Wildland protection.. never give up!

Everyone THANK YOU for reading my blogs, and for your wonderful comments always!! Nicky you wrote ‘Is it possible to stop the poaching in the desert!?? ‘ Well…. when we did NOT see lion tracks for nearly ten years in the Milgis I wondered if we would ever see them again here .. BUT look who we have wondering around at the moment. This most BEAUTIFUL KING….

AND whats more after the rain there is massive movements of livestock especially cattle, and he is being so well behaved.. !!

This mighty ‘king of the jungle’ came to visit us below our hill.. He was absolutely MAGNIFICENT!

At one worrying time this seemed the only lion around.. Although I do LOVE IT!!

Our ‘beauty’ kept on looking towards the lugga as if he was waiting for someone, …later on just as it was getting dark we saw him get up and wonder down in the direction, calling.. Then the beautiful music of two lions .. he had met his mate..

Captured on the night camera.. looking very healthy

Its a pretty tough life for a lion in these places where people and them live together .. And I might add its tough to live with those huge lions if you are a pastoralist! BUT here we are ALL LIVING TOGETHER!! Imagine you are a hungry lion and a slow moving delicious animal walks past .. wouldn’t you!?? As our manager says .. You cant blame the lion..

In the last few days there has been massive movements of domestic animals moving to greener pastures in the west.. and the lions were perfectly behaved..

A very small portion, of the thousands upon thousands of livestock on the move walking up the Milgis lugga looking for greener pastures..

Imagine if you are a young boy walking along with your goats or cows and you meet one of these monsters!!

Imagine if you are on the move with every thing you own, you stop for the night, exhausted probably after 40 kms walk and a lion kills three of your donkeys in the night!

Imagine losing three camels in one day to lion.. their little calves waiting for mum at home..

These are not unusual happenings..

Women with their donkeys fully loaded with every thing they own.. following their men with the cattle.

BUT as I’ve said before, Lions mean alot to the Samburu and a lion has to be very bad to merit being killed!.. Apart from any thing NO ceremony happens with out a piece of lion skin tied to every ones shins..

SO ITS A MUST… LIONS WILL SURVIVE HERE!!! ( touching wood!!)

So BACK to the subject in question the ‘triangle’ in the North/East of the Ndotos, reaching up to Kulal, and to Kargi on the Chalbi desert… And the poaching being carried out by people running the plains game down by motor bike.. ( see my last blog.. desert extremes)

The only rather useless picture I managed to get of the herbivores in the triangle.. if you can see the animal at all.. ! it was a small herd of grants gazelles, moving fast.. BUT theres lots there… Giraffe, oryx, grants gazelle, gerenuk, grevey’s Zebra and many carnivores, including cheetah… And as i said before the birds of prey are incredible..

Cheetahs live here, and don’t drink..only living off the blood of their kills.. they are hardy!.. Really hardy!

so the question is…’Can we do it??’ .. Can we save what’s left and give them security.. OF COURSE WE CAN!! I certainly don’t think it will be impossible to make a difference.. We hope to make a small base near these rocks, where we will have a camel patrol right through the area every month.. We’ve travelled the triangle from tip to head and this is our final decision to have a small camp for our scouts and who will patrol this area with camels..

This kori bustard, and many other very interesting birds also like it here!!

Abbysinian roller..

a young martial eagle checks us out..

It was this rain coming across from the west that sent us packing off into the desert only to come across this amazing spot!

An ants hole.. How do you think the ant makes such a perfect circle!.. each ant takes 6 steps!??

At the north west end of our triangle is Kulal, and we went and spent 3 days talking to the communities, and hearing their stories.. AND we were blessed with some PROPER RAIN!! .. it rained for 24 hours.. so nice for the people there it was really needed..

Mt Kulal… The North/west vital corner of the triangle.. impending rain and our team racing to find a spot to camp.. The community could not have been more friendly and very talkative..

Mt Kulal is a completely different mountain to our ones further south, its an old volcano that blew so hard it smashed the whole side of the mountain out.. The valley in these pictures is this spot.. its amazing.. No pictures from up on the mountain because it was raining most of the time..

The next afternoon, a different scene..

The area is dry, and mostly covered in lava rocks spewed over the desert from the mountain.. its really tough country and you have these wonderful shaped hills around..

looking down into the desert

the Huri hills on the north side of the Chalbi

Amazing !! Miles away in the distance we see the Chalbi has become a lake.. Reflecting off the morning sun!..

Back home on the Milgis…

its that time of the year again