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[post_content] => In the week before Easter, the "classroom" of the Wildlife Management Studies program was shifted to the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem. On our way to Serengeti we drove through the Ngorongoro Crater, the largest unbroken and un-flooded caldera in the world where thousands of animals live off the grass that grows on the nutritious volcanic soils. Besides huge herds of Cape buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles, a family herd of African elephants, spotted hyena clans and several lion prides, students observed several Black rhinoceroses that are well protected from poaching in this Garden of Eden of Tanzania.
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[post_title] => Christian Kiffner, Ph.D.
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[post_content] => Starting early in the morning, we made our way through the clouds and the Afromontane forest and arrived at the rim of the Ngorongoro Caldera. After taking some pictures of the breathtaking views over this large and complete caldera, we descended with our Landcruisers via a steep road and explored the vast grasslands of the Ngorongoro. We were fortunate as we all spotted at least one of the well-protected black rhinoceros – a species that was once widely distributed but has been decimated in many parts of Africa because of illegal hunting to satisfy the demand for its horn. It's difficult to comprehend that the deep-rooted but illogical belief in the curing powers associated with its horn still threatens this majestic species, of which there are only 5000 individuals left in the world.
We were amazed by the sightings of lions feeding on a wildebeest kill, a rare elephant bull whose tusks almost reached the ground, and numerous herbivores in the grasslands of the Ngorongoro Caldera. Additionally the Serengeti welcomed us with an incredible sight: a large fraction of the 1.3 million wildebeest and numerous zebras and gazelles were in the nutrient-rich short grass plains of the southern Serengeti and it was a delight driving past them as we made our way to our campsite in the central part of the Serengeti.
Although the majority of the grazing animals (following their annual movement routine) were located in the southern plains, the central part of the Serengeti did not fail to impress either. Even before leaving the campsite on the first morning, we observed a leopard feeding on a baboon while other baboons were mobbing the predator.
While studying and counting the diverse bird community and assessing the impact of tourist vehicles on animal behavior, we had numerous observations of small and large wildlife species ranging from chameleons and leopard tortoises crossing the roads to family herds of elephants enjoying the long, fresh grasses that flourished well after some substantial rains revived the landscape from the long drought lasting from November to February.
On our way back to the SFS Center, thousands of zebra and wildebeest as well as a sleepy lioness fringed the road in the southern plains. Our journey was halted at Oldupai Gorge where we had a short lecture on this archaeological site which includes the remains of several early hominids. After crossing the Ngorongoro Highlands – this time with clear views over the amazing landscape – we returned to Moyo Hill, where students are now eagerly studying for their final exams.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Serengeti Expedition
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[post_content] => How many elephants, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeest roam in Tarangire National Park? Which habitats are used by each species? How many mammalian wildlife species are found in this area?
To address these central questions students conducted a vehicle transect count in the northern part of this 2850 km2 (1,096 mi2) protected area. Driving more than 100 km of transects on rough roads, SFS students had counted and recorded numerous herds of elephants, zebras, wildebeest, waterbuck, impala, other antelope species and even encountered two lion prides along the transects.
After a relaxing lunch break at the pool of the Safari lodge with amazing views over a valley packed with wildebeest and zebra, we enjoyed a game drive along the Tarangire River with wonderful close up views of Elephant herds.
The following day, students entered the total of 270 animal sightings made by the five counting groups and started analyzing the data with respect to animal density, habitat use and species diversity using state-of-the-art statistical methods. The results of this exciting exercise will be presented in scientific posters illustrating the abundance and diversity of wildlife found in the Tarangire National Park.
[post_title] => Student Animal Counts Make Scientific Posters
[post_excerpt] => How many elephants, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeest roam in Tarangire National Park?
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[post_content] => What are the consequences of climate change for local livelihoods in northern Tanzania? Which wildlife species are used by traditional healers? Which wildlife species compete most for scarce resources with the abundant livestock? How many elephants, wildebeest, zebra and other species are in this ecosystem? Which areas do wildlife species use for migrating between protected areas? Do different forms of protection affect behavior and demography of wildlife?
To address these and related issues, SFS students went out to the field, counted and observed animals, interviewed local stakeholders and compiled a wealth of data. Surely, the nine days of fieldwork were packed with memorable experiences: exploring largely unbeaten tracks in the wilderness, close encounters with elephants, conversations with local stakeholders which opened new perspectives and views, and great teamwork among students, drivers, guides and faculty. To the end, heavy rain made fieldwork more challenging and occasionally field crews had to work hard to get cars out off the mud. Despite all the positive, adventurous experiences, we also directly experienced the challenges of this ecosystem at first hand. In one study area, we recorded several elephant carcasses that had been poached recently. This range of experiences, however, enables students to put their research into perspective.
Currently, we are analyzing the data and will soon start writing up the reports. Much of our research has direct relevance to the conservation of wildlife in this amazing ecosystem and to the livelihood of its people. We are looking forward to present the results to all local stakeholders in the end of the semester.
[post_title] => Research in the Maasai Steppe
[post_excerpt] => What are the consequences of climate change for local livelihoods in northern Tanzania?
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[post_content] => Having returned from the Serengeti Expedition, students embarked on the proposals for their individual research projects: conducting background literature research at the Camp, coming up with meaningful research questions and designing an adequate study design and field protocols.
<
Only a few days later, students were already out in the field and started collecting data that would help answering important questions in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem. Students conducted interviews in Maasai bomas to investigate impacts of climate change on local livelihoods, interviewed farmers bordering Lake Manyara National Park about human-wildlife conflicts, tracked wildebeest on foot in the Maasai steppe and carried out extensive wildlife surveys in Lake Manyara National Park, the community area and a ranch where livestock and wildlife are managed to co-exist.
Within just 8 to 9 days out in the field, students managed to collect a considerable amount of data and gained a thorough understanding of wildlife and human livelihoods in the ecosystem. Some projects even continued previous Directed Research projects so that we now have data on wildlife populations over all seasons (short rains, long rains, dry season).
The past week was dedicated to data organization and analysis, or in other words – to provide substantial evidence for the patterns observed in the field. After a first small confusion about the meanings of F-, p-, and t-values, degrees of freedom, and logarithms, students have become very knowledgeable in statistical analysis of their data and are already writing up their papers now.
Completing the entire research circle – planning, data sampling, analysis, and write-up – in less than 4 weeks is very challenging but extremely rewarding and we look forward to presenting the results to local stakeholders at the end of this semester. As we are addressing many important questions, recommendations derived from SFS research may help to make a difference in the conservation of the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem.
