General
There was heavy and widespread rain over the first three weeks of January, resulting in more flooding and leaving large areas of the Triangle completely waterlogged. Fortunately we had ten days of hot, dry weather at the end of the month.
President Kenyatta visited the Triangle with his family, local leaders and friends on the 1st. They then had a bush lunch in one of the camp sites.
We hosted a meeting of the Greater Serengeti Society from the 22nd to 24th at Mara Serena. The meeting was a success with key decision makers from both Kenya and Tanzania. The meeting was opened by the Hon S Tunai, Governor of Narok County and was also attended by Dr K Desai, Principal Secretary in the East African Community, and key stakeholders from Tanzania - we were very fortunate in that we were able to get permission for Tanzanians to fly direct from Kilimanjaro International Airport to Mara Serena – thanks to the Governor and the Department of Immigration.
Dr Grant Hopcraft from Glasgow University synthesized findings from different researchers into one very interesting and thought provoking presentation and this formed the basis for discussion on five cross-cutting issues. The key issues discussed included:
· The Mara River. The work done in reclaiming parts of the Mau forest by both the National and County Governments was recognized and applauded. However, it was noted that the severe land degradation in the Talek catchment was leading to severe flash flooding, removal of huge amounts of top soil and siltation of the Mara River.
· Land use changes – managing fencing and the decline in rangelands. The figures presented at the meeting were truly alarming, 2,1242 kilometers of the wildebeest dispersal area has been fenced off[1] (up from 4442 km in 2011). This has all but destroyed the Loita migration, contributed to a collapse in the Loita wildebeest and zebra populations and severely curtailed the movement of wildlife within the ecosystem. The County is developing a Spatial Plan which may, or may not, place caveats on land use within the dispersal area.
· Serengeti-Mara in a time of austerity. It was noted that, despite financial constraints as a result of Covid-19 in 2020, there had been a significant decline in poaching and the number of snares collected over the past four years. The close association between management in the Serengeti and Mara was recognized and a commitment made to continue collaboration.
· Tourism. There were some slides that indicated a link between over-tourism in prime wildebeest habitat and a significant reduction in the amount of time the migration is spending around Seronera and in the Mara – the wildebeest currently spend an average of 35 days less per year in the Mara. Pressure at crossings has led to animals attempting to cross is unsuitable places and consequently over 6,000 animals die each year in the river. These issues have a severe implication on tourism and marketing of the Mara as a destination during the migration.
· Human-wildlife conflict. It was noted that no elephant or rhino were poached in the ecosystem in 2020, but that human-wildlife conflict was becoming an increasingly important issue. The Mara Elephant Project (MEP) explained various mitigation methods being used to reduce conflict and there was a discussion on compensation.
The meeting also discussed the desire to register the Mara as a World Heritage Site and proposed that consideration be made to incorporate with revisions to the Serengeti’s status as a World Heritage Site.
Research
A new paper echoed some of the points discussed at our Greater Serengeti meeting:
Upstream land-use negatively affects river flow dynamics in the Serengeti National Park.
E.S.KihweleabM.P.VeldhuisacA.LoishookibJ.R.HongoabJ.G.C.HopcraftdH.OlffaE.Wolanskie. Ecohydrology & Hydrobiology: Available online 7 January 2021.
The paper discusses how “land use changes and catchment degradation are the key factors driving the progressive decline of the flows of the Mara River, the only perennial river in SNP. Between 1973 and 2000, for the Mara watershed upstream of SNP, there has been a decline in natural forest by 31%, an increase in agricultural land by 204%, and savannah and rangelands reduced from 79% to 52% of the basin land, and all these have significantly impacted the river flow dynamics. In addition, there is commercial-scale irrigation in Kenya using Mara River water; in 2005 it extracted Mara River water at a rate of 0.5 m3s−1 in the dry season (Hoffman et al., 2011), which is larger than the measured minimum Mara River flow of 0.3 m3 s−1 in SNP in 2005. Thus in 2005 irrigation farmers in Kenya took out about 62% of the Mara River water during the dry season.”
