President Kenyatta visited the Triangle with his family on the 4th.
The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) started a site survey for the release of roan antelope along the escarpment on the 5th. They have written a report which we will share with the stakeholders.
The President of Hungary, Jânos Ader visited the Triangle between the 18th – 20th, he was on a State Visit to Kenya and came with a large delegation. It was raining while they were here but they still managed to have excellent sightings of lion, leopard and elephant.
We received a total of 938.3 mm (37”) of rain in 2021, well down on the 1,624 mm recorded in 2020. Essentially, the November – December “short rains” failed, causing one of the most severe droughts experienced in the Mara ecosystem in recent years. The rains seem back to front, with the rainy season being the driest in recent years and the dry season exceptionally wet. We had a few days of rain starting the 15th, with heavy rain on the 16th and 17th replenishing some of our water courses and pans, the rains continued intermittently until the end of the month when we had a very heavy storm that flooded many areas. Total rainfall for the month exceeded 160 mm.
Figure 1: Monthly rainfall 2021
We have been working hard to replace our vintage .303 rifles with more modern firearms and the Senior Warden met with the Governor, his counterpart in the Main Reserve, together with senior County staff. Together they visited the Deputy Inspector General of Police on the 11th. Approval was given to replace the firearms and place them under the control of the Operations Commander – a senior policemen based in the Mara. All our rangers will be required to undergo training on the use of these firearms once they have been delivered.
We allowed access to the salt-lick on the 15th, after closing it to the community mid 2021, when cattle herders were reporting the whereabouts of lions to the morans (warriors) – who then attempted to hunt them. The morans have now graduated and there will be no threat again for several years.
The Chief Executive met with M/s Phil King and Tom Kendall on the 21st, to discuss an overhaul of our radio system. They will come down in the third week of February for a week.
We hosted the team developing a new National Rhino Action Plan for 2022-2026 on the 26th.
Collaboration Agreement
Narok County has signed a five year Collaboration Agreement that will enable us to assist in supporting the Main Reserve, but falls well short of allowing management responsibility for areas such as security and revenue collection. We have requested a minor amendment to the agreement and hope to have it ratified at our next Board meeting in February.
COVID-19
In Kenya we have had a total of 321,335 positive cases, with 5,580 recorded deaths; contrast this with 365,059,044 cases globally, resulting in 5,600,779 deaths. – we have had less than 0.1% of the deaths. The Omicron variant swept through the country and at one point the positivity rate reached 37%, or around 3,300 new cases a day. However, the number of new cases has now dropped to around 2.5%, or 100 cases per day. Omicron does not seem nearly as dangerous as previous variants and the majority of people who had been double vaccinated only experienced flu-like symptoms. Hopefully this will lead to the end of Covid as a very dangerous pandemic and life will begin to return to the old normal.
Tourism
Total visitor numbers in 2021stood at 68,349, of which 32,284 (47.2%) were classified as non-paying. The total number of visitors was well down on a high of 157,591 in 2019 but better than the low of 45,328 in 2020. Non-resident adult visitors – our main source of income – was still only 31.6% of 2019 (24,588 vs 77,904 in 2019). Unfortunately, a resurgence of Covid – the Omicron variant – has severely set back the beginning of a recovery. We can not predict what will happen in 2022 but all the indications are that we will be in for another very tough year. This year we not only have to contend with Covid, but we will have elections at the height of the tourism season. The elections in the recent past have always led to a significant drop in tourism and we can only hope that this will not be the case this year.
Figures 2-3: Visitor numbers for the past 10 years
Staff
The annual staff transfers took place on the 6th. The transfers were slightly earlier than usual, to accommodate planned ranger training at the KWS (Kenya Wildlife Service) Law Enforcement Academy at Manyani on the 8th. Unfortunately the training was postponed at the last minute and will now take place from the 5th February.
Wildlife
One dead elephant was found at Nyamburi in the Northern Serengeti by one of our patrols on the 2nd, the ivory was removed and handed over to TANAPA at Lemai.
One zebra was euthanized after it was injured by a throwing iron, these are short pieces of round iron sharpened at both ends and used by young herders instead of throwing sticks, the young men often test their skills on animals and they are one of the major causes of injury to wildlife along the escarpment.
Security
A total of 19 people were arrested in January, two of them in the Triangle and the rest in the Serengeti. We managed to collect 476 snares and find where numerous animals had been killed. These included: five buffalo, a hippo, at least 10 zebra, more than 10 Thompson’s gazelle, an impala, a giraffe and two dik dik. Two zebra had snares removed on the escarpment.
Figure 4 below shows the extent of our patrols in the last quarter of 2021 – during that time our patrols travelled over 16,300 kilometers, arrested 30 poachers and recovered 1,166 wire snares.
Figure 4: Patrols for the months October to December
Forty eight snares were collected in the first week of January and we found where three zebra had been butchered, one was dead in a snare. One person was arrested in Limana on the 4th, during a night ambush by the Nigro-are rangers
The Iseiya rangers crossed the river on the 8th and found where a number of animals had been butchered, including: three buffalo, one hippo, a number of zebra and impala. The Nigro-are rangers collected four snares and found one had a dead zebra.
The Nigro-are rangers came across four people hunting a hippo near Mlima Hotel – along the Mara River – on the 9th. They managed to arrest two people and handed them over to their counterparts in Lemai. The two were notorious hippo poachers and were being sought by TANAPA.