[post_title] => Conducting Research and Making a Difference in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
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[post_date] => 2013-03-27 06:42:00
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[post_content] => It is now about half-time in the SFS program, but instead of having a break, students are now really getting into the issues and challenges of conserving wildlife in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem. The week started off with an inspiring guest lecture given by Tom Morrison. Using data from his Ph.D. work, Tom presented a comprehensive overview on the wildebeest migration and illustrated how photographic capture-mark recapture methods can be used for applied wildlife conservation projects.
Wildebeest utilize Tarangire and Manyara National Park during the dry season and leave the parks during the wet season to give birth in the nutrient rich plains near Lake Natron (about 130km north of Tarangire) or in the Simanjiro plains to the east of Tarangire. These wet season ranges largely lack formal protection status and hence, wildebeest face serious threats during a critical time of the year.
Earlier this semester, SFS students conducted a wildlife survey in Manyara Ranch and met a part of the wildebeest migration (see picture). While wildebeest are protected in the ranch, other areas along the migration route are severely encroached by human settlements and agricultural expansions. Planned road constructions may accelerate these human developments and illegal hunting is widespread. The task that SFS staff, students, and other researchers in the ecosystem are now tackling collaboratively is to identify bottlenecks along the migratory route, so that these critical areas can be effectively protected.
Another recent highlight of the SFS program was a visit to the Hadzabe near Lake Eyasi. The Hadzabe live in small groups of 10-30 people and still maintain a hunter-and-gatherer lifestyle: the men hunt baboons and antelopes with bows and arrows and the women collect tubers, fruits, and seeds for their subsistence. This visit provided a rare insight into a culture that is so different from our modern “society,” and yielded an interesting perspective on how humans can live in and with nature.
[post_title] => Challenges of Conserving Migratory Wildlife Species
[post_excerpt] => Earlier this semester, SFS students conducted a wildlife survey in Manyara Ranch and met a part of the wildebeest migration.
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[post_date] => 2013-04-11 06:51:28
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[post_content] => Just after final exams and Easter, the second SFS Tanzania expedition set off to Serengeti. In the short grass plains of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and southern Serengeti, the SFS convoy came across one of the most impressive sights in East Africa — the big migration. Thousands and thousands of wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles were grazing in the nutrient-rich and green plains. Spotted hyenas and jackals roamed around the plains in search of carcasses and once inside Serengeti National Park, we were greeted by Cheetahs.
Yet, upon setting up the camp, we were welcomed by another constant fellow of this expedition: heavy rains. Three days of heavy rains made driving in the Serengeti a real challenge but the entire expedition crew accepted this challenge and was reimbursed by impressive wildlife sightings: lions stalking gazelles, lions feeding on zebras, leopards with cubs climbing in trees, and many more unique wildlife observations. Three very informative lectures gave unique insights into the wild dog re-introduction program, the challenges of managing Tanzanaia’s second largest national park, and into the interplay between fire, herbivory and vegetation dynamics.
After this fulfilling expedition students and staff are now ready to start off with another exciting highlight of the SFS program: Directed Research.
[post_title] => Lions, Leopards, Cheetahs, and Rain
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[post_date] => 2013-07-24 06:42:04
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[post_content] => Summer session II in Tanzania is in full swing. So far, students have conducted vegetation assessments, assessed tracks and signs of wildlife around Lake Manyara, learned how to identify individuals within a population and how to track radio-collared animals, and established contours to prevent soil erosion in the highlands around the SFS camp in Rhotia.
In the last two weeks we have explored the protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem: Lake Manyara National Park and its rich woodland vegetation, diversity of primates and plains game; Tarangire National Park and its high density of African Elephants roaming around the Baobab trees; and Manyara Ranch, a crucial area for the seasonal wildlife migrations between the two National Parks and Lake Natron. In these three protected areas, SFS students conducted animal counts and utilized these data to improve their quantitative skills in wildlife ecology. The regular counting of animal populations is a crucial part for the center’s 5 Year Research Plan—using results from the regular animal counts, we are evaluating the performance of different protection schemes and the overall performance of wildlife populations in the entire ecosystem. Integrating this exercise into the syllabus allows students to gain hands-on experience and contribute to wildlife conservation in the ecosystem.
[post_title] => Conducting Wildlife Research in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
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[post_date] => 2013-10-11 06:00:41
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[post_content] => The past week at the Moyo Hill Center in Tanzania was filled with exciting activities. Students stayed a full day in an Iraquw (the local ethnic group around the center) family. Playing with kids, cooking food over open fireplaces, exchanging ideas, and being involved in a plethora of other activities allowed the students to fully experience life in rural Tanzania. Just two days later, a visit to a Maasai homestead near Mto Wa Mbu provided an insight into the life and culture of the Maasai—a pastoral ethnicity that mainly inhabits the Rift Valley and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and who have a very different way of life than the Iraquw.
Probably the highlight of the past week was a visit to the Ngorongoro Crater. The Crater—actually the largest inactive and intact caldera on the terrestrial earth surface—is a wildlife paradise. Black rhinos are well protected in the caldera and frequently spotted (albeit often from a distance) and thousands of grazing animals (wildebeest, zebras, cape buffaloes, and gazelles) feed on the productive grasslands and swamps. High herbivore densities, in turn, support high densities of spotted hyenas and African lions. SFS students were happy to see multiple hyena and lion sightings even though the lions were mainly doing what they do for most of the day: sleeping in the grass.
In contrast to the lions in the Ngorongoro Crater, students are very active in the camp: busy working on assignments, enthusiastically organizing and participating in a very ambitious and fun volleyball tournament and warmly welcoming SFS President Dr. Cramer who is currently visiting our camp.
[post_title] => Tanzanian Culture, Lions & Volleyball
[post_excerpt] => The past week at the Moyo Hill Center in Tanzania was filled with exciting activities.
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[post_date] => 2013-11-18 08:26:40
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[post_content] => Directed Research is the academic highlight of the SFS semester program. In Tanzania, fieldwork started earlier this week. Students and faculty are currently collecting data on forest structure and rural livelihoods in the remote Endabash area, and assessing the distribution, density, demography, and behavior of African elephants, giraffes, wildebeest, impala and zebra. Studies are being conducted in Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Park, Manyara Ranch and the Mto wa Mbu game controlled area.
The pace of the program has notably changed—in the early morning everyone is hurrying up to get to the field sites as soon as possible, long hours are spent in the field, and in the evening data is digitalized as research proposals are being finalized.
Students are highly engaged in their individual projects and obviously enjoy the process of conducting research in East Africa. Clearly, conducting field research in northern Tanzania comes along with some hardships—long and steep walks to reach sample plots in the forest, long drives on bumpy roads until one finds wildlife species to be studied, monotonous counting of huge livestock herds, and of course: heat and dust. At the same time all the effort is rewarded when observing elephant calves playing in the mud, zebras grazing next to wildebeests, and talking to the friendly people who live in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem.
