Here’s the latest information on wildlife conservation in Africa, as covered by the conservationists who blog at Wildlife Direct.
Snake Discovery Rocks the World Wide Web
In December 2007 the world learned about a remarkable new species of cobra, the Naja ashei, from East Africa. This was not just any snake: it turned out to be the largest spitting cobra in the world.
It all started about four years ago when Bio-Ken Snake Farm, a reptile center in Watamu, Kenya contacted Dr. Wolfgang Wuster a lecturer at the University of Bangor in Wales about a cobra that they had suspected to be different. Blood and tissue samples were sent to him. He was so excited at what he found that he came out and spent some time at Bio-Ken. It took about three years to prepare the paper and get it published.
During the work done at Bio-Ken with Dr.Wolfgang Wuster in 2004 for this snake, Royjan milked a specimen which gave a whopping .20 fluid ounces of liquid venom, weighing .25 ounces, which is enough venom to kill 15 people and possibly one of the largest venom yields milked from any one snake at any one milking anywhere in the world. Some of the larger specimens at Bio-Ken are nearly eight feet long. This is massive and so people are advised to be most careful if one is seen in the wild.
With the help of a press release that went out on 7th November through WildlifeDirect, the whole world was told about the largest spitting cobra. As Royjan Taylor, Director of Bio-Ken states, “At the end of November 2007 if you typed Naja ashei in a Google search engine you would have got 1-10 sites covering the species … By the end of December 2007 it was an amazing 17,500. These are not hits on a system but, actual sites carrying the Naja ashei story.”
Keep up with their adventures and discoveries on their blog.
Poisoning our Heritage
Over the last three months several blogs have been reporting cases of poisoned wildlife and birdlife. The Lion Guardians blog recently reported the death of two lions by poisoning in southern Masailand. The photos are gruesome. The lions died after consuming a carcass of a cow that had been laced with poison by the livestock owner who had lost cattle to the lions. Samuel Maina from the Water Hole states, “The use of poisons to kill predators is spreading like bush fire in East Africa and if it remains unchecked, it could reach catastrophic levels. Moreover, we could easily wipe out our predator and scavenger population in a very short time.”
He continues, “In recent times, pastoralists in Kenya and other eastern African countries have been using the chemical carbofuran to poison predators that prey on their livestock with a devastating knock-on effect on vultures and other scavengers. The problem is prevalent in northern Kenya and is increasingly becoming a case for concern in Masailand. It is particularly worrying since carbofuran is not being used to get rid of livestock pests such as ticks but for the deliberate elimination of lions, hyenas, cheetahs, leopards, jackals and other predators. Once these have died, vultures will consume them and eventually die of secondary poisoning.
Raptor specialist, Simon Thomsett believes that the current level of usage could cause the extinction of five different species of vultures in Kenya in no time.”
Follow up all these incredible stories on our blogs.
A Free Town for Chimps
Bala Amarasekaran and his wife Sharmila were traveling through a village about 150 miles north of the capital city of Sierra Leone, Freetown, when they saw a baby chimpanzee offered for sale. The chimp looked weak and sick, which prompted Bala and Sharmila to pay $30 for him, suspecting that if he was left without care any longer, he would die. Like most people, Bala and Sharmila knew very little about chimpanzees in general, never mind how to care for a tiny infant. With care and attention, the little chimp started to recover and he was given the name Bruno. The reason was that on the day the chimp was bought, Frank Bruno and Mike Tyson were fighting for the boxing world heavyweight title and Bala wanted Bruno to win.
For one year, Bruno lived inside their house, free to roam and get into mischief. As he grew, he became more destructive and so Bala built him a cage located in their garden. As their knowledge about chimps grew, so did their realization that there were many more chimps in Freetown, most of which were kept in appalling conditions. By 1993, more than half of the 55 chimps seen in Freetown in 1989 had disappeared or been killed, and Bala had seven misbehaving chimps at his home! As there was no prospect of returning these chimps to the wild, a more permanent and suitable home would have to be found for them.
Sierra Leone’s Forestry Ministry allocated 100 acres of prime rain forest for the chimp project. In 1995, a sanctuary was officially opened only 20 minutes drive from Freetown. Today, Tacugama has almost 90 chimpanzee residents here that have been rescued from illegal captivity or who have been orphaned by bushmeat hunters.
Keep up with the chimps on their daily adventures on Tacugama blog.
Gorilla Orphans Seized from Poachers
The Gorilla Doctors started 2008 with a jolt: Two gorilla babies were confiscated from poachers and brought to the park headquarters in the north of Virunga National Park on January 2nd. The Grauer’s gorilla orphans were in a fragile state, and needed immediate veterinary attention. Dr. Jacques and Dr. Eddy were dispatched in addition to Andre, who usually cares for Ndeze and Ndakasi, the mountain gorilla orphans in Goma. Medicine, tests, forest food, warmth and love were deployed in abundance over a nail-biting 10-day period.
Vumilia – meaning “patient” in Swahili – the oldest orphan, died in the early hours of January 13th. An autopsy will hopefully tell us why, but he was a very sick little boy. Dr. Eddy tried to stabilize him, but the change in his condition was dramatic and grave; he managed to revive the little gorilla once, but not for long.
The other orphan, a female named Mapendo – which means “love” (because she loved her older companion Vumilia) – has now been moved to Goma where she can be monitored and cared for closely by the vets.
Follow the blog to monitor their progress.
This report was written and distributed by Wildlife Direct’s Samantha Newport, Communications Director.
This comes from my friend, Zelda: “It’s the birthday of Austrian-born wildlife conservationist and writer Joy Adamson, born in what is now Opava, Czechoslovakia (1910). She’s best known as the author of “Born Free (1960),” the first in a series of books about lions.
She said, ‘Since we humans have the better brain, isn’t it our responsibility to protect our fellow creatures from, oddly enough, ourselves?’”
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Filed under: endangered species, Mountain gorillas, Virunga National Park Rangers, wildlife conservation
