Education Program Update - First Week at the Academy

The Kanzi Academy branch of our Education Program had been busy last week with the beginning of a new term! Head Teacher Sarah shares some stories and photos with us!

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Jambo! What a great, busy, and very exciting first week we have had!

Class 2 watching as a helicopter arrives at Campi ya Kanzi

We have begun all our work and topics in earnest and had much fun along the way. Our measuring, volume, and capacity unit has begun in Maths, with the children really getting involved... and getting wet while estimating how many cups of water fill a sufuria, which really cooled us down! We also got to grips practically with fractions, using everything from cutting and sticking, to dissecting apples! We started and finished our handprint lion head too! Class 2 really enjoyed this.

Estimating volume with water!

We also encountered some unplanned experiences this week.. from finding a tortoise in a bush, to watching a helicopter land in our football field! Life here at the Academy and in the bush is always wild and varied, and we like it like that!

Class 2 found a turtle!

We also went on countless nature walks, one which saw us collecting 16 different types of grass! Phillip has started looking at weather in his teaching, so we have enjoyed making weather charts and exercising daily observations of the weather!

Grasses found on a nature walk

And with a view just behind the school of Mount Kilimanjaro, what a completely splendid environment to learn in!

More news, photos, and updates to come next week!

Karibu tena, Sarah!

Education Program Update - New Term at the Kanzi Academy!

The Kanzi Academy is now back in term for the New Year, and Head Teacher Sarah has some creative and innovative thoughts to share with us on the upcoming weeks! Welcome back Kanzi Academy!

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Happy New Year! The holidays are over and we are all back at school ready for lots of teaching, learning, and fun! the children all appear to be happy, keen, and well rested and are looking forward to lots of new things this half term. So, without further ado, let me give you a general breakdown of what we will be doing!

English this half term sees us re-capping nouns, verbs, and adjectives and of course, we will continue to focus on sentence writing and story sequencing. Adding verb tenses (past, present, and future) will be a useful challenge as this will add dimension to the children's writing. Vocabulary building is ongoing, and plays an important part of day-to-day reading and writing. We will be looking at syllables, poetry, and classic fairy tales, such as "The Three Billy Goats Gruff", and "The Little Red Hen". Not only are these stories and absolute must and 'right of passage' in children's literature, they will form the basis for our Spiritual Education - as these stories rely on 'right and wrong' and 'making the right choices'. There will be many questions and 'what ids' so that we can have good debates about the choices and endings of these stories and how we might make them differently by exploring alternative options! In addition, we will be recapping the days of the week, 'weather words' and parts of the body.

In History, we will look at the late Nelson Mandela - Madiba. The children will have the opportunity to research and learn about this iconic man. They will make a time line of major achievements in his life and celebrate him as an African leader. We will also be using one of his quotes: "Education is the most powerful weapon you can use to change the world" as a point for debate!

Geography is all about countries, capitals, climates, and culture. We will take three countries (students' choice) to explore. We will look at differences and similarities between the environment we are in and the countries we have chosen, and discuss what it might be like to live there. We'll look at flags, food, and families too! Wow!

Art takes us up close and personal with The BIG FIVE and BIG ART. We will be looking at the Big Five in Kenya; the lion, the leopard, rhino, elephant and buffalo. We will work collaboratively to creative big, exaggerated animal heads that will be displayed at school. The art emphasis will be on textures, prints, and patterns, so drawing on what we learned and the knowledge we have from last term.

Physical Education, as ever, will see us continue with swimming, horse riding, music/movement, yoga, and meditation. On top of this, Phillip continues his wonderful PE curriculum with outdoor skills, which this term includes hand-ball, volleyball, soccer skills and athletics to name a few.

Math as always is eclectic! We will (and always will) be recapping times tables, mental maths, and basic arithmetic in a broad way. Numbers are not just about sums on a board.. we have to explore problems and problem solving and apply maths to everyday situations. We are going to be looking at 5, 6, and 7 sided shapes as well as 3D shapes. We will take walks to look at where we can find these shapes in our environment as well as making them from different materials.