The different sub-projects address critical questions of the Center’s 5-Year Research Plan: How effective are the different protected areas in protecting wildlife species? How can we harmonize forest resource extraction and human livelihoods?
SFS students are actively involved in these big questions and one easily feels that students are engaged in meaningful projects that not only enhances their academic learning experience, but also constitute a valuable contribution to the environment and the human population in northern Tanzania.
[post_title] => Directed Research in Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Directed Research is the academic highlight of the SFS semester program. In Tanzania, fieldwork started earlier this week.
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[post_date] => 2014-03-12 05:00:55
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[post_content] => It’s been more than a month that students have arrived at the Tanzanian field station. The last several weeks were filled with lectures inside and outside the classroom, various exercises in the field, a full day spent in an Iraqwi homestead, and field trips to different protected areas.
Field trips brought us to baboon-packed and scenic Lake Manyara National Park, and elephant-loaded Tarangire National Park with its large baobab trees. We also visited rural areas adjacent to the national parks where humans utilise the same resources as wildlife species. In these rural areas, disease transmission between livestock and wildlife species, competition for resources (wildlife species damaging crops or carnivores killing livestock), and illegal and unsustainable hunting of wildlife are negatively affecting wildlife populations.
Today, we visited Ngorongoro Conservation Area and its world famous Ngorongoro Crater (actually world’s largest continuous caldera) with its enormous densities of grazing wildlife, associated carnivores (mainly spotted hyenas and lions), and well-protected black rhinoceros population. The Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority implements an interesting approach that tries to harmonize human utilization of the landscape and wildlife conservation. Clearly, such a multiple-use approach only works with clear laws and limits, capacity to enforce these rules, and a solid economic basis (principally funded by photographic tourism).
So far, this approach seems to work well and other areas in Northern Tanzania (such as Manyara Ranch located between Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks) employ similar approaches that aim at harmonizing human livelihoods and wildlife conservation. Clearly, co-existence of large mammals and humans remains difficult at times even in these well-managed areas, but overcoming the challenges will be worthwhile for both the environment and humans inhabiting these fascinating landscapes.
[post_title] => Human Livelihoods and Conservation
[post_excerpt] => Field trips brought us to baboon-packed and scenic Lake Manyara National Park, and elephant-loaded Tarangire National Park with its large baobab trees.
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[post_content] => The fall semester in Tanzania is running at a fast pace. Students have explored and experienced many facets of Northern Tanzania: the daily livelihoods of different rural communities, wildlife-packed Ngorongoro Crater, and different protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem. During a 5 day expedition, we explored Tarangire National Park and its surrounding buffer zones that are so vital for sustaining the migratory wildlife species (mainly wildebeest and zebra) in the ecosystem and at the same time provide opportunities for rural communities to benefit directly from wildlife conservation.
During the expedition, we completed the seasonal animal survey of the entire ecosystem. For four years, SFS students have been involved in the regular wildlife monitoring of four different protected areas (Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks, Manyara Ranch and Mto wa Mbu game controlled areas) – a truly unique monitoring scheme in terms of temporal and spatial scale. And all largely run by SFS students!
Students used data from this exercise to accomplish a small quantitative research project and are already preparing research proposals for the upcoming Directed Research (DR). This semester, DR will span from the Ngorongoro Conservation Area all the way to Burunge Wildlife Management Area and students will work on topics as diverse as range assessment, human-wildlife conflict, wildlife population dynamics, connectivity of protected areas, and ethnozoology.
Before this exciting research phase starts, we will explore the Serengeti during our second expedition and hopefully come back to our Center with great memories and pictures of exciting wildlife encounters.
[post_title] => Many Facets of Northern Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Students have explored and experienced many facets of Northern Tanzania: the daily livelihoods of different rural communities, wildlife-packed Ngorongoro Crater, and different protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem.
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[post_content] => In the week before Easter, the "classroom" of the Wildlife Management Studies program was shifted to the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem. On our way to Serengeti we drove through the Ngorongoro Crater, the largest unbroken and un-flooded caldera in the world where thousands of animals live off the grass that grows on the nutritious volcanic soils. Besides huge herds of Cape buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles, a family herd of African elephants, spotted hyena clans and several lion prides, students observed several Black rhinoceroses that are well protected from poaching in this Garden of Eden of Tanzania.
On our way back, some students even witnessed a lion attack on Cape buffalo. However, this time the lions remained hungry as the buffaloes fought off the lions successfully. Then, the long-awaited rain finally set in. It had been unusually dry this March and the vegetation, animals, and humans were longing for this rain. The main highlight on our way to the campsite was observing a serval cat hunting for rodents in the high grass and shortly thereafter, some students even caught a glimpse of a caracal – another first-time sighting for SFS Tanzania!
During the next days in Serengeti, students conducted exercises on carnivore species, tourist behavior, and got to know the diverse bird life of Serengeti. Besides memorable observations of antelopes, elephants, giraffes and hippos, lions, cheetahs and spotted hyenas, students also observed a female leopard and its two tiny cubs on two consecutive days. This semester we were truly blessed with special sightings of large carnivores!
After a long journey through muddy Serengeti roads, we returned to our Moyo Hill campus, and are now focusing on exams and looking forward to the next adventure: Directed Research in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem!
[post_title] => Wild Cats in Serengeti
[post_excerpt] => The "classroom" of the Wildlife Management Studies program was the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem.
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[post_content] => Life has been very busy since Directed Research (DR) projects have started a few days ago. This semester, students and faculty are running a highly diverse set of research projects: some students are working on a human-elephant conflict project in villages nearby the center; others are studying baboon behavior along roads; others are conducting playback experiments to investigate how elephants and cattle interact; others are assessing the relative density and activity patterns of mammals that were "caught" in camera traps. One group is investigating how local people adapt to variable climatic conditions and how local residents perceive a recently initiated community-based conservation scheme.
One DR group spent the last week in the Yaeda Valley. This area is home to the Hadzabe, a hunter-and-gatherer society that still largely depends on natural resources. With the help of highly skilled Hadzabe and Wildlife Division guides, SFS students conducted the first wildlife count in this area. Walking through thick bush, up and down hill, and recording animal sightings and mammal signs was highly challenging but clearly an unforgettable experience. Days in the field start early and end late and are fulfilled with new experiences and unexpected encounters; the heavy rain in the last week added some additional challenges with cars being stuck in the mud for hours. In the evenings, the experiences of the day are being shared at dinner and one can literally sense the enthusiasm and passion for the research projects.
