Almost back..

Almost back…

The last 3 months in the forest where really great, it went by very fast. Time flies when you are having fun :). I did and see really a lot of things. First of all I had my work in the forest with camera traps, and exploring the forest in search for the pygmy hippo. Until the beginning of June I was working with Mark but unfortunately he had to leave earlier because of an infection on his finger. So the last 2 months I was on my own and for 1,5 month I was the only white person at the Station, Agnes and Ryan left as well.

In total we did 3 more rounds with the camera traps. And with that a lot of nice pictures of a lot of animals, some of them we didn’t had before on the camera such as the bongo and the giant pangolin. I will put some pictures online later on, first have to add a logo :). Every round of camera trapping we put them out for 3 weeks. So with placing the camera’s, retrieving them and maintenance it took around a month. Of course in those 3 weeks when the camera’s were out we were not eating out of our nose. We made several trips into the forest, searching for pygmy hippo tracks, dung and feeding places. We walked along the rivers and over many layons. And for the places further away we went out camping in a tent, very nice to do (as long it is not raining).

For placing the camera’s and exploring the forest we walked really a lot. With my estimate on average of 10km a day I must have walked over 1000km in the forest. Its hard walking in a warm and hot rain forest, but you get used to it. Were I almost died the very first day of placing the camera’s, in the end no problem to walk over 11 hours a day and 30+ km on rubber boots. You only get tired and after 2 or 3 days nice to take a break.

Off course this is Africa and that goes never without problems which we had to face a lot. First you have the roads, those are really bad. It is only accessible with a 4x4 car and especially in the rainy season sometimes even impossible. Because of the bad road the cars also brake down in no time and together with the African quality garage in the village of Tai you are always certain there is something to be fixed if you even get to the village :P
Normally in the camp where I was staying there should be running water and the possibility to run it for electricity. But on the station the first generator broke down totally because it ran out of oil (I already warned them, its using a lot of oil so check it every time). Then it took 4 weeks for the new generator, which was already waiting for months in Abidjan, to arrive. Then there was no oil for the new diesel generator, 1 week later there was finally. Then nobody knew how to use the generator and the manual is in English only. So I fixed it and also fixed the electrical connection as well and made a proper ground connection. And then it wouldn’t start. It turned out that the battery (by hand impossible to start) was 6v instead of 12v. So after using a car battery it finally worked again after more than 5 weeks, finally running water again. It worked fine until 2 weeks ago when they let it run empty on diesel and then fill it with very old diesel from a rusty jerrycan. Then it didn’t work anymore, how surprising :P. I tried to fix it but no success. And I guess the station is right now still without running water….

These are not all the problems, it will be a very long story, but it gives a nice impression how things are going here. I didn’t got depressed, most time it’s a nice challenge to get a solution for the problem. The assistants were very happy with me fixing things :P. But sometimes you can get really tired of it.

In the beginning of july I decided to visit Guiroutou, a village 55 km south of Tai. There you have the mountain Niénokoué with a maqnificant view over the rainforest, see the pictures. It is also the place where the Marco Polo documentary of the pygmy hippo was filmed and there are really big rivers. So I really wanted to see the place. First I was a little bit uncertain it was wise to do, the road was so bad no cars or buses were going and I didn’t really knew the situation so close to the Liberian border. But it turned out great, I travelled together with my assistant Donatien on the back of a motorcycle. Before and after entering the forest I stayed at the house of the uncle of Donatien. The people in the village were very happy with my unexpected visit. They offered me a lot of food, koutoukou (locally brewed liqueur of sugarcane) and beer. The uncle also invited me to the church, and the children loved to play with me. I visited the forest for 4 days together with 2 assistents who are working with chimpanzees.

In the forest of guiroutou there is also a habituated group, not for research but habituated for the tourists. Right now there are no tourists because of the political situation here and also because of the rainy season (had to cross 2 rivers by canoe before I could enter the forest). But now they are improving the hotel and even building more houses deeper into the forest. The view from the mountain was really stunning, everywhere you look just primary rain forest. You could hear the monkeys, saw a lot of eagles and hornbills passing by. I heard elephants roaring and even on the mountain run into some forest buffalos. In the forest I found a lot of pygmy hippo tracks, even saw a bongo and zebra duiker. If you guys want to visit the forest and see this all by yourself go to Guiroutou! And tell the people there that you know me (Henk from Pays-bas, numero deux coupe de monde, blab la) At the moment there is only research going on near the village of Tai but the Wild Chimpanzee Foundation is busy with starting up a ecotourism project so maybe in a few years you can visit there as well.

There is one thing that really concerns me for the future of the animals of the forest and that is poaching. Not particulary for the pygmy hippo, bullets you need for them are too expensive. I talked to the eaux de foret (They search for poachers), only in one part of the park, near Soubre, once in a while pygmy hippos are killed. But for smaller animals it is really a problem. The last weeks I could hear gunshots 2 or 3 times a week mostly during the night but also during the day. Most days I went into the forest I found at least one empty bullet shelf. Not so much in the area were the chimpanzee researchers are working but outside that you will definitely find bullets, layons de braconniers (paths were small trees are cut/broken by poachers to find their way back) and abandoned camps near rivers where they smoked the meat before taking it out of the forest. The last months the eaux de foret was not present the whole time, I was told there is not enough money to pay them so they only work 20 days in a month. And I have the idea that the poachers know that very well. The last weeks the chimpanzee researchers even heard gunshots near the chimps were they are working with. And together with the mentality of the local people and even the people here in Abidjan, they all think its good to eat monkeys, the future of the monkeys and other endangered species is really uncertain.

Last weekend I visited the beach, not in Abidjan but 30km west near the village Jaqueville. All the students here at the Centre Suisse go there once in a while. It is really a nice place and only students and friends of the owner go there. This weekend I saw also the local fishing practice, big net put into the water and pulled with a lot of people on shore. It was full moon so during the evening it was very nice eating and drinking beer on the beach.

The pygmy hippo project didn’t went by unnoticed when I was in the forest. There has been a press release: http://www.uu.nl/NL/faculteiten/diergeneeskunde/Actueel/nieuwsfaculteit/Pages/Dwergnijlpaarden.aspx and now the even the NCRV television program ‘On Air’ is interested in the project, so maybe I will come on dutch television as well :P But I am not sure about that yet.

Right now I have 3 days left here. Will relax a bit, work on my data, meeting with Karim my supervisor here and maybe visit the souvenir market. And before I know it I will be back in NL :). Will be a lot of catching up with people and things I missed. But the 21st of august I will be gone again, to Thailand. And there I will finally meet my girlfriend again!

For the photos look here: http://picasaweb.google.nl/eshuishenk/Ivoorkust# and for camera trap pictures wait a bit more :)
Marks blog you can find here: http://ivorymark.wordpress.com/
And some more information about the project here: http://ibream.org/projects/protecting-the-pygmy-hippo/