It further states that: “By contrast, the baseflow recession time scale of the Mara River in SNP has decreased from 100 days in the early 1970s to 16.4 days at present. This change means that for Mara River water to reach SNP, in the early 1970s in the dry season a rainfall event was needed every 3-4 months in the Mau forest in Kenya, now this is needed every 2-3 weeks. This suggests that a future drought is likely to stop the Mara River flow entering SNP. The main reason for that appears to be commercial irrigation in Kenya.”
This is obviously not a problem at the moment, when we are receiving unprecedented rains and there hardly appears to be a dry season at all. However, the loss of habitat has resulted in equally alarming declines in wildlife numbers.
The Mara River Research Project has published four papers on their work in the Mara this year and I list them below for anyone interested in them.
1. Handler, K., A. L. Subalusky, C. Kendall, C. L. Dutton, E. J. Rosi, and D. M Post. In press. Temporal niche partitioning of scavengers on wildebeest carcasses after mass mortality events. Ecosphere.
2. Masese, F. O., M. J. Kiplagat, C. Romero, A. L. Subalusky, C. L. Dutton, D. M. Post, and G. A. Singer. 2020. Hippopotamus are distinct from domestic livestock in their resource subsidies to and effects on aquatic ecosystems. Proceedings of the Royal Society-B. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2019.3000.
3. Dutton, C. L., A. L. Subalusky, S. K. Hamilton, E. C. Jourdain, L. Njoroge, E. J. Rosi, and D. M. Post. 2020. Alternative biogeochemical states of river pools mediated by hippo use and flow variability. Ecosystems. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10021-020-00518-3.
4. Subalusky, A. L., C. L. Dutton, E. J. Rosi, L. Puth, and D. M. Post. 2020. A river of bones: wildebeest skeletons leave a legacy of mass mortality in the Mara River, Kenya. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution 8:31. doi: 10.3389/fevo.2020.00031
[1] There are now over 40,000 kilometers of fencing in Southern Kenya - sufficient to circumvent the Globe - on land that was once prime wildlife habitat. Areas that were teeming with wildlife in the recent past between Nairobi and Kajiado and between Mai Mahiu and Sekenani are now almost devoid of all but the smallest animals.
Collaboration Agreement
The Chief Executive met with Ms Christine Koshal on the 2nd and then again with her and the Governor on the 10th to prioritize work in the Main Reserve. The key constraint is funding but we agreed to repair the rain damage at Double Crossing and near Musiara, grade a few key roads and send a mechanic to Sekenani.
We visited a site on the 12th to see a method for building simple, durable staff housing, with a view to doing the same in the main Reserve. We have prepared a list of the housing required and submitted it to the County.
The approaches to the causeways at Double Crossing were repaired.
We surveyed the road between Talek and Sekenani on the 15th, this passes outside the Reserve, we estimated the cost of making the road to an all-weather standard to be in the region of Ksh 20 million and gave the quotation to the County Government for consideration.
COVID-19.
Whereas Covid-19 continues to be of major concern in Europe and the United States, despite the roll-out of vaccines, the second wave appears to have peaked in Kenya and we are experiencing new cases in the low hundreds, sometimes fewer than 100, with less than 10 deaths per day, none on some days (Total cases in Kenya now stands at 100,773 from 1.2 million tests, with 1,755 deaths) . The virus seems to be mutating, with new strains in the United Kingdom, South Africa and Brazil. It is too soon to fully understand the implications, but the new strains seem more contagious, if not more virulent. The implications are that we cannot expect a return to “normal” any time soon and we should prepare for at least another year of hardship and a lack of revenue
Tourism
We are beginning to see a few international tourists visiting the Mara – it is certainly one of the safest places on the Planet in terms of Covid-19. But, delays in vaccinations and uncertainties over their effectiveness will probably mean that we miss out on the high season. We are most concerned about the complete lock-down in some European countries – this could potentially write off international tourism for most of this year and we can expect a fraction of the number that visited prior to 2020.
Staff
We conducted our annual staff transfers on the 15th .
We have opened a new ranger post along the escarpment, near Partikilat, we now have four posts along the escarpment between Oloololo Game Ranch and the border, excluding Nigro-are.
Wildlife
One young male lion was seen with an arrow embedded in his hindquarters on the 3rd. He is part of the pride that moves between Kilo 2, the escarpment and the main Oloololo road. The arrow was removed by a KWS veterinarian on the 18th.