Yaeda Valley
In the next few days, we will start analyzing the data and write up the different research projects. Considering the dedication shown by each student, I’m sure that projects will progress very quickly and smoothly. It is particularly rewarding to see that our work is highly appreciated by the communities we work in and by our local stakeholders. Many projects directly touch on problems at the interface of wildlife conservation and human livelihoods, and our projects aim to provide solutions to some of these problems. This is what makes Directed Research so unique and valuable for students, faculty, and local communities and stakeholders.
→ Wildlife Management Studies Semester Program in Tanzania
[post_title] => Directed Research in Tanzania
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[post_content] => During the last week we shifted our classroom from the Moyo Hill Campus to the Ngorongoro caldera and the vast plains of the Serengeti. Within the Ngorongoro caldera we spotted and observed several black rhinoceros, prides of lions, elephant bulls, and thousands of wildebeests and zebras grazing next to Maasai livestock herds. As we continued our way to the Serengeti plains, it started raining. Yet, the timing of this semester’s expedition could not have been better as the rain attracted a major portion of the 1.3 million wildebeest and 200,000 zebras to the central part of Serengeti. From our tented base camp in the Seronera area, we explored the vast plains and woodlands of the Serengeti that were covered with huge ungulate herds. Moreover, we were lucky enough to spot cheetahs and leopards on several occasions. Each student completed spotting the Big Five (elephant, rhinoceros, Cape buffalo, lion and leopard) on the second day!
Photo by Christian KiffnerPhoto by Christian Kiffner
During the expedition, we observed stunning interactions between large carnivores and their prey. In particular, the lions were feasting on the migrating zebra and wildebeest and students in one car even observed a kill. During our exercises on predator-prey interactions, tourism preferences and birds, we experienced wilderness and wildlife encounters first hand, and upon returning to camp in the evenings, had lots of exciting observations to share.
Photo by Christian Kiffner
Having returned from our Serengeti classroom to our Moyo hill home, students are now eagerly preparing for the final exams before we start our directed research next week.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Wildebeests, Lions, and Exams
[post_excerpt] => Within the Ngorongoro caldera we spotted several black rhinoceros, prides of lions, elephant bulls, and thousands of wildebeests and zebras.
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[post_content] => After a short break from the Summer I program, the SFS Tanzania Summer II session started last week. With many returning Summer I students and new students from the US and Tanzania, we have a diverse and very enthusiastic group of students living at our field site in Rhotia. We already explored nearby Lake Manyara National Park and students did focal observations on giraffes. For example, we observed red-billed oxpeckers feeding on the ectoparasites of giraffes - one of the many fascinating mutualisms in East African animal communities.
In the morning of this exciting field trip, students completed the dry season animal count in the park. Students record numbers, habitat usage and behavior of all mammal species in four protected areas of the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem. This seasonal monitoring system is a very valuable source of data. Students use this dataset to train in quantitative data analysis and we also use this data for research and to compare how wildlife populations are doing in areas with variable conservation status. In another series of lectures and field trips to the shores of Lake Manyara, students learned how to identify and interpret signs of wildlife and explored participatory learning approaches in communities around our field site.
The current week will be filled with field trips to learn about soil conservation techniques, vegetation survey techniques, Maasai culture and two more animal surveys in Manyara Ranch and Tarangire National Park, thus offering insights and active participation in a diverse range of field research.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Out in the Field in Tanzania
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[post_content] => The highlight of the last weeks was our five-day expedition to Tarangire National Park and its surroundings. Exchanging the comfort of our Moyo Hill center for sleeping in tents and dining under the stars allowed us to discover and experience the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem in more detail. We explored wildlife-packed Tarangire National Park, observed hunting attempts by a cheetah and by a single lioness, studied elephant behavior, enjoyed the beauty of the stunning savannah landscape and completed this season’s animal count within the park. Now, at the end of the dry season, wildlife is highly concentrated around the few water sources inside the park, which makes wildlife observations particularly spectacular.
However, during the wet season, many wildlife species leave the park and migrate or disperse into adjacent human-inhabited areas. During the second half of the expedition, we explored these adjacent areas to see and experience how wildlife and humans co-exist. For example, we visited Manyara Ranch, a key stepping stone for the annual wildebeest and zebra migration, and counted livestock and wildlife species as part of our ecosystem-wide monitoring program. We were welcomed by the Burunge Wildlife Management Area - a community-based conservation scheme- and enjoyed a thorough explanation of how this inclusive conservation approach benefits both wildlife and local people. Finally, we walked through the Kwakuchinja wildlife corridor that connects Tarangire National Park and Manyara Ranch and interviewed local residents about their struggles and solutions to living in close proximity to large wildlife.
Having returned from the expedition with thousands of pictures, data on wildlife counts, and lots of experience and memories, student life at the center is back to “daily routine”; a full day home stay, lectures inside and outside the classroom, and computer labs to analyze animal count data.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Exploring the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
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[post_content] => Starting early in the morning, we made our way through the clouds and the Afromontane forest and arrived at the rim of the Ngorongoro Caldera. After taking some pictures of the breathtaking views over this large and complete caldera, we descended with our Landcruisers via a steep road and explored the vast grasslands of the Ngorongoro. We were fortunate as we all spotted at least one of the well-protected black rhinoceros – a species that was once widely distributed but has been decimated in many parts of Africa because of illegal hunting to satisfy the demand for its horn. It's difficult to comprehend that the deep-rooted but illogical belief in the curing powers associated with its horn still threatens this majestic species, of which there are only 5000 individuals left in the world.
We were amazed by the sightings of lions feeding on a wildebeest kill, a rare elephant bull whose tusks almost reached the ground, and numerous herbivores in the grasslands of the Ngorongoro Caldera. Additionally the Serengeti welcomed us with an incredible sight: a large fraction of the 1.3 million wildebeest and numerous zebras and gazelles were in the nutrient-rich short grass plains of the southern Serengeti and it was a delight driving past them as we made our way to our campsite in the central part of the Serengeti.
Although the majority of the grazing animals (following their annual movement routine) were located in the southern plains, the central part of the Serengeti did not fail to impress either. Even before leaving the campsite on the first morning, we observed a leopard feeding on a baboon while other baboons were mobbing the predator.
While studying and counting the diverse bird community and assessing the impact of tourist vehicles on animal behavior, we had numerous observations of small and large wildlife species ranging from chameleons and leopard tortoises crossing the roads to family herds of elephants enjoying the long, fresh grasses that flourished well after some substantial rains revived the landscape from the long drought lasting from November to February.
On our way back to the SFS Center, thousands of zebra and wildebeest as well as a sleepy lioness fringed the road in the southern plains. Our journey was halted at Oldupai Gorge where we had a short lecture on this archaeological site which includes the remains of several early hominids. After crossing the Ngorongoro Highlands – this time with clear views over the amazing landscape – we returned to Moyo Hill, where students are now eagerly studying for their final exams.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Serengeti Expedition
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[post_content] => How many elephants, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeest roam in Tarangire National Park? Which habitats are used by each species? How many mammalian wildlife species are found in this area?
