Baraza

Category: Emergencies, Forests, Gorillas, Trade, wildlife | Date: Oct 10 2008 | By: baraza

We are all been glued to the depressing headlines every day about the housing crisis, economic credit crunch, collapsing banks. On the bright side we are witnessing an unprecedented level of global cooperation to manage bailouts and rescue packages to save the worlds’ economies.I don’t think I’m alone in wondering how come we couldn’t get this level of cooperation on global climate change. Surely it is having an even greater impact on global economies.

The current financial news focuses on industrial nations of North America and Europe but here in Africa (and I’m sure it’s similar in other developing countries) we are already feeling the impact. We’re experiencing massive inflation which affects us all. Yesterday I heard about a middle class Kenyan family who are now feeding their children on anything that fills their stomach. Although they are a well educated couple, they cannot afford to balance their children’s diet. It’s a vicious cycle – the kids will be undernourished, will perform poorly at school. This will cap their own prospects and limit their capacity to escape poverty.

So, we are reacting to the financial crisis because it affects each of us individually. We approve the bail out rescue packages, and have allowed our governments to take billions of dollars from our taxes to rescue failing financial institutions.

Many environmentalists and conservationists are amazed that we can galvanize global coordination to prevent a global financial crisis; and furious that the same countries couldn’t come together and agree on a rescue package to address other global crises like climate change and poverty in developing countries.

This story appeared today on the BBC website and it stirred me to write this post because while the financial situation may be a global crisis, it is nothing compared to the unfolding environmental crisis . A new report by TEEB (The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity) informs us that are racing towards catastrophic damage to our economies because of what how we are destroying biodiversity and ecosystem services.

What are ecosystem services and how dependent are we on them?

Our very existence is tied to ecosystems.

They clean our water and air; give us fertile soils; provide us with building materials and clothing (timber, cotton); pollinate our crops (bees); store carbon and stop the world from over-heating. The list goes on.

33 Billion - the annual value of these ecosystem services in US Dollars

16 Billion – the annual value of the global economy

In this study by Robert Costanza and others  of 17 ecosystem services in 16 biomes, the value of ecosystem services that are not already captured in economic markets is US $15 – 54 Trillion (that’s twelve 0’s!) with an average of US $33 trillion. They emphasize that this is a minimum estimate. To put this into perspective remember that the Global economy is worth about US $16 trillion – half of what nature gives us for free.

To make this real, consider pollination services – without pollinators like bees, we would have virtually no vegetables and of course no honey! The value of pollination of our commercial crops is estimated to be US $216 billion every year. We can survive without bees, of course but imagine if we had to do all that pollination by hand!

It is this value that we do not capture in our economic evaluations. These ecosystem services are considered free public goods! There are no markets and no prices. We simply don’t count them in our national economies and they don’t feature in our economic planning.

We are trashing our ecosystems and losing a host of free services

By 2050 11% of the natural areas remaining in 2000 could be lost to agricultural expansion, the expansion of infrastructure, and climate change.

Almost 40% of the land currently under low-impact agriculture could be converted to intensive agricultural use, with further biodiversity losses

60% of coral reefs could be lost - even by 2030 - through fishing, pollution, diseases, invasive alien species, and coral bleaching due to climate change.

And climate change is exacerbating this problem.

What are the global financial implications?

In an interview here, the lead author of the TEEB report Pavan Sukhdev warns that “the fisheries that are basically going to die out in 40 years time don’t just mean $80 to 100 billion worth of lost fishing income, but also lost protein for the world’s billion poorest people”.

Nearly one-third of the world’s fisheries are severely depleted, and some have suffered complete collapse, such as the Grand Banks cod stocks off Canada’s eastern coast. If current trends continued, we will have no commercially viable marine fisheries left within fifty years.

The loss of biodiversity will have serious repercussions on the world’s economy. The TEEB report predicts we are losing forest ecosystem services at a rate of between $2 trillion and $5 trillion per year. This is the combined value of their services, including cleaning water and absorbing carbon dioxide. The situation will worsen with time as our natural stock is depleted, and we lose the services they provide. It’s a little like losing the interest from an investment, as you eat into the capital. Except that the value of the services a forest provides, is worth many times what we would make if we were to chop down the timber and sell it on the open market.

We tend to undervalue things that we get for free.

We understand the value of those things that we spill our sweat for. The TEEB report suggests that we have flawed economic analysis and we’ve been making policy mistakes. Because environmental services are ‘free’ their loss often is not detected by our current economic incentive system, losses due to deforestation, unsustainable harvesting, habitat destruction etc will continue unabated. To add salt to this wound, the world’s poor are most at risk from the continuing loss of biodiversity, as they are the ones that are most dependent on the ecosystem services that are being degraded.

How big is the problem?

Between 1900 and today we have destroyed 50% of the worlds wetlands. In addition 30% of the our coral reefs are damaged and 35% of our magroves deforested. Extinction rates are now 1000 times greater than they should be and the IUCN states that 70% of the worlds plants are in jeopardy. This is already affecting food, water and health. By 2050 7.5 million square kilometers be lost – that’s the size of Australia.

The TEEB report suggests that the cost of the loss of biodiversity today dwarfs the current financial crisis and that we urgently need a rescue package for environment.

You can read the full TEEB report here or the executive summary here.

Bailing out ecosystems

We know that our very well being is totally dependent upon these “ecosystem services” and that we are hurtling towards a crisis, and yet we are not even talking about any sort of rescue package for ecosystems. No one has dared quantify how much that would cost us.

However, the TEEB report warns that if we do not adopt the right policies, the current decline in biodiversity and the related loss of ecosystem services will continue and even accelerate. Some ecosystems are likely to be damaged beyond repair. With a “business as usual” scenario, by 2050 we, or our children and grand children will be faced with serious consequences.

I agree with Corey, the TEEB report is “Yet more evidence that we have to stop the extinction crisis“

Although it sounds horrendous, we mustn’t see this situation as hopeless. Ecosystems are far more robust than banks and economies. If we lose millions of dollars in ecosystem services by chopping down a forest, we can recover that value with a relatively small investment in forest restoration.  It’ll take years but nature also has her own inbuilt repair mechanisms. We can help her to speed up the recovery by planting, protecting and managing the restoration.

Here’s an example of what can be achieved after only 30 years of forest restoration in Africa.

Tree planting with nitrogen fixing casuarina after open cast mining has stripped all the surface soil and rock at Lafarge in Mombasa Kenya

30 years later the restored ecosystem provides many services - cleaning water, producing fish, carbon sequestration, wildlife habitat, recreation and income generation. It is a global showcase and should be replicated and scaled up. You can see more about this amazing place here

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Tags: biodiversity, rescue plan, TEEB report, wildlifedirect

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Category: Emergencies, Gorillas, National Parks and protected areas, WildlifeDirect news, wildlife | Date: Oct 09 2008 | By: baraza

We have been following the alarming developments in Eastern Congo on the Gorilla protection blog and here we bring some of the latest reports on BBC here and from the United Nations official site

There is additional inforamation at the UNITED NATIONS Monuc website here Oct 8, 2008 - The Democratic Republic of Congo’s envoy to the United Nations called Wednesday for an urgent UN Security Council meeting to discuss what he called an “imminent” Rwandan attack on the eastern DRC city of Goma.

Speaking to AFP, Atoki Ileka said DRC authorities had “observed concentrations of Rwandan troops in the Rwandan border town of Gisenyi,” and that this suggested that an attack on Goma, located just across the frontier, was “imminent.”
In an earlier statement, the United States has responded angrily to Nkunda’s recent declarations in this statement from the US Department of State

“The United States condemns and rejects the statements made by General Nkunda, leader of the National Congress for the Defense of the People (CNDP), claiming the CNDP intends to overthrow the elected and universally recognized Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (GDRC). The U.S. calls on the international community to support the GDRC as it works to consolidate its democracy and capacity to govern justly its entire territory. The U.S. opposes all those who seek to foment instability in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
The Goma Agreement and the Nairobi Communiqué remain the only true viable framework to bring stability to eastern Congo. The signatories should respect their commitments and implement them swiftly. All concerned parties should also respect the current cease fire and move quickly to disengage their forces in accordance with the UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (MONUC) Global Disengagement Plan. The U.S. applauds MONUC for its efforts to stabilize eastern Congo and calls on all parties to cooperate with those efforts. Conflict between the CNDP and the DRC Armed Forces only detracts attention from resolving the root problem causing instability in the region posed by the ex-Rwandan Armed Forces (ex-FAR), the Interahamwe, and the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR).
The U.S. remains committed to supporting the GDRC and the people of the Congo to ensure a strong, democratic state, free from all illegal armed groups. At the October 3rd UN Security Council meeting on DRC, the U.S. condemned statements made by Nkunda and called for the improvement of MONUC capabilities to better carry out its mandate. The U.S. will continue to work with the DRC and the Great Lakes countries both bilaterally and through the Tripartite Plus process to strengthen regional cooperation and build a stable and prosperous region.
The U.S. will work to bring to justice those responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in eastern Congo and elsewhere”.

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Tags: CNDP, Gorillas, MONUC, Nkunda, rebels, Rwanda, Virunga National Park

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Category: wildlife trade | Date: Oct 08 2008 | By: baraza

After going through the IUCN reports yesterday I was shocked to read Glaucia’s latest blog post from Brazil about 225 MORE baby parrots seized - this was in addition to the 400 parrots seized earlier. Parrots, are among the most intelligent birds. Their popularity stems mostly from their ability to mimic human voices. This site tries to match your needs with the characteristics of differn parrot types - criteria include ‘noise level”, “talking ability”, and “cuddliness”. According to the site, the Amazon  Blue fronted and it’s relatives all score high on these criteria - and all will live to at least 50 years of age (African Grey parrots go up to 60). They are popular because like dogs they bond with indivduals.

Because of these factors, and perhaps the declining sociability of people, the popularity of keeping parrots as pets is growing and as a result they are subjected to more exploitation than any other group of birds.  A study done in Tanzania a few years ago revealed that only 1 in 100 taken from the wild actually makes it to a pet store!

Why would anyone get into such business? Money of course. Amazon parrots sell for $600 while African Greys go for 900 according to this website . Even if the poacher in Africa only gets 1/100th of the price for each parrot, it’s worth it - afterall, most people survive on less than 1$ per day. I believe that it is these prices that drive the illegal trade.

While working for the KWS I discovered  that thousands of parrots are held illegally in Kenya - most are caught by children in neighbouring countries, transported by dealers and arrive over the borders quietly in bags and tubes. They are purchased and kept clandestinely by wealthy people, some get exported. Everyone knows it’s illegal so to avoid detection by the authorities many are kept in small cages in back rooms… resulting in serious maltreatment and are sometimes kept in deplorable conditions. Talking to the owners I realised that these were not bad people, they loved the parrots, they felt that they had ‘rescued’ the bird from certain death…..they didn’t  understand why they were being victimized. They had also bonded very strongly with these charismatic birds and considered them a member of the family.

If the person  left Kenya they could not take the parrot as it did not have ‘papers’ so they would leave it with a well wisher …and so the cycle continued.

When I met I met Jane Goodall she told me about her experiences with African Greys. She believes that they don’t just mimic, that they are intelligent enough to actually ‘talk’. She told me this story  which is apparently related in this book  “Of Parrots and People: The Sometimes Funny, Always Fascinating, and Often Catastrophic Collisions of Two Intelligent Species.”..in a review of the book in the Los Angeles Times state “Jane Goodall learned of one such New York parrot and scheduled a visit. In advance of her arrival, the “parront” (a parrot’s human “parent”) showed the parrot pictures of the primatologist with chimpanzees and explained her work. When Goodall arrived, the parrot looked at her and asked, “Got a chimp?”

Ie. they say things for a purpose. Dr Goodall is not alone in this thinking. Though there are many skeptics out there, I agree with the view that parrots are special and intelligent. This story of a lost parrot that told the police it’s name and address convinces me.

KWS rules were to conduct an all out seizure of all these thousands of illegal parrots but we knew that nobody had the means to look after them if they were seized. So we turned a blind eye.  After I met Jane I decided to take her advice and began planning to offer an amnesty to those who came clean - to enable parrot keepers to get papers which would allow them to take care of these special birds more openly, get veterinary support, and start a parrot owners association that would set standards, advise, and provide networks for parrot lovers, plus provide the much needed register of birds and owners to prevent them from returning into trade illegally. I also wanted to build a huge aviary so that any owners who wanted to let go of their parrot could do so and create an environment for the parrots to live in a flock.  Once big enough a flock could be returned to a suitable safe place in the wild.

My colleagues at the KWS however didn’t agree with me - they felt that an amnesty would drive further illegal trade further and lead to even more poaching. I could see that but if the only solution was to arrest and charge anyone with a parrot - the trade would remained underground and parrots would continue to suffer, and we’d never get information on the scale of the trade.

After I left the Wildlife Service the status quo remained.  I think about the parrots situation all the time and wonder whether the amnesty would have helped. I wonder what we should have done.

If you had the power to decide… what would you do?

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Tags: African grey parrots, blue fronted parrot, illegal trade, Parrots

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Category: elephants | Date: Oct 07 2008 | By: baraza

Elephants generally evoke strong reactions from anyone who has to deal with them. Long term studies on a number of populations of elephant have taught us so much about the species by Cynthia Moss, Katy Payne, Joyce Poole, Ian Douglas-Hamilton and others have revealed how they are similar to people in terms of their social structure, and how intelligent they are. This knowledge has contributed significantly to our ability to empathize with the individual animals. But does this help us manage elephants?

In Kenya elephants are sometimes killed by the authorities if they are deemed problem animals and a threat to people. Last month, one elephant was saved by cell phone technology. Dr. Iain Douglas-Hamilton of Save the elephants was able convince authorities not to kill a problem bull because it’s radiocollar data revealed that Mountain Bull was not a habitual crop raider. Mountain Bull’s leather collar carries a cellphone that text-messages his GPS location every hour. If the team sees him headed for the fields again some night, they can probably call the Kenya Wildlife Service to avert any dangers to local communities.

Further south a debate is currently raging in Namibia about whether to hunt elephants or not. Voice of America has raised the alarm about trophy hunting of desert elephants in Kunene and Conservationists are seeking support and funds to pay for the trophy hunting permit to save a single desert elephant. Ethics and Animals report that ten women from all around the world will trek 120 km through Damaraland to raise money for the purchase of the remaining trophy hunting permit. Conservationists accuse the Namibian Government of ignorance - they believe that the 6 hunting permits per year will decimate this small and rare population.

But Dr Kieth-Legget who has been studying the Kunene population of desert elephants for the last ten years says “My understanding of the new quotas is that 6 bulls will be shot in the Kunene Region (eastern and western sections) over a 2 year period. While the elephant population of the region is capable of sustaining this level of off-take at the present time, the question remains as to whether they are able to sustain this level of off-take in the longer term, and I suggest that they are probably not. However, the MET has stated that this is a one-off quota and, while this is always subject to political will, the quota will probably not be repeated for several years so the longer-term sustainability of such an off-take rate does not need to be considered at present.”

Elephants are native to Angola; Benin; Botswana; Burkina Faso; Cameroon; Central African Republic; Chad; Congo; Congo, The Democratic Republic of the; Côte d’Ivoire; Equatorial Guinea; Eritrea; Ethiopia; Gabon; Ghana; Guinea; Guinea-Bissau; Kenya; Liberia; Malawi; Mali; Mozambique; Namibia; Niger; Nigeria; Rwanda; Senegal; Sierra Leone; Somalia; South Africa; Sudan; Tanzania, United Republic of; Togo; Uganda; Zambia and Zimbabwe

They have been  have reintroduced into Swaziland.

Although elephant populations are stable or increasing in eastern and southern Africa, the trend is unknown in other regions and the IUCN says that overall there is insufficient information inform current trends at the continental level, it seems that elephant numbers have always been dictated by humans, as research reveals that elephants have gone through population booms and busts over the last few centuries. When populations increase they reach a threshold and then poaching escalates causing a population crash. The easy access to guns combined with habitat loss means that elephant populations cannot return to former ranges or densities and I fear that unless we can persuade governments to prioritise these spectacular animals, we will lose many more of our elephants and will one day end up with pockets of elephants in fenced enclosures. The increasing populations in Southern Africa have convinced some countries to support the exploitation of elephants for products like meat and ivory. By keeping the ivory trade alive however, we put vulnerable populations at risk, they could blink out. This has already happened in some places, elephants are extinct in Burundi; Gambia; Mauritania.

Despite what we know from the history of elephant exploitation, legal ivory trade has been re-opened which may be fueling the poaching of elephants in vulnerable locations like eastern DR Congo as reported on Gorilla.cd where there is evidence of increased elephant poaching in the Virunga National Park, and reports also suggest an increase in poaching and ivory seizures in Kenya, China and Zambia. Because many conservation agencies supported the decision for the reopening of ivory trade as a ‘pro development’ move, none of them seem willing to raise alarms again.

But it’s not just ivory trade, war and arms - it seems that the mix has just gotten deadlier with the influx of Chinese workers across Africa. In the first eight months of this year, 57 carcases have been found across Kenya with their tusks hacked out, 15 per cent more than the total for all of 2007. It  was the third annual increase in a row. This week the Telegraph reported what everyone has been thinking but too afraid to say … the carcasses seem to be eerily correlated with locations where Chinese workers are operating.  Since many Chinese firms in Africa are private and not state controlled, the Chinese government is unlikely to do anything about it. In the worlds of Ian Taylor “It is not China’s responsibility to “look out” for Africa’s interests”. He reminds us that “while China has an Africa policy, Africa does not have a China policy”.

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Tags: China, elephant poaching, elephants, ivory trade

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Category: Emergencies | Date: Oct 06 2008 | By: baraza

I could kick myself for canceling a trip to attend the IUCN World Conservation Congress meeting in Barcelona. I attended the previous Congress in Bangkok which was a great meeting of conservation professionals, except in retrospect I realise that there was alot of talk and not much achieved … except species continue to slide towards extinction. In its first of the 10 days of meeting the report has revealed an alarming statistic that a quarter of the world’s mammal species are at risk of extinction.

It seems that every study on biodiversity reveals increasing threats to species - many of my colleagues form university were involved in this study so I believe the statistics.

Mammals are not faring very well

Imagine if one in four mammals actually went extinct! Some of the species at greatest risk include Iberian Lynx (Lynx pardinus) which may number fewer than 150 and continue to decline due to a shortage of its primary prey, the European Rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus).

The Tasmanian Devil (Sarcophilus harrisii) has declined by more than 60 percent in the last 10 years due to a fatal infectious facial cancer, while Southeast Asias  Fishing Cat (Prionailurus viverrinus) has become endangered due to habitat loss in wetlands.

Mammals in Asia are especially vulnerable because they are hunted for food and traditional medicines. Rapid rates of development and population growth also means that habitats are shrinking and as a result of these combined threats, more than 70 per cent of known species in Asia, are now under threat.

Reptiles and amphibians are doing much worse

Other groups of animals are faring even worse. Thirty-one percent of reptiles, 30 percent of amphibians and 37 percent of fish are deemed threatened. In total, 22 percent of assessed species are nearing extinction, and thousands more animals, especially reptiles and fish, have yet to be evaluated. Birds are not faring as badly as the other groups,  almost one in eight birds are threatened.The main reason for these threats include habitat loss and over exploitation of terrestrial mammals and marine mammals, and pollution, and global warming …it is ironic that human populations meanwhile are on the increase.

African Elephants are recovering in some places

Thankfully it’s not all bad news. Apparently African elephants are less endangered than before as a result of effective conservaiton efforts and the ivory ban in Southern and Eastern Africa. Five percent of mammals are actually doing better than before, these include the black footed ferret which was extinct in the wild but has now been reintroduced. The Chinese Père David’s Deer (Elaphurus davidianus) though now extinct in the wild may yet recover. The captive population has increased in recent years and it is possible that free-ranging populations could soon be re-established.

The IUCN study and related issues are under discussion by more than 8,000 peope who are attending the World Conservation Congress.  I wish I could feel hopeful, somehow I doubt that they will actually come up with a workable game plan for a sustainable future. However I was pleasantly surprised to read Cindy Ellen Hills article explaining how the Institute for Environmental Security handles the threat of lack of security to species in an article called Waging a Sustainble Peace

“key military leaders at an invitation-only roundtable to spearhead a paradigm shift in thinking about the intersection of environmental issues and local, regional, and national security.

The IUCN Roundtable on Environment and Security will match representatives from the military (USA, Netherlands, Spain, Thailand, Nepal, Mauretania), NATO, and other members of the world’s security community with key environmental leaders to explore strategies for waging an environmentally sustainable peace.”

I am curious about what the security meeting will conclude but in general I doubt that “Barcelona” will get enough attention to really gain political will for conservation. One major problem is timing, this meeting couldn’t have come at a worse time with global attention focused on the worlds unfolding financial crisis.  It’s a pity, many scientist are convinced that we are witnessing the sixth wave of extinctions, and it’s entirely man made. We could lose nearly a quarter of the worlds species just because we don’t care enough. I was looking at these photos from the wildlife photographer of the year competition and couldn’t help feeling  sad that some species will never be photographed in the wild again.

For more detailed info and official documents go here I can’t find a single blog from the congress… if you find any please send me the link.

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Tags: endangered species, extinction, Gorillas, IUCN

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Category: Gorillas | Date: Oct 06 2008 | By: baraza

Jenny, a 55 year old gorilla has died at Dallas Zoo in early September. She was an old gorilla, and died of a stomach tumor (actually she was euthanized because the tumor was inoperable).  In the wild gorillas don’t live much beyond 30 so Jenny had along life, yet it still feels sad and this story is getting wide coverage. It is the second death of a gorilla at the Dallas Zoo in a month.

Jenny who has her own Wikipedia page is a western lowland gorilla and was born in the wild and was acquired by the zoo in 1957. She gave birth in 1965 to a female named Vicki but never conceived again. Vicki was sent to a Canadian zoo at age 5. There are four other gorillas at Dallas Zoo.

Just last month, another gorilla at the zoo, 43-year-old Hercules, died after undergoing a medical procedure for spinal disease and in 2004, Dallas police shot and killed a 13-year-old gorilla named Jabari at the zoo after it jumped over a wall, bit three people and snatched up a toddler by his teeth. The enclosure was remodeled and the city paid a fine to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Should Gorillas and other apes be in zoos?

There are about 360 gorillas in North American zoos. I love zoos and think that they play an important role in education and awareness, but somehow it seems wrong to keep apes in zoos. We would never imagine keeping a human in a zoo - so why do we keep our closest living relatives in them? It must be like a prison for gorillas, chimps and other intelligent animals. You just have to google gorilla images to see the deplorable conditions that most zoo apes live in, check out their expressions, and see how sad they look. Gorillas are one of the mian attractions at the Dallas Zoo which recieved  670,084 visitors last year alone. The entrance fees would have generated almost $4.7 million.  I wonder how much of this goes back into conservation, to the places where these endangered animals were taken from so many years ago?

Today we also recieved the alarming news that gorillas are the latest victims of the tainted milk scandal in China that has killed four human infants and left more than 50,000 ill. The two gorillas from Hangzhou Wildlife World in the eastern province of Zhejiang, aged one and three, had been fed with milk powder made by Sanlu Group, the company associated with the contamination scandal. Both gorillas are showing the early signs of kidney stones.

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Tags: Dallas Zoo, Gorillas, Hangzhou Wildlife World, melamine, western lowland gorillas

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Category: Gorillas | Date: Oct 06 2008 | By: baraza

When we launched Owen and Mzee a few years ago, Turtle Pond, our partner also set up a special website for children to participate, interact and play games as a companion site for the Owen and Mzee books. The site was hugely successful.

So it was natural that Turtle Pond has also created Miza.com as a companion website for the children’s book “Looking For Miza: The True Story of the Mountain Gorilla Family Who Rescued One of Their Own”, published by  Scholastic Corporation Turtle Pond Publications.

According to the write up about the makers of Miza.com here “The goal of the site is to provide an interactive, jungle-inspired environment featuring Miza, where children can learn more about Africa’s endangered mountain gorillas and encourage them to take an active role in helping to alleviate the animals’ plight. According to Matthew Kicinski, president of Artgig, “This was our first time working with ESI, who approached us because of our experience designing and building online games and interactive websites. Although we were tasked with building the entire Flash site based on design and direction provided by ESI, the real showcase for us is the Gorilla Mountain game.” “Gorilla Mountain was a lot of fun to build,” says Artgig Chief Engineer and Programmer Steven Grosmark. “ESI provided a base set of requirements, but we were able to run with it and create something that reflects Artgig’s approach to Flash gaming that I think kids will really enjoy.”

In addition to the Gorilla Mountain game, Miza.com includes an interactive video maker where kids can create audio/video mash-ups of their favorite wildlife clips, Gorilla Finder - a first person narrated slideshow from the rangers’ perspective, sing-alongs, videos, animated shorts, a Nose Matcher game, and Jungle Jammer - a place where kids can create their own songs by adding animated animals to several jungle scenes.

“This was the perfect project for us,” said Matthew Kicinski. “Not only did we have the opportunity to do what we do best, which is create full-featured, interactive websites, but Miza.com is also a great cause, which is a big bonus as far as we’re concerned.”

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Category: Gorillas, WildlifeDirect news | Date: Oct 05 2008 | By: baraza

Here are some of the photos taken during the Kids Gorilla Summit which we talked about here and here

This was the team that sat on the panel, back row from left to right Isabella Hatkoff, Juliana Hatkoff, Peter Greste, Trevor Nielsen, Lucy Spelman, Billy Di Michelle, front row: Craig Hatkoff, Richard Leakey, Paula Kahumbu

The hall was filled to capacity with school children from 6 schools in the tri-state area.

Dr. Lucy Spelman conducted a break out group with children from one school

More photos are available here

The gorilla summit was picked up in a number of news sites like the Environmental News service here, Earth times and Reuters.

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Category: Gorillas | Date: Oct 04 2008 | By: baraza

After spending a day with Lucy Spelman a vet with the Mountain Gorilla Veterinary Project (MGVP)  in New York and hearing her amazing stories about live as a gorilla vet I realised that I’d much rather be in the rainforest experiencing what the MGVP does first hand. Well, I may yet get to do it one day but for now I can only experience it virtually.  So can you!

The Mountain Gorilla Veterinary Project (MGVP) is an innovative gorilla health initiative first established in 1985 when Dian Fossey asked the Morris Animal Foundation for help in response to a crisis situation for these gorillas. MGVP established veterinary care and health resources in the Rwanda rainforests. To watch the video go to the Morris Animal Foundation website and watch this video about MGVP.

Dr. Lucy is currently on a promotional book tour of USA so if you don’t yet have her book “The Rhino with Glue on Shoes” then you must get it.

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Tags: Lucy Spelman, MGVP, mountain gorillas, Rwanda, Veterinarians, Virunga National Park

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Category: wildlife | Date: Oct 01 2008 | By: baraza

There are some conservation projects that really make you feel good. This month we’d like to congratulate and celebrate the Colobus Trust success in Diani Kenya where hundreds of monkeys have been saved by a simple innovation, arboreal rope bridges.

Before we talk monkeys, first come to Diani Beach, Kenya’s version the Florida keys. Driving down the highway you will notice about 20 rope bridges swinging over the highway. If you are there at the right time of the day, you’ll notice it swinging, look harder you’ll see a little bulge with a tail. Before you flash by, you might just recognize that it’s a monkey sitting up there. Yes it’s watching you! And then in a burst of action an entire troop of black and white might start galloping across the wildly swaying bridge!

Colobridges were built by the Colobus Trust to save the rare Angolan colobus monkeys from road traffic accidents

In the 1990’s it was predicted that this species could be driven to extinction within a decade. Faced with a crisis innovative solutions were sought - Lollipop stick men were deployed at major crossing points, roadsigns erected to slow down the speed, and education for taxis, stickers in matatus (local buses), and speeding tour operators were reported to the Residents Association. The idea of speed humps was rejected - in general it was tough to get any support, after all, who really cares about a bunch of thieving monkeys?

The bridges cost about 400 dollars each and are made of cable, rubber and PVC. The bridges straddles the Diani Beach highway between two of the monkeys favourite trees on either side of the highway.

Being naturally shy, the colobus stared at the bridges with disdain for a couple of months until the more inquisitive and daring Sykes monkey began to see the logic. Once the Sykes and even vervet monkeys started using the bridges, the colobus followed suit, and are now very comfortable with their arboreal walkways.

This is an Amazing video of Colobus crossing a “colobridge” (Warning this video is GREAT but the link take you to another site - so read on first or you”ll miss the Australian madness)

There are now 23 ‘Colobridges’ and it’s estimated that they are used 150,000 time a year by at least three different species of monkeys! Amazing because there are only 300 of these Angolan colobus monkeys left in Diani where road kills are now rare.

Not for everyone: Bridges have also been deployed in Zanzibar to save the crazy looking Kirks red colobus but it looks like they aren’t interested in using them. Check out the photos of a confused monkey here

Colobridges have been exported, three arboreal bridges have been built in Australia for possums, squirrel gliders and other arboreal species down there.

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Tags: Colobus Monkeys, Colobus Trust, Diani, Kenya, monkey bridges

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