Phillip takes Class 2 on the scientific journey through comparing living and non-living things, weather symbols, charts and appropriate dress/clothing for such weather, basic needs of both humans and animals with comparisons between each, external parts of the human body and how to maintain its health.

Kiswahili as ever, introduces new and recaps familiar vocabulary, grammar, and spelling strategies. It is interesting in this age group how English and Kiswahili mirror each other a great deal.

Social Studies looks at travelling safely to and from school and the dangers we may encounter along the way (zebra, giraffe...), as well as asking questions such as, "How do we keep ourselves safe?". Phillip will also be introducing the topic of dangerous insects and dangerous/poisonous plants around the school. Something very useful in the Kenyan savannah!

So, from all of us here at Kanzi Academy, Karibu tena, and keeping popping back to check from more weekly updates and photos!

Kindest wishes, Sarah

Conservation Program Update - Meetings & Collaborations

As you may know from our previous posts, the Conservation team here the Maasai Wilderness Conservation Trust has been extremely busy in the last few months. Not only has the lion collaring process been at the forefront of the efforts, but tremendous amounts of other work has occurred.

A large part of the success of the Conservation Program, is the collaboration that occurs with various partners and organizations. Over the past few months, the following meetings and works of collaboration have taken place:

MWCT Conservation Managers were invited by Stefano Desperati from IMMap to attend the International UNEP-Interpol conference on Wildlife Crimes in Nairobi on the 7th and 8th of November. At the conference, Stefano Desperati gave a presentation on data management and its' implications for conservation management. In this presentation MWCT was featured as a case study.

Further, Chris Tuite from Conservation International (CI) visited MWCT on the 24th of November to discuess the progress of the Chyulu Hills REDD+ carbon project. During this visit, Chris announced that the international law firm, Freshfields, is willing to do pro bono work to assist the partners in the development of the necessary legal agreements.

Joseph Lairumbe (MWCT Outreach Officer) speaking to the community about the Chyulu Hills REDD+ carbon project
at one of the Free Prior and Informed Consent meetings. During these meetings, community members were
informed about the project, and consent and support was given for the project. Community members also said
that they see the importance of the project and that they would refrain from charcoal burning and help MWCT
rangers to prevent charcoal burning and illegal logging on the group ranch. 

Christina Ender from Wildlife Works visited MWCT headquarters to gather information and to work on the Project Development Document (PDD) of the Chyulu Hills REDD+ carbon project.

And finally, a total of 18 community meetings were held across Kuku and Rombo Group Ranch to inform the community members of the Chyulu Hills REDD+ Carbon Project. In these Free Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) meetings the community and the local leaders gave their consent to the project.

Lion Collaring Expedition - Aftermath

Our conservation team caps off the lion collaring story with one final post.

The next day, Dr. Poghon left MWCT because of other obligations, but we still had one female collar left. The coming week, we will try to set the date for one of two more collaring nights to collar one more lioness.

The collaring operation was quite intense, but we feel that it went very well, and the team is happy and feeling confident to collar one more female within the next few weeks!

The Simba Scouts have already been out tracking "their" new lions with great enthusiasm. It is with high hopes that the new lion collars with be able to accurately assist in the appropriate conservation measures for the lion population of Kuku Group Ranch; understanding their location, habits, and ranges  will contribute to this.

The new Simba Scouts, Songoi, Orkewa, and Joshua tracking the lions from Orkeri Hill

Lion Collaring Expedition - Day Four & Five

We've got updates on the next two days of the lion collaring!

Day four arrived and the entire team had good hopes of putting the remaining 3 collars on lions. The new calling station was close to Iltilal, very close to the position the lions were spotted a day earlier - would have been a good central location on the Group Ranch to collar a lion!

Despite the terrible smell of a 2-day old carcass, and hours of playing distress calls of buffalo and warthog, lions were not observed in the area. We thought we had heard lions roaring in the direction of Campi ya Kanzi earlier in the evening. We moved to this area, but this time did not only play distressed calls of buffalo and pig, but also sounds of territorial males as dominant male lions are known to quickly respond to a potential "intruder".