To address these central questions students conducted a vehicle transect count in the northern part of this 2850 km2 (1,096 mi2) protected area. Driving more than 100 km of transects on rough roads, SFS students had counted and recorded numerous herds of elephants, zebras, wildebeest, waterbuck, impala, other antelope species and even encountered two lion prides along the transects.
After a relaxing lunch break at the pool of the Safari lodge with amazing views over a valley packed with wildebeest and zebra, we enjoyed a game drive along the Tarangire River with wonderful close up views of Elephant herds.
The following day, students entered the total of 270 animal sightings made by the five counting groups and started analyzing the data with respect to animal density, habitat use and species diversity using state-of-the-art statistical methods. The results of this exciting exercise will be presented in scientific posters illustrating the abundance and diversity of wildlife found in the Tarangire National Park.
[post_title] => Student Animal Counts Make Scientific Posters
[post_excerpt] => How many elephants, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeest roam in Tarangire National Park?
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[post_content] => What are the consequences of climate change for local livelihoods in northern Tanzania? Which wildlife species are used by traditional healers? Which wildlife species compete most for scarce resources with the abundant livestock? How many elephants, wildebeest, zebra and other species are in this ecosystem? Which areas do wildlife species use for migrating between protected areas? Do different forms of protection affect behavior and demography of wildlife?
To address these and related issues, SFS students went out to the field, counted and observed animals, interviewed local stakeholders and compiled a wealth of data. Surely, the nine days of fieldwork were packed with memorable experiences: exploring largely unbeaten tracks in the wilderness, close encounters with elephants, conversations with local stakeholders which opened new perspectives and views, and great teamwork among students, drivers, guides and faculty. To the end, heavy rain made fieldwork more challenging and occasionally field crews had to work hard to get cars out off the mud. Despite all the positive, adventurous experiences, we also directly experienced the challenges of this ecosystem at first hand. In one study area, we recorded several elephant carcasses that had been poached recently. This range of experiences, however, enables students to put their research into perspective.
Currently, we are analyzing the data and will soon start writing up the reports. Much of our research has direct relevance to the conservation of wildlife in this amazing ecosystem and to the livelihood of its people. We are looking forward to present the results to all local stakeholders in the end of the semester.
[post_title] => Research in the Maasai Steppe
[post_excerpt] => What are the consequences of climate change for local livelihoods in northern Tanzania?
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[post_content] => Having returned from the Serengeti Expedition, students embarked on the proposals for their individual research projects: conducting background literature research at the Camp, coming up with meaningful research questions and designing an adequate study design and field protocols.
<
Only a few days later, students were already out in the field and started collecting data that would help answering important questions in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem. Students conducted interviews in Maasai bomas to investigate impacts of climate change on local livelihoods, interviewed farmers bordering Lake Manyara National Park about human-wildlife conflicts, tracked wildebeest on foot in the Maasai steppe and carried out extensive wildlife surveys in Lake Manyara National Park, the community area and a ranch where livestock and wildlife are managed to co-exist.
Within just 8 to 9 days out in the field, students managed to collect a considerable amount of data and gained a thorough understanding of wildlife and human livelihoods in the ecosystem. Some projects even continued previous Directed Research projects so that we now have data on wildlife populations over all seasons (short rains, long rains, dry season).
The past week was dedicated to data organization and analysis, or in other words – to provide substantial evidence for the patterns observed in the field. After a first small confusion about the meanings of F-, p-, and t-values, degrees of freedom, and logarithms, students have become very knowledgeable in statistical analysis of their data and are already writing up their papers now.
Completing the entire research circle – planning, data sampling, analysis, and write-up – in less than 4 weeks is very challenging but extremely rewarding and we look forward to presenting the results to local stakeholders at the end of this semester. As we are addressing many important questions, recommendations derived from SFS research may help to make a difference in the conservation of the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem.
[post_title] => Conducting Research and Making a Difference in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
[post_excerpt] => Having returned from the Serengeti Expedition, students embarked on the proposals for their individual research projects.
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[post_content] => It is now about half-time in the SFS program, but instead of having a break, students are now really getting into the issues and challenges of conserving wildlife in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem. The week started off with an inspiring guest lecture given by Tom Morrison. Using data from his Ph.D. work, Tom presented a comprehensive overview on the wildebeest migration and illustrated how photographic capture-mark recapture methods can be used for applied wildlife conservation projects.
Wildebeest utilize Tarangire and Manyara National Park during the dry season and leave the parks during the wet season to give birth in the nutrient rich plains near Lake Natron (about 130km north of Tarangire) or in the Simanjiro plains to the east of Tarangire. These wet season ranges largely lack formal protection status and hence, wildebeest face serious threats during a critical time of the year.
Earlier this semester, SFS students conducted a wildlife survey in Manyara Ranch and met a part of the wildebeest migration (see picture). While wildebeest are protected in the ranch, other areas along the migration route are severely encroached by human settlements and agricultural expansions. Planned road constructions may accelerate these human developments and illegal hunting is widespread. The task that SFS staff, students, and other researchers in the ecosystem are now tackling collaboratively is to identify bottlenecks along the migratory route, so that these critical areas can be effectively protected.
Another recent highlight of the SFS program was a visit to the Hadzabe near Lake Eyasi. The Hadzabe live in small groups of 10-30 people and still maintain a hunter-and-gatherer lifestyle: the men hunt baboons and antelopes with bows and arrows and the women collect tubers, fruits, and seeds for their subsistence. This visit provided a rare insight into a culture that is so different from our modern “society,” and yielded an interesting perspective on how humans can live in and with nature.
[post_title] => Challenges of Conserving Migratory Wildlife Species
[post_excerpt] => Earlier this semester, SFS students conducted a wildlife survey in Manyara Ranch and met a part of the wildebeest migration.
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[post_content] => Just after final exams and Easter, the second SFS Tanzania expedition set off to Serengeti. In the short grass plains of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and southern Serengeti, the SFS convoy came across one of the most impressive sights in East Africa — the big migration. Thousands and thousands of wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles were grazing in the nutrient-rich and green plains. Spotted hyenas and jackals roamed around the plains in search of carcasses and once inside Serengeti National Park, we were greeted by Cheetahs.
Yet, upon setting up the camp, we were welcomed by another constant fellow of this expedition: heavy rains. Three days of heavy rains made driving in the Serengeti a real challenge but the entire expedition crew accepted this challenge and was reimbursed by impressive wildlife sightings: lions stalking gazelles, lions feeding on zebras, leopards with cubs climbing in trees, and many more unique wildlife observations. Three very informative lectures gave unique insights into the wild dog re-introduction program, the challenges of managing Tanzanaia’s second largest national park, and into the interplay between fire, herbivory and vegetation dynamics.
