Lion Guardians

Category: Lions killed, ways you can help | Date: Mar 31 2009 | By: lionguardians

I have been very interested to read all the comments and different people’s views on Furadan, on this blog, on the CBS 60 minutes page, and on the Stop the manufacture of Furadan Facebook group. What do you think? Should we be blaming the manufacturers for producing this poison, or the Government for allowing it to be sold here in Kenya when it has been banned in other countries, (I now hear that it is now banned here but we still see it on the shop shelves) or should we be blaming the people here who are using it to kill wildlife, like this beautiful lion, that sadly died from poisoning.

Tell us what you think!

Whatever your view on Furadan, I would like to thank you very much for your donations, which will directly help the work of the Lion Guardians here in Kenya. The project is completely funded by donations and grants, and the money you donate will go towards paying the salaries of the Guardians, their equipment and training, and all the other costs of running this project here in Maasailand.

All the Guardians are extremely grateful for the support they receive from blog readers, and are so excited that they are being supported from the other side of the world! Here are Lion Guardians Kapande and Koikai.

We are currently expanding the program to two neighbouring ranches where lion killing and the use of poisons to kill wildlife is still widespread, so your donations are needed now more then ever. THANK YOU!

Tags: furadan, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, lion poisoning, lions, Maasai, masai, wildlife poisoning

6 responses so far

Category: Lion Guardian reports | Date: Mar 30 2009 | By: lionguardians

We hope that a lot of people watched 60 minutes last night and are eager to find out about the lions here in Maasailand, and what the Lion Guardians are doing to save them. If you missed it you can watch it here, and view the comments about whether a poison like Furadan should be still sold here in Kenya, when in other countries it has been banned because of its dangerous nature. I believe there must be other ways for crops to be treated for pests, and we do not need to use the kind of control that can also kill lions, and even people!

I have some great news for you about our Mbirikani lions. Yesterday we had a second report of the three young lion cubs that Lion Guardian Koikai reported to us a few weeks ago! The cubs are still small, probably around 3 or 4 months old, and although we don’t have a photo of them, we are told they are around the size of these cubs below.

We went to track in the area that they were spotted in, and did not pick up any signal, so it seems like we have a new female on our ranch, as well as the new cubs! I hope we can find them again soon, and bring you some photographs. 

Tags: 60 minutes, cubs, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, lion poisoning, lions, Maasai, masai

3 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Mar 27 2009 | By: lionguardians

We are very excited that the CBS program 60 minutes featuring the Lion Guardians will be shown on TV in the US this Sunday March 29th at 7pm Eastern Time. It will also be available to watch on the internet at http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/60minutes/main3415.shtml soon after. The program is all about wildlife poisoning, and Bob Simon and his team came to the Chyulu Hills to find out about lion poisoning in our area and how we work to stop wildlife being killed.

Wildlife poisoning is an extremely urgent issue - it is very easy and cheap to buy the agricultural pesticide carbofuran (Furadan) and sadly it can easily kill any animal you would like it to. Many people in Maasailand are using it to kill carnivores, and we have even heard reports that it has been used by a man to kill his father.

Across Kenya there are more and more cases of wildlife, especially carnivores, being killed with poison. It is also destroying vulture populations, as they feast on poisoned carcasses too.

We are very glad that CBS 60 minutes visited Kenya to highlight this important issue, and we hope that the program will make people sit up and listen. Our hope is that no one will be able to buy this substance anymore, and it will be replaced in shops with a pesticide that cannot be used to kill wildlife.

Have a look at our web page on lion poisoning on the Living with Lions website: http://www.livingwithlions.org/lion-poisoning.html, and please tell all your friends to watch 60 minutes. Thank you!

Tags: 60 minutes, Bob Simon, cbs, furadan, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, lion poisoning, lions, Maasai, masai, poison

10 responses so far

Category: Maasai traditions, Meet the Lion Guardians | Date: Mar 25 2009 | By: lionguardians

Saturday was a special day for one Lion Guardian. Apart from me, our youngest Lion Guardian Solonka Sakimpa was the only one not married. But this Saturday we were all very pleased to celebrate his wedding with him.

Early in the morning we went to pick up his new wife from Mbirikani village, which is about 45 minutes drive away. Solonka was looking handsome with lots of beads and red ochre all over his body. We got to his new wife’s boma quite early and met her to bring her on the journey to Ol Donyo Wuas, where Solonka lives. Of course she was looking very beautiful, and Solonka could not help but smile all the way to his home.

Three goats were slaughtered for the wedding and we were given plenty of meat to thank us for picking up his bride. By the evening were all full and happy, and glad to have celebrated the special day with Solonka and his friends and family. I hope you are happy to see these photos from his special day too!

CONGRATULATIONS SOLONKA!

Tags: Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, lions, Maasai, masai, masai marriage, wedding

6 responses so far

Category: lion research fieldwork | Date: Mar 23 2009 | By: lionguardians

The story of finding our collared lion Nemasi has been going on for some time now. We are desperate to see whether she still has all three of her cubs with her. A young lion was found dead close to the area she has been residing in recently and we haven’t managed to see any of her cubs since then. Here is Nemasi and one of her cubs when they were a lot younger.

Nemasi has been hiding out in a thick forest which is impossible to drive into, so our search has so far been very difficult. Finally we managed to track her to an open area outside the forest. At night we tied some bait to a tree and played sounds of a dyeing buffalo through a loud speaker to attract her towards it. Our first visitor to the bait was a striped hyena.

After a while the hyena moved off and to our delight we could just make out Nemasi in the distance walking around the side of the forest through the darkness and towards the bait. Once she was eating, we drove closer to get a good look and see whether she had any companions. She looked well, but unfortunately she was feeding on her own. Here’s another photo of Nemasi (we couldn’t take any this time, as it was night and the flash might have scared her).