We suddenly heard a big noise and saw a huge black animal running in the dark towards our cars. It appeared to be a very angry buffalo coming to the rescue of the "buffalo calf in distress" call. Although this created some excitement, the lions that we were looking for did not show up. We decided to move onto our next location; but as the rains set in, the expedition was aborted once again.

Day five is now upon us! This would be the last day of the collaring as the KWS vet had to leave for another job the next day. Experts told us to plan for 8 days to collar 4 lions, but the idea of not managing to collar more than 1 lion in 5 days frightened the team. We tried everything in our means to find and collar lions, not sleeping before 5 a.m. and awake at 8 a.m., and we gathered all our strength to give it one more push!

Full of hope, and a little bit of despair, we decided on an area between lake Olpakai and Oltiasika. Some of our Simba Scouts managed to find evidence of lion tracks, even as they were largely washed away by the rains. We were sure there must be lions in the area.

After about 3 and a half hours sitting quietly in the care patiently waiting for the lions to show up, we started to whisper about where to go next as the current location seemed not to be so successful. It was decided to play the buffalo calve in distress one more time before we left. The soundtrack is about 7 minutes long, and on the 6th minute we suddenly heard the growl of a lion that has been darted! Instant excitement!

We were extremely relieved that at last a lion showed up! While searching for the lion, the vet told us over the radio that we were to be looking for a female. When we found the sedated lioness, we saw a male lion laying in ambush next to the sedated lioness waiting for us to come out of the car.

We asked the vet to try to also dart this male lion, because even though they were from the same pride, they will have very different behaviour and movement patterns. Males have larger home rangers and will leave females from time to time to go on territorial patrols, while females usually have smaller home rangers and move less. Furthermore, this would increase the safety of the team trying to collar the lioness.

After a wild chase, the KWS vet managed to dart the lion from the car. When this male was darted, we heard a loud roar and asked Dr. Poghon whether there was possible a third lion in the area - but he assured us he darted the lion that made the noise. The sedated lion was taken into the KWS car and later placed next to its sedated companion.

Oldere and Ormaoi

On close inspection, we noticed that the female was quite muscular and appeared to have male "parts". This was one of the famous mane-less males of Tsavo! These two brothers were moving together as a bachelor group. We decided there was no reason to collar both males of such a group as they might stay together for years. The collar was placed on the one with the man, as it is mostly likely dominant over his mane-less brother. The male collar was far too big to fit properly, so we decided to put on a female collar. The two brothers were named Ormaoi (meaning part of a twin in Maa) and Oldere (refers to grey - whitish colour of the lions coat).

After measuring and treating the lions with necessary health boosters, the antidote was given. To our surprise, after just a few minutes, the mane-less male jumped up and ran away in the darkness - - nobody saw that coming!

Then suddenly the silhouette of a big lion with a full mane appeared in the distance. Seconds later the big maned lion attacked the still partly sedated maneless male, while its brother was still asleep in front of out car. We suspected the young brothers to have come into the territory of the big male who was now investigating our calling station. We told the vet to quickly dart the big male before it could seriously injure the partly sedated young mane-less male.

Lorpolosie fast asleep!

Another wild case resulted in the vet also darting the big male! As a car arrived to watch over the other 2 males, another car managed to find the newly darted big male lion; he was considerably bigger than the others and estimated to be 8 years old. He was in the company of a female lion with 3 - 4 7 month old cubs. The lioness quickly ran off with her cubs to take coverage in the nearby lava.

Measuring the canine length of Lorpolosie - 5.5 cm

The decision was made to also collar this big dominant male with the big male collar. After measurements were taken, this big male was moved about 2 kilometres away to ensure that the fighting males would not immediately meet each other after recovery from the sedation. This male was known by the Simba Scouts, and was named Lorpolosie, meaning "boundaries". He has a large territory on Kuku Group Ranch, but also extends onto neighbouring group ranches.

Translocating Lorpolosie 2 km away so the 2 other males would not attack him

We received a report that the maneless male came back to have a look its collared brother, as he recovered after 30 minutes and left together into the bush. Keeping a watch on the 2nd collared male lion, the other MWCT vehicle moved onto the second calling station. Unfortunately by this time it was quite late (4:30 a.m.) and we did not manage to call any lions at this last position of the evening.