After this fulfilling expedition students and staff are now ready to start off with another exciting highlight of the SFS program: Directed Research.
[post_title] => Lions, Leopards, Cheetahs, and Rain
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[post_content] => Summer session II in Tanzania is in full swing. So far, students have conducted vegetation assessments, assessed tracks and signs of wildlife around Lake Manyara, learned how to identify individuals within a population and how to track radio-collared animals, and established contours to prevent soil erosion in the highlands around the SFS camp in Rhotia.
In the last two weeks we have explored the protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem: Lake Manyara National Park and its rich woodland vegetation, diversity of primates and plains game; Tarangire National Park and its high density of African Elephants roaming around the Baobab trees; and Manyara Ranch, a crucial area for the seasonal wildlife migrations between the two National Parks and Lake Natron. In these three protected areas, SFS students conducted animal counts and utilized these data to improve their quantitative skills in wildlife ecology. The regular counting of animal populations is a crucial part for the center’s 5 Year Research Plan—using results from the regular animal counts, we are evaluating the performance of different protection schemes and the overall performance of wildlife populations in the entire ecosystem. Integrating this exercise into the syllabus allows students to gain hands-on experience and contribute to wildlife conservation in the ecosystem.
[post_title] => Conducting Wildlife Research in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
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[post_date] => 2013-10-11 06:00:41
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[post_content] => The past week at the Moyo Hill Center in Tanzania was filled with exciting activities. Students stayed a full day in an Iraquw (the local ethnic group around the center) family. Playing with kids, cooking food over open fireplaces, exchanging ideas, and being involved in a plethora of other activities allowed the students to fully experience life in rural Tanzania. Just two days later, a visit to a Maasai homestead near Mto Wa Mbu provided an insight into the life and culture of the Maasai—a pastoral ethnicity that mainly inhabits the Rift Valley and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and who have a very different way of life than the Iraquw.
Probably the highlight of the past week was a visit to the Ngorongoro Crater. The Crater—actually the largest inactive and intact caldera on the terrestrial earth surface—is a wildlife paradise. Black rhinos are well protected in the caldera and frequently spotted (albeit often from a distance) and thousands of grazing animals (wildebeest, zebras, cape buffaloes, and gazelles) feed on the productive grasslands and swamps. High herbivore densities, in turn, support high densities of spotted hyenas and African lions. SFS students were happy to see multiple hyena and lion sightings even though the lions were mainly doing what they do for most of the day: sleeping in the grass.
In contrast to the lions in the Ngorongoro Crater, students are very active in the camp: busy working on assignments, enthusiastically organizing and participating in a very ambitious and fun volleyball tournament and warmly welcoming SFS President Dr. Cramer who is currently visiting our camp.
[post_title] => Tanzanian Culture, Lions & Volleyball
[post_excerpt] => The past week at the Moyo Hill Center in Tanzania was filled with exciting activities.
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[post_date] => 2013-11-18 08:26:40
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[post_content] => Directed Research is the academic highlight of the SFS semester program. In Tanzania, fieldwork started earlier this week. Students and faculty are currently collecting data on forest structure and rural livelihoods in the remote Endabash area, and assessing the distribution, density, demography, and behavior of African elephants, giraffes, wildebeest, impala and zebra. Studies are being conducted in Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Park, Manyara Ranch and the Mto wa Mbu game controlled area.
The pace of the program has notably changed—in the early morning everyone is hurrying up to get to the field sites as soon as possible, long hours are spent in the field, and in the evening data is digitalized as research proposals are being finalized.
Students are highly engaged in their individual projects and obviously enjoy the process of conducting research in East Africa. Clearly, conducting field research in northern Tanzania comes along with some hardships—long and steep walks to reach sample plots in the forest, long drives on bumpy roads until one finds wildlife species to be studied, monotonous counting of huge livestock herds, and of course: heat and dust. At the same time all the effort is rewarded when observing elephant calves playing in the mud, zebras grazing next to wildebeests, and talking to the friendly people who live in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem.
The different sub-projects address critical questions of the Center’s 5-Year Research Plan: How effective are the different protected areas in protecting wildlife species? How can we harmonize forest resource extraction and human livelihoods?
SFS students are actively involved in these big questions and one easily feels that students are engaged in meaningful projects that not only enhances their academic learning experience, but also constitute a valuable contribution to the environment and the human population in northern Tanzania.
[post_title] => Directed Research in Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Directed Research is the academic highlight of the SFS semester program. In Tanzania, fieldwork started earlier this week.
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[post_date] => 2014-03-12 05:00:55
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[post_content] => It’s been more than a month that students have arrived at the Tanzanian field station. The last several weeks were filled with lectures inside and outside the classroom, various exercises in the field, a full day spent in an Iraqwi homestead, and field trips to different protected areas.
Field trips brought us to baboon-packed and scenic Lake Manyara National Park, and elephant-loaded Tarangire National Park with its large baobab trees. We also visited rural areas adjacent to the national parks where humans utilise the same resources as wildlife species. In these rural areas, disease transmission between livestock and wildlife species, competition for resources (wildlife species damaging crops or carnivores killing livestock), and illegal and unsustainable hunting of wildlife are negatively affecting wildlife populations.
Today, we visited Ngorongoro Conservation Area and its world famous Ngorongoro Crater (actually world’s largest continuous caldera) with its enormous densities of grazing wildlife, associated carnivores (mainly spotted hyenas and lions), and well-protected black rhinoceros population. The Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority implements an interesting approach that tries to harmonize human utilization of the landscape and wildlife conservation. Clearly, such a multiple-use approach only works with clear laws and limits, capacity to enforce these rules, and a solid economic basis (principally funded by photographic tourism).
So far, this approach seems to work well and other areas in Northern Tanzania (such as Manyara Ranch located between Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks) employ similar approaches that aim at harmonizing human livelihoods and wildlife conservation. Clearly, co-existence of large mammals and humans remains difficult at times even in these well-managed areas, but overcoming the challenges will be worthwhile for both the environment and humans inhabiting these fascinating landscapes.
[post_title] => Human Livelihoods and Conservation
[post_excerpt] => Field trips brought us to baboon-packed and scenic Lake Manyara National Park, and elephant-loaded Tarangire National Park with its large baobab trees.
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[post_content] => The fall semester in Tanzania is running at a fast pace. Students have explored and experienced many facets of Northern Tanzania: the daily livelihoods of different rural communities, wildlife-packed Ngorongoro Crater, and different protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem. During a 5 day expedition, we explored Tarangire National Park and its surrounding buffer zones that are so vital for sustaining the migratory wildlife species (mainly wildebeest and zebra) in the ecosystem and at the same time provide opportunities for rural communities to benefit directly from wildlife conservation.
