energy. The ever-happy Olubi is always laughing and making jokes about things he comes across, or about other people! He participates enthusiastically in all murran activities, including singing. In fact he is the murran best known for his excellent singing across three ranches!

Listen below to hear the Lion Guardians singing: the voice you can hear singing out is Olubi!

Olubi killed seven lions in his life before becoming a Guardian, and for this he was given the name Meitiaki. Among the lions he killed was a female that was pregnant with five cubs. He regretted killing this lioness very much, and for this reason he volunteered to become a Lion Guardian instead of continuing to kill carnivores. He is very popular and well known among the murrans, not only those from his own group ranch Mbirikani, but also from the surrounding ranches, Olgulului and Eselenkei.

Listen below to Olubi talking about being a Lion Guardian:

All of Olubi’s six brothers and his father have killed lions in the past. His father used to hate carnivores, and encouraged his sons to hunt lions, but since Olubi became a Guardian his father has been advising his younger sons not to kill them.

Olubi is married to one wife and two children. He is our second Lion Guardian that has been sponsored, thanks to Jia!

Tags: Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, Maasai, masai

2 responses so far

Category: Meet the Lion Guardians | Date: Jul 23 2008 | By: lionguardians

Solonka is the youngest of the Lion Guardians, and the newest to join the program. His aspiration to be a Guardian through willing volunteering has finally earned him this prestigious position among the Maasai warriors (murrans).

He spent time learning all the skills he needs to be a Lion Guardian. Here he is learning how to track collared lions.

 

He is a very quiet and unassuming character, and would not even complain if you stepped on his toe with spiked shoes! But whilst among his community we have seen that he has a good reputation. This was clearly revealed when the Lion Guardians were working on fixing a boma in his community. The owners of the boma had had livestock taken by a hyena on more than one occasion and they were fed up with it, and just wanted the hyena to be killed.

They did not want us to fix the boma, and were angry. However, with a few softly spoken words from Solonka, the community gave us the chance to protect their boma rather than kill the hyena. Here Solonka is dragging thorn branches to help fix the boma.

Solonka is in the class of murrans who have not killed a lion. In the past he participated in several different lion hunts, but has not killed one himself.

He grew up without a mother who passed away when he was young, and he struggles to support his wife. He has no children himself yet.

Thank you for the donations we have been receiveing over the past weeks. All the Lion Guardians really appreciate the support they are getting from the blog readers. Your donations are so important and much needed to keep this project running. Thank you!

Tags: Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, Maasai, masai

One response so far

Category: Meet the Lion Guardians | Date: Jul 22 2008 | By: lionguardians

Mokoi is the only Lion Guardian who is not a murran. He is in the junior elders age class, known as Ilkidotu; the age level above murrans. He was chosen for his position as a Lion Guardian due to his exceptional hard work - he volunteered for more than six months before he was given a job!

 

Listen to Mokoi talking about being a Lion Guardian:

Mokoi is always ready to learn new things despite his lack of schooling. He is also a great leader. He likes to guide his younger colleagues, and is so enthusiastic that during tracking he always picks up the receiver first, before anybody else has a chance to place a hand on it!

Mokoi is dedicated to helping his community. He always attends local meetings to address issues concerning wildlife and better husbandry, and passes on his knowledge about good livestock husbandry to his community.

Mokoi has no lion name despite the fact that he participated in different lion hunts during his time as a murran. This is because he was never the first person to spear a lion.

He is married to two wives and has six children. Here he is with one of his young children.

Tags: Kenya, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, Maasai, masai

One response so far

Category: Meet the Lion Guardians | Date: Jul 21 2008 | By: lionguardians

Melubo is another one of the pioneers of the Lion Guardians program. His real name is Matasha ole Nakenyu. Simply, Matasha son of Nakenyu. Melubo is his ‘lion name’ -  a title of reverence he was given after he killed a lion. His fame still prevails, as the lion he killed was legendary. It was a huge fully-maned male lion that struck terror among fellow warriors.

That was the past; today Melubo is a force to reckon with in lion conservation. In his zone, everyone knows him. They burden him with all their woes about conservation and human-wildlife conflict, expecting him to magically solve their problems! Cool under all circumstances, Melubo handles them with such gracefulness that everyone is happy dealing with him.

Here Melubo tells us about how his community feels about lion conservation and the Lion Guardians:

At the beginning of this year, two lions were poisoned, one of which was Sangale, Melubo’s favourite lion. Melubo got the news of their deaths when he got home from our end of month meeting and New Year celebrations, and was extremely shocked and saddened. He says that thinking of Sangale makes him very sad as he worked so hard to conserve him.

Listen to Melubo telling us how he feels about being a Lion Guardian, and how it has helped him:

Melubo is married to one wife and has three young children. He lives in a large boma with a few of his brothers, his mother, and his huge father! Yes, his father is a really big man! Mr. Nakenyu, Melubo’s father is also a charismatic and highly regarded member of the Oltiasika community, which Melubo represents. Here he is chatting to Lenkina, one of the Lion Guardians.

Tags: Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, Maasai, masai

8 responses so far