Conservation Managers (Lana & Dirk) with Simba Scouts and Simba Scout Coordinator 

Wow - what a couple of days it has been!

Lion Collaring Expedition - Day One

Continued description of the intricate lion collaring process that occurred just recently. This is what happened on Day 1!

In the morning before the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) vet arrived, MWCT rangers discovered zebra carcass close to the Chyulu Conservation and Research Center (CCRC). It was not killed by predators, but died of natural cause and it looked like perfect lion bait. In the late afternoon, when the KWS vet arrived, he inspected the carcass and rejected it, as it might have died from anthrax - a dangerous but common disease among wildlife in Kenya.

On the first night of the collaring operation, we went to the airstrip of Campi ya Kanzi and played sounds of warthogs, buffalos in distress, and feeding hyenas to attract lions within the vicinity. Except for over 10 spotted hyenas and a pair of black-backed jackals, no lions showed up (although we were pretty certain they were in the area as there had been regular sightings by Simba Scouts and Campi ya Kanzi personnel). There can be many reasons for a lion not responding to a calling station. When lions are full after feeding on a carcass, it is likely that they will not respond to a buffalo calf or a warthog in distress. Furthermore, lions can move large distances during one night (more than 15 km) and resting places can be different every day. After 4 hours of calling, we decided to relocate to a new position.

This map indicated the locations of the calling stations.
The yellow circles indicate calling station positions without lion sightings. The pins indicate the positions where fresh lion tracks were found; blue pins vare verified observations by conservation managers; organs pins are Simba Scout lion observations; green pins are community observations; and red pins indicate location of livestock predation incident by lions

The second position was closer to the seasonal river. Again, drooling spotted hyenas came running towards the sound, expecting a nice meal. After 4 hours of calling, there was still no sign of any lions. We decided to try our last location near Longido to attract some of the lions that have visited the waterhole at Campi ya Kanzi the previous week. During this call up, heavy rains set in and after an hour it was decided to call it a day and go back to camp. The rains prevented the sounds from travelling a big distance and the visibility became constrained.

After this first night, we realized that the task to collar lions on Kuku Group Ranch is by no means an easy one...

Stay tuned to the blog for what happened next!

Lion Collaring Expedition - Preparation

As you may have read previously, MWCT planned to collar 4 new lions on Kuku Group Ranch with iridium satellite GPS collars to learn more about lion behaviour on community land and ensure a better protection of lions. These collars allow us to see lion movement on the group ranch in real time and enable the Simba Scouts to check more often on the lion's well-being and diet.

We have compiled the story of this extensive process that took place at the end of November. We are very happy to share day-by-day, the excitement, frustration, failures, and successes of this process with you on the blog!

At the end of October, the new GPS collars were picked up in South Africa. After the collars arrived at MWCT headquarters the appointment for the lion collaring was made as soon as possible with the KWS vet, who would assist us during the collaring operation. The vet was only available from the 25th - 29th of November.

This meant that our team needed to collar the 4 lions in the middle of the rainy season in only 4 days - not an easy task! Other lion researchers said suggested scheduling 8 days to collar the 4 lions on this community group ranch, as these lions are more elusive and difficult to track compared to lions in protected areas such as national parks. We immediately realized the challenge ahead of us was a great one, and began extensive planning to maximize knowledge on the lion presence on the group ranch prior to collaring.

Simba Scouts were hard at work during the preparation for this collaring

In the weeks prior to this process, vast areas were scanned for lion tracks and Maasai herders in the field were asked about lion prescence. Lions on community land such as this are generally very shy and cunning and hide away in lava flows and dense bush during the day - making tracking extremely difficult!

Searching for lion prints is difficult in the rainy season as they frequently get washed away

Prior to the arrival of the vet, we created a clear plan on where to collar the lions. We aimed for 3 lionesses and 1 male. We set up call-up locations (sound playbacks that attracts predators i.e. sound of a buffalo calf in distress, pig squeal, sound of hyenas on a carcass, and the roaring of a territorial male) in 3 locations on the group ranch. These locations were at least 2 kilometres away from seasonal bomas to prevent these luring lions incidentally towards the cattle bomas.