A lioness injured a school child near Partikilat on the 14th, she was trying to escape but was cornered by the motor cycle taking the child to school on one side and a fence on the other. The community were very understanding and allowed our rangers to drive the lioness away.
A female leopard was killed by lions near Egyptian Goose, on the main road to Mara Bridge, on the 14th. She obviously walked into the pride, four females with seven cubs, in a very open area and had nowhere to escape.
A lion killed and partly ate a young cattle herder near Olare Orok before it was in-turn killed. It was apparently very weak from injuries, probably sustained in a fight.
Security
The Map below amply demonstrates the extent of our collaboration with the Serengeti and the area we cover in our patrols, mainly concentrated in the Triangle and Lemai Wedge, but with periodic, and joint, patrols, as far as 60 kilometers into the Serengeti.
Figure 1. Patrol areas October to December 2020
A routine patrol on the 8th came across a dead buffalo in a snare near the Kimondo Camp, this is where three people were arrested for killing warthog in December, and the snare may have been left by them.
We had our first success using the advanced trail cams donated by Wildlife Protection Systems (WPS) on the 8th. The camera at Daraja Mbili, in the Lemai Wedge, recorded a person crossing at 10.00 pm. We had a team at Watu Kumi, quite close by, in case the cameras picked up anyone and they managed to chase the poachers – over 10 of them as they were hunting gazelles. The poachers escaped but the Nigro-are team were alerted and managed to catch one person soon after he crossed the bridge on his way back.
Revenue and Accounts
We had a total of 45,328 visitors in the Triangle in 2020, down from 157,591 the previous year. Non-residents accounted for 13,908 – 11,490 of them in January, February and March, with only 2,418 for the rest of the year; compare that with 65,684 Non-residents in the corresponding nine months of 2019. It should be noted that 23,000, or 53%, of the visitors to the Triangle in 2020 were classified as “non-paying” (those in transit, complimentary, or with Main Mara tickets)
Figures 2 & 3: Comparison of park revenue between 2019/20 (2) and total visitor numbers from 2012-2020 (3).
The Figures above amply show how Covid-19 affected us. January was the only month in the whole year in which our share of revenue matched expenditure, thereafter our share of Park revenue fell well below a break-even point and we were living off reserves and donations. Even a comparatively good month like December only raised 45% of our current monthly requirement.
We received another donation of US$ 100,000 from WPS on the 12th, yet another incredibly kind gesture by Dave Weidner and Sue Thomson. This brings their total donations to US$ 390,000, we would definitely been unable to continue operations without their support.
Our half-year management accounts show a total income of Ksh 51.6 million, compared to Ksh 210.8 million for the same period the previous year – a drop of 76%. The majority of our income came from donations and only Ksh 21.9 from Park Fees. We managed to reduce expenditure by slightly over 25% - from Ksh 111.7 to Ksh 83.1, without significantly impacting our ability to manage and maintain the Triangle. However, the exceptional and sustained rains have put a great deal of pressure on our infrastructure, in particular the roads, and we will be hard pressed to maintain infrastructure at such a high level.
Table 2: Cash flow for the six month period July – December 2020
Repairs and maintenance
We spent every possible moment keeping our main roads in good order – difficult with the unrelenting rain.
We started work on a new crossing of the Sabaringo Lugga near Little Governors, this is to avoid a newly formed flood plain that makes a section of the old road virtually impassable.
We are building a toilet and shower for the new staff block near the office.
We sent a team around all the buildings prior to the transfers and recorded all the minor problems – mainly broken window panes and door locks. These were then repaired.
Collaboration agreement
· Repaired damage to causeways at Double Crossing;
· We surveyed the proposed road from Sekenani to Talek, this passes outside the Reserve and would greatly reduce the pressure of traffic through the Reserve.
Report on focus for January
Focus for February 2021
1. Complete Sabaringo crossing;
2. Complete toilet and shower facility;
3. Continue with road repairs;
4. Rebuild causeway near Kichwa airstrip;
5. Work on Collaboration Agreement – funds permitting;
o Start work on Talek to Sekenani road;
o Repair culvert near Musiara;
o Maintain vehicles;
o Repair roads to Keekorok and Talek; and
o Repair housing at Musiara.