During the expedition, we completed the seasonal animal survey of the entire ecosystem. For four years, SFS students have been involved in the regular wildlife monitoring of four different protected areas (Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks, Manyara Ranch and Mto wa Mbu game controlled areas) – a truly unique monitoring scheme in terms of temporal and spatial scale. And all largely run by SFS students!
Students used data from this exercise to accomplish a small quantitative research project and are already preparing research proposals for the upcoming Directed Research (DR). This semester, DR will span from the Ngorongoro Conservation Area all the way to Burunge Wildlife Management Area and students will work on topics as diverse as range assessment, human-wildlife conflict, wildlife population dynamics, connectivity of protected areas, and ethnozoology.
Before this exciting research phase starts, we will explore the Serengeti during our second expedition and hopefully come back to our Center with great memories and pictures of exciting wildlife encounters.
[post_title] => Many Facets of Northern Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Students have explored and experienced many facets of Northern Tanzania: the daily livelihoods of different rural communities, wildlife-packed Ngorongoro Crater, and different protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem.
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[post_date] => 2015-04-14 07:27:50
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[post_content] => In the week before Easter, the "classroom" of the Wildlife Management Studies program was shifted to the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem. On our way to Serengeti we drove through the Ngorongoro Crater, the largest unbroken and un-flooded caldera in the world where thousands of animals live off the grass that grows on the nutritious volcanic soils. Besides huge herds of Cape buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles, a family herd of African elephants, spotted hyena clans and several lion prides, students observed several Black rhinoceroses that are well protected from poaching in this Garden of Eden of Tanzania.
On our way back, some students even witnessed a lion attack on Cape buffalo. However, this time the lions remained hungry as the buffaloes fought off the lions successfully. Then, the long-awaited rain finally set in. It had been unusually dry this March and the vegetation, animals, and humans were longing for this rain. The main highlight on our way to the campsite was observing a serval cat hunting for rodents in the high grass and shortly thereafter, some students even caught a glimpse of a caracal – another first-time sighting for SFS Tanzania!
During the next days in Serengeti, students conducted exercises on carnivore species, tourist behavior, and got to know the diverse bird life of Serengeti. Besides memorable observations of antelopes, elephants, giraffes and hippos, lions, cheetahs and spotted hyenas, students also observed a female leopard and its two tiny cubs on two consecutive days. This semester we were truly blessed with special sightings of large carnivores!
After a long journey through muddy Serengeti roads, we returned to our Moyo Hill campus, and are now focusing on exams and looking forward to the next adventure: Directed Research in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem!
[post_title] => Wild Cats in Serengeti
[post_excerpt] => The "classroom" of the Wildlife Management Studies program was the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem.
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[post_content] => Life has been very busy since Directed Research (DR) projects have started a few days ago. This semester, students and faculty are running a highly diverse set of research projects: some students are working on a human-elephant conflict project in villages nearby the center; others are studying baboon behavior along roads; others are conducting playback experiments to investigate how elephants and cattle interact; others are assessing the relative density and activity patterns of mammals that were "caught" in camera traps. One group is investigating how local people adapt to variable climatic conditions and how local residents perceive a recently initiated community-based conservation scheme.
One DR group spent the last week in the Yaeda Valley. This area is home to the Hadzabe, a hunter-and-gatherer society that still largely depends on natural resources. With the help of highly skilled Hadzabe and Wildlife Division guides, SFS students conducted the first wildlife count in this area. Walking through thick bush, up and down hill, and recording animal sightings and mammal signs was highly challenging but clearly an unforgettable experience. Days in the field start early and end late and are fulfilled with new experiences and unexpected encounters; the heavy rain in the last week added some additional challenges with cars being stuck in the mud for hours. In the evenings, the experiences of the day are being shared at dinner and one can literally sense the enthusiasm and passion for the research projects.
Yaeda Valley
In the next few days, we will start analyzing the data and write up the different research projects. Considering the dedication shown by each student, I’m sure that projects will progress very quickly and smoothly. It is particularly rewarding to see that our work is highly appreciated by the communities we work in and by our local stakeholders. Many projects directly touch on problems at the interface of wildlife conservation and human livelihoods, and our projects aim to provide solutions to some of these problems. This is what makes Directed Research so unique and valuable for students, faculty, and local communities and stakeholders.
→ Wildlife Management Studies Semester Program in Tanzania
[post_title] => Directed Research in Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Days in the field start early and end late and are fulfilled with new experiences and unexpected encounters.
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[post_content] => During the last week we shifted our classroom from the Moyo Hill Campus to the Ngorongoro caldera and the vast plains of the Serengeti. Within the Ngorongoro caldera we spotted and observed several black rhinoceros, prides of lions, elephant bulls, and thousands of wildebeests and zebras grazing next to Maasai livestock herds. As we continued our way to the Serengeti plains, it started raining. Yet, the timing of this semester’s expedition could not have been better as the rain attracted a major portion of the 1.3 million wildebeest and 200,000 zebras to the central part of Serengeti. From our tented base camp in the Seronera area, we explored the vast plains and woodlands of the Serengeti that were covered with huge ungulate herds. Moreover, we were lucky enough to spot cheetahs and leopards on several occasions. Each student completed spotting the Big Five (elephant, rhinoceros, Cape buffalo, lion and leopard) on the second day!
Photo by Christian KiffnerPhoto by Christian Kiffner
During the expedition, we observed stunning interactions between large carnivores and their prey. In particular, the lions were feasting on the migrating zebra and wildebeest and students in one car even observed a kill. During our exercises on predator-prey interactions, tourism preferences and birds, we experienced wilderness and wildlife encounters first hand, and upon returning to camp in the evenings, had lots of exciting observations to share.
Photo by Christian Kiffner
Having returned from our Serengeti classroom to our Moyo hill home, students are now eagerly preparing for the final exams before we start our directed research next week.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Wildebeests, Lions, and Exams
[post_excerpt] => Within the Ngorongoro caldera we spotted several black rhinoceros, prides of lions, elephant bulls, and thousands of wildebeests and zebras.
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[post_content] => After a short break from the Summer I program, the SFS Tanzania Summer II session started last week. With many returning Summer I students and new students from the US and Tanzania, we have a diverse and very enthusiastic group of students living at our field site in Rhotia. We already explored nearby Lake Manyara National Park and students did focal observations on giraffes. For example, we observed red-billed oxpeckers feeding on the ectoparasites of giraffes - one of the many fascinating mutualisms in East African animal communities.