The rangers collected 80 snares in the Lemai Wedge on the 10th and the Nigro-are rangers managed to arrest three people at Serengeti Ndogo – across the river when they went on a late patrol. The three were part of a gang of eight and one of the three was only caught because he was tracked by Shakaria, one of the dogs, well after dark.
The Iseiya rangers were joined by their counterparts from Tabora B and went on an all-day – all night patrol on the 11th and saw signs of poachers at 3.00 am on the 12th near Binamu. They managed to arrest two people at 7.00 am. They were targeting buffalo and had 11 heavy snares with them. The Nigro-are rangers managed to collect 25 snares on the 12th and another 19 the following day.
The Iseiya rangers went on an ambush along the Mara River on the night of the 14th and managed to arrest two, of four, people who had just crossed the river near Mlima Hotel. They were setting snares and had already caught a zebra when arrested. The next morning the rangers took the poachers back to where they had set the snares and 11 were recovered, three more were found later.
The rangers from Kilo Two found 10 snares near Nyarakunguri, a thicket in the Triangle on the 16th, they also found where five zebra had been butchered.
It rained all of the 17th and our patrols collected 102 snares around Limana in the Lemai Wedge on the 18th. That evening our rangers decided to set an ambush near Nyarakunguri and watched as eight people came in to hunt at 10.00 pm. The eight then split up, with some hunting warthog, whilst others checked and set snares – one of the snares had killed a buffalo, and a lion was feet away from another snare. The rangers managed to arrest two people and take buffalo meat as evidence in court. Shakaria, one of the dogs, followed a third poacher for a considerable distance before the trail was lost.
A total of 71 snares were collected between the 20th and 23rd, one Thompson’s gazelle was rescued, but subsequently died.
The sub-division of land and clearing of individual parcels for agriculture has definitely led to an increase in poaching along the escarpment: two zebra had snares removed and one giraffe was killed in a fence near Partikilat on the 23rd.
Both our patrol teams went on an ambush on the 24th, there was a lot of torch activity on the plains upstream from Daraja Mbili soon after dark and one of our teams managed to re-deploy without being seen at around 11.00 pm; to where the poachers were operating. They managed to arrest two people from a large group of maybe 16, who were hunting gazelle with torches and dogs. The poachers had managed to kill at least 10 Thompson’s gazelle and two dik dik. There were a lot of hyenas in the area and they took most of the carcasses before they could be collected.
We continued to collect snares in the Lemai Wedge, recovering 92 between the 26th and 30th. One zebra was found dead in a snare. Our rangers crossed the river on the 26th, they saw four poaches but all escaped after dropping a zebra that they had killed. We had more luck on the 29th when the rangers patrolled Binamu in the Northern Serengeti; they came across a poachers’ camp with a freshly butchered buffalo - killed by slashing its spine and then spearing it. Three people were arrested. The same evening the same rangers set up an ambush and managed to catch two more people close to the Kibo Camp.
Revenue and Accounts
Figure 5 below shows our share of the total Park Revenue for the past three years and clearly indicates the improvement over 2020, but also how far we are from reaching 2019 levels. We were just beginning to reach par in December when we were hit with Omicron – this has been a major setback, with Travel Advisories from the United States, and the temporary halting of flights from Dubai.
Figure 5: Conservancy share of revenue for past three years (Ksh)
Our break-even point is around Ksh 15,000,000 per month- this has only been exceeded twice in the past two years – August and September 2021, and we can expect our share of revenue to be well below the threshold in the coming months.
Our management accounts for the first six months clearly show the improvement in revenue, but we would not have managed without the support of Wildlife Protection Solutions (WPS) – we cannot thank them enough. Our expenditure was 13% over budget – staff related costs and vehicle costs accounted for almost all the overspend. Part of these extra expenses can be attributed to the ranger training at Manyani – Ksh 3,000,000 - reinstating the 30% salary cut imposed in March 2020, and the fact that we have stopped replacing vehicles and equipment for two years – resulting in increased maintenance costs.
Table 1: Cash flow for first six months of the financial year
Repairs and maintenance
We are closing Maji ya Ndege campsite and have opened a new site further downstream. In future we will use Maji ya Ndege as a picnic site for anyone who may want to use it as such.
The river stopped flowing past our Hippo Pool, resulting in some very stagnant pools. The river divides several hundred meters upstream, normally creating a substantial island in the river – we cleared the channel into the right hand channel, allowing a trickle of water to flow again. This is the first time the river has stopped flowing down this arm – a very clear indication of just how low the river was – unheard of for this time of year.
We have renovated two vehicles and have one remaining – they have been pannel beaten and resprayed.
We have built a road into the new campsite, a distance of 1.4 km.
We patched both roads to Nigro-are before we had rain on the 15th
We graded the main road from Oloololo to Dirisha and then started on the road to Mara Serena.
We re-calibrated our fuel pumps and found that both were under-reading with the diesel pump out by 0.75% or 7.5 litres per thousand and the petrol pump out by 0.25%. This explains the constant variance we experience each week.
Collaboration agreement
We repaired the water supply to Musiara Gate.
Report on focus for January
Focus for February 2022
· Hold Board meeting on the 11th;
· Send rangers to Manyani;
· Complete final car;
· Plan for Greater Serengeti Society meeting in Tanzania 26-27 March
· Check our radio network; and
· Finalize collaboration agreement.
Work on Collaboration Agreement
– Dependent on Agreement and funding;
o Road works;
§ Keekorok to Sand River;
§ The road to Ashnil;
§ Start on rehabilitating housing.