And then the collaring expedition begins.... Stay tuned to the blog for the next story soon!

Lion Collaring Update

A quick update from the Conservation Program team at the Chyulu Conservation and Research Center!

We are getting ready for the lion collaring... the countdown has begun and we are beginning the process this evening!

Simba Scout coordinator looking for lions

We have been tracking lions for the past week and have encountered several wild and wonderful things! A snake, and some gerenuk amongst other things. We heard a lot of roaring last night at CCRC and some of our Simba Scouts found fresh tracks of lions!

Gerenuks reaching for a bite to eat!

Snake slithering through the newly green grass

Fresh lion tracks just the other night

We are pulling together the last few details, and compiling all of our equipment to begin the collaring that will occur over the next four days. Be sure to stay tuned to the blog as we will do our best to send updates on how the collaring went! 

All of the equipment needed for the lion collaring!

Education Program Update - Kanzi Academy

The Head Teacher at the Kanzi Academy has provided us with another informative update from her and her students this past week! Please enjoy!

Jambo from the Kanzi Academy! This week has flown by! The Kanzi Academy has had a wonderful week. Having had even more rain, we have been on lots of walks; observing change in our environment and discussing the "what-ifs" of too much rain, not enough rain, and so on. It is fascinating how "tuned in" the children are to their immediate environment and the importance of the right climate. Their awareness and learning has obviously been helped by their recent practical activities with regard to their planting and growing. There has been much sorrow with regard to the "control" plants, which have been kept in the dark, planted in stones, or deprived of water. Their "passing" has been met with some sad faces!

Student's observing their "shamba" outdoors

One of the biggest and most noticeable changes here at the moment is that everything at Campi ya Kanzi is very green! Being able to describe our environment on lovely walks has made it easy to introduce Class 2 to the world of adjectives; which they are really enjoying. Adjectives are wonderful tools for vocabulary expansion. No longer do I hear "Good morning Sarah, your dress is nice"... I rather hear "Good morning Sarah, you have a beautiful, colourful, blue dress on today!". Their awareness of placing adjectives in sentences has really given their sentence writing a colourful boost!

In Physical Education, the children's confidence in swimming has moved on from a couple of timid souls clinging to the side with a look of terror on their faces, to now being able to make some effort to swim a width with a kick board. In fact, two children are swimming very well, one with no float at all!

We have been out "data gathering" as part of our maths this week. I am introducing the children to recording data in different ways. At this age, it is all about "playing with numbers" and realizing that numbers can be used in different ways to provide us with information. So we are going to put a graph together entitles: "What is your favourite soda". We have walked around Campi ya Kanzi to gather such information which has been fun and informative.

Relaxation has become even more relaxing for the students now that we have our fantastic new yoga mats. Thank you Antonella! I have introduced the children to positive thinking while relazing. I talk to them about their favourite colour,  about making it big and beautiful. Then we make this colour into a sheet and fill it with positivity and things that we love and/or are good; things that we need. Then we "allow the sheet" to float down and cover us. I talk to the children calmly and gently about "noticing their breathing"... and usually end up with one or two asleep! It's a lovely time, and certainly the children are learning to be aware of themselves, their bodies and their minds.

Students with their new yoga mats!

This week we are having a gentleman come to teach the children (and myself) Transcendental Meditation (TM). I will give further updates on the progress of this once we are finished our course.

Feeling very relaxed during relaxation time!

Art this week has been all about rainbows! With our current exposure to rain and sun we have been seeing so many beautiful rainbows, which have then prompted all sorts of discussion from they are formed!

Continents has been our topic in Geography this week and the children have really embraced it! They have really enjoyed noticing how the oceans "join up" and have loved exploring world maps and the glops. With most of the children never having experienced a cold climate, they cannot imagine what snow or ice is like, but this will soon change, as in science they are learning about materials: man made and natural and if they can change or not. This will extend to the making of ice-lollies, so they will be up close and personal with something cold and tasty!

Painting rainbows in Art!

As ever, if you have any question, or would like to know anything further about life at the Kanzi Academy, please feel free to post any questions here!

Karibu tena! Sarah