In the morning of this exciting field trip, students completed the dry season animal count in the park. Students record numbers, habitat usage and behavior of all mammal species in four protected areas of the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem. This seasonal monitoring system is a very valuable source of data. Students use this dataset to train in quantitative data analysis and we also use this data for research and to compare how wildlife populations are doing in areas with variable conservation status. In another series of lectures and field trips to the shores of Lake Manyara, students learned how to identify and interpret signs of wildlife and explored participatory learning approaches in communities around our field site.
The current week will be filled with field trips to learn about soil conservation techniques, vegetation survey techniques, Maasai culture and two more animal surveys in Manyara Ranch and Tarangire National Park, thus offering insights and active participation in a diverse range of field research.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Out in the Field in Tanzania
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[post_content] => The highlight of the last weeks was our five-day expedition to Tarangire National Park and its surroundings. Exchanging the comfort of our Moyo Hill center for sleeping in tents and dining under the stars allowed us to discover and experience the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem in more detail. We explored wildlife-packed Tarangire National Park, observed hunting attempts by a cheetah and by a single lioness, studied elephant behavior, enjoyed the beauty of the stunning savannah landscape and completed this season’s animal count within the park. Now, at the end of the dry season, wildlife is highly concentrated around the few water sources inside the park, which makes wildlife observations particularly spectacular.
However, during the wet season, many wildlife species leave the park and migrate or disperse into adjacent human-inhabited areas. During the second half of the expedition, we explored these adjacent areas to see and experience how wildlife and humans co-exist. For example, we visited Manyara Ranch, a key stepping stone for the annual wildebeest and zebra migration, and counted livestock and wildlife species as part of our ecosystem-wide monitoring program. We were welcomed by the Burunge Wildlife Management Area - a community-based conservation scheme- and enjoyed a thorough explanation of how this inclusive conservation approach benefits both wildlife and local people. Finally, we walked through the Kwakuchinja wildlife corridor that connects Tarangire National Park and Manyara Ranch and interviewed local residents about their struggles and solutions to living in close proximity to large wildlife.
Having returned from the expedition with thousands of pictures, data on wildlife counts, and lots of experience and memories, student life at the center is back to “daily routine”; a full day home stay, lectures inside and outside the classroom, and computer labs to analyze animal count data.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Exploring the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
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[post_content] => Starting early in the morning, we made our way through the clouds and the Afromontane forest and arrived at the rim of the Ngorongoro Caldera. After taking some pictures of the breathtaking views over this large and complete caldera, we descended with our Landcruisers via a steep road and explored the vast grasslands of the Ngorongoro. We were fortunate as we all spotted at least one of the well-protected black rhinoceros – a species that was once widely distributed but has been decimated in many parts of Africa because of illegal hunting to satisfy the demand for its horn. It's difficult to comprehend that the deep-rooted but illogical belief in the curing powers associated with its horn still threatens this majestic species, of which there are only 5000 individuals left in the world.
We were amazed by the sightings of lions feeding on a wildebeest kill, a rare elephant bull whose tusks almost reached the ground, and numerous herbivores in the grasslands of the Ngorongoro Caldera. Additionally the Serengeti welcomed us with an incredible sight: a large fraction of the 1.3 million wildebeest and numerous zebras and gazelles were in the nutrient-rich short grass plains of the southern Serengeti and it was a delight driving past them as we made our way to our campsite in the central part of the Serengeti.
Although the majority of the grazing animals (following their annual movement routine) were located in the southern plains, the central part of the Serengeti did not fail to impress either. Even before leaving the campsite on the first morning, we observed a leopard feeding on a baboon while other baboons were mobbing the predator.
While studying and counting the diverse bird community and assessing the impact of tourist vehicles on animal behavior, we had numerous observations of small and large wildlife species ranging from chameleons and leopard tortoises crossing the roads to family herds of elephants enjoying the long, fresh grasses that flourished well after some substantial rains revived the landscape from the long drought lasting from November to February.
On our way back to the SFS Center, thousands of zebra and wildebeest as well as a sleepy lioness fringed the road in the southern plains. Our journey was halted at Oldupai Gorge where we had a short lecture on this archaeological site which includes the remains of several early hominids. After crossing the Ngorongoro Highlands – this time with clear views over the amazing landscape – we returned to Moyo Hill, where students are now eagerly studying for their final exams.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
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[post_content] => How many elephants, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeest roam in Tarangire National Park? Which habitats are used by each species? How many mammalian wildlife species are found in this area?
To address these central questions students conducted a vehicle transect count in the northern part of this 2850 km2 (1,096 mi2) protected area. Driving more than 100 km of transects on rough roads, SFS students had counted and recorded numerous herds of elephants, zebras, wildebeest, waterbuck, impala, other antelope species and even encountered two lion prides along the transects.
After a relaxing lunch break at the pool of the Safari lodge with amazing views over a valley packed with wildebeest and zebra, we enjoyed a game drive along the Tarangire River with wonderful close up views of Elephant herds.
The following day, students entered the total of 270 animal sightings made by the five counting groups and started analyzing the data with respect to animal density, habitat use and species diversity using state-of-the-art statistical methods. The results of this exciting exercise will be presented in scientific posters illustrating the abundance and diversity of wildlife found in the Tarangire National Park.
[post_title] => Student Animal Counts Make Scientific Posters
[post_excerpt] => How many elephants, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeest roam in Tarangire National Park?
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[post_date] => 2012-05-02 08:48:46
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[post_content] => What are the consequences of climate change for local livelihoods in northern Tanzania? Which wildlife species are used by traditional healers? Which wildlife species compete most for scarce resources with the abundant livestock? How many elephants, wildebeest, zebra and other species are in this ecosystem? Which areas do wildlife species use for migrating between protected areas? Do different forms of protection affect behavior and demography of wildlife?
To address these and related issues, SFS students went out to the field, counted and observed animals, interviewed local stakeholders and compiled a wealth of data. Surely, the nine days of fieldwork were packed with memorable experiences: exploring largely unbeaten tracks in the wilderness, close encounters with elephants, conversations with local stakeholders which opened new perspectives and views, and great teamwork among students, drivers, guides and faculty. To the end, heavy rain made fieldwork more challenging and occasionally field crews had to work hard to get cars out off the mud. Despite all the positive, adventurous experiences, we also directly experienced the challenges of this ecosystem at first hand. In one study area, we recorded several elephant carcasses that had been poached recently. This range of experiences, however, enables students to put their research into perspective.
Currently, we are analyzing the data and will soon start writing up the reports. Much of our research has direct relevance to the conservation of wildlife in this amazing ecosystem and to the livelihood of its people. We are looking forward to present the results to all local stakeholders in the end of the semester.
[post_title] => Research in the Maasai Steppe
[post_excerpt] => What are the consequences of climate change for local livelihoods in northern Tanzania?
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[