We waited in the area for some time, hoping her cubs might appear. We did see a young sub-adult in the darkness but it disappeared as quickly as we could get our binoculars out to get a closer look. We also picked up the signal of Lentim, our collared male in that area, and were pleased to get a good look at him too. However, for the moment our search for the cubs continues.

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

2 responses so far

Category: Community work | Date: Mar 20 2009 | By: lionguardians

For the last three days I have been busy trying to get things started with the new Lion Guardians projects on our neighbouring group ranches Eselenkei and Olgulului. In the past, these two ranches have been significant in finishing off the few lions that still roam the vast Maasai plains. They are larger and will require many more Lion Guardians, spread over a wider area. Its going to be a lot of work but we hope the murrans will be enthusiatsic, as we have been told many times they can’t wait for us to start work there.

 

With the help of Philip Briggs, who has recently joined the Lion Guardians team, we will be holding meetings across the different Maasai communities on the ranches to try to find the best warriors for the job of Lion Guardians, to track and monitor lion activity in their areas and help the communities to reduce conflict with wildlife.

We hope that soon the lion killing in these ranches will come to a complete stop. Please help us to do this - your donations will be vital in helping get these new projects up and running! I will keep you posted on how the search for the new Lion Guardians is going on these new ranches.

Thank you so much for your comments about Oxford. I am so excited and happy that I have so much support from you all! I will definitely stay in touch!

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

3 responses so far

Category: life in camp | Date: Mar 18 2009 | By: lionguardians

It was a dream come true when I was accepted into the University of Oxford. It has been my goal to continue with my education since I finished High School in 2003, but little did I know that I could end up at one of the world’s best universities!

The Postgraduate Diploma in International Wildlife Conservation Practice is a new course from Oxford’s Wildlife Conservation Research Unit (WildCRU), which will improve my skills in lion conservation and running the Lion Guardians program and teach me all about conservation research. I am so excited that I will be able to bring these skills back to Maasailand!

The course lasts for 7 months and starts at the end of April, so I have not got long to prepare myself for visiting a very different and much colder country! I also do not have long to train my successor, who I will introduce to you soon. He will keep you posted with Lion Guardians news and stories, and I will keep you updated on my studies and what is happening in Oxford when I am there.

I hope you are excited about this too! I hope it will really benefit the lions and the Lion Guardians, as well as me, my family and my community.

Tags: International Wildlife Conservation Practice, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, lions, Maasai, masai, oxford, Oxford University, WildCRU

13 responses so far

Category: Lion Guardian reports | Date: Mar 16 2009 | By: lionguardians

Yesterday when we were going out lion tracking in the early morning (still trying to see the elusive Nemasi and her cubs), we came across a giraffe with a badly injured leg. He was standing in the middle of the road and did not even try to run away when we drove towards him. He slowly walked off the road as we came closer.

We called the game scouts from the Maasailand Preservation Trust immediately to attend to the giraffe, whose leg was badly hurt. The poor giraffe could only walk very slowly, and could hardly stand on its front left leg.

We don’t know how it happened. It does not look like there was any human involvement. I will let you know what happens to this poor animal, but it doesn’t look too good for this giraffe.

When we got to a high point we tried to get Nemasi’s signal, but it was clear that she was well inside the thick lava forest. This lion is proving to be extremely hard to track down!

Tags: giraffe, injury, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, lions, Maasai, masai

2 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Mar 13 2009 | By: lionguardians

Yesterday we gave you the link to listen to the first of two programs about Living with Lions and lion conservation in Kenya, on Alex Chadwick’s Day to Day program on NPR. Here is the link to the second of the programs which is all about us - the Lion Guardians and our lion conservation work in Southern Kenya.

I hope you enjoy listening to it. Please let us know what you think.

Tags: Alex Chadwick, Day to Day, Kenya, lion, lion conservation, Lion Guardians, lions, Maasai, masai, NPR

One response so far

Category: Lion Guardian reports, ways you can help | Date: Mar 13 2009 | By: lionguardians

The search for Nemasi’s cubs continues…… Just by the edge of the thick lava forest we found a young eland that had been killed the previous day by what looked like young lions (from the tracks). We were very excited!

But as we had no luck seeing the very secretive lions previously we decided to ask our neighbours Ol Donyo Wuas lodge whether we could borrow their camera traps, so we could put them up by the eland to see if the cubs came back at night. That way we would not disturb them from their food, and would be able to see how many cubs there were.

We went back to the eland carcass at early evening and set up the traps.

Then we waited! When we came back the next day we could see elephant tracks but did not notice any fresh lion tracks. When we got back to camp we immediately ran to the computer to have a look at the photos. And look at what we found! Sadly, still no lion cubs but instead we got some great photos of a beautiful leopard! Hope you like them!

What do you think is happening here? Did the leopard fall over? Was it just relaxing next to the eland carcass?

Aren’t the photos great? It is not often we see leopards here so we were very happy to see this healthy looking animal. We have now had to give the camera trap back to the lodge, so if anyone can donate a camera trap to us we would be extremely grateful - and would be able to bring you more photos like these!

We are also in need of a digital camera as the Lion Guardians camera recently broke, and we are relying on borrowing a digital camera to take all the photos you see on the blog. If you know anyone who has a spare digital camera or camera trap please write us a comment and I will tell you how you could get these items to us. Or if you could help us by donating some money to go towards either of these items we would be very grateful too. Thank you!

Tags: camera trap, digital camera, Kenya, leopard, lion, lion conservation, lion cubs, Lion Guardians, lions, Maasai, masai

4 responses so far