Training on lion and cheetah ecology with wardens, drivers & scouts…
On the 19th of March, I arranged for a workshop in Samburu on “Lions and Cheetahs of Samburu National Reserve”. 45 participants attended the workshop comprising of rangers and wardens of the reserve, and a number of resident tour drivers.
Mary Wykstra from Cheetah Conservation Fund was here to present on cheetahs. We started at 10 am and I began by giving an outline on lion ecology. This went on for more than an hour as there were tons of questions from the participants. Following this, I went into details of how to age and identify lions and gave specific information on the resident lions of the reserve. By the end of the training, the drivers and rangers knew all the names and ages of the lions! I concluded by giving my findings of lion numbers and distribution over the last few months. Mary took over with her talk on cheetahs. I briefly spoke about cheetahs of Samburu and the issue of the disease mange that our Samburu cheetahs have suffered from. By the end of the training it was past 1 pm! We all had tea, sodas and biscuits and the guests left by 2 pm. Overall, it was a very successful workshop and exhausting too; I had totally lost my voice by the end of the few hours!
In the evening, I went out on a game drive and saw a male lion. A few minutes later, some of the resident drivers and rangers who had come to the workshop drove by. They looked at the lion and discussed amongst themselves before announcing with confidence that the male lion was Baasi. I was thrilled; the workshop was definitely a success!
On the 21st of March, Mary and I drove to West Gate to do some one-on-one training with the Ewaso Lions scouts. Mary went through all the different predators and prey. I continued with how to collect data and went through the individual data sheets. I then supplied the scouts with their equipment; binoculars, GPSs and radios and showed them how to use everything. The training ended in a hurry as a huge wind storm almost blew us away! We rushed through, packed up and drove back to the reserve quickly as I was worried that we would not be able to cross Kiltamany lugga. We were just in time!
The scouts are doing very well and have been collecting data for a month now. I recently got them solar panels to charge their radios and bags for their equipment.
Many thanks to the Rufford Small Grants Foundation for funding the workshop/training, the Oregon Zoo for all the scouts equipments and to Stacey for the cool waist bags to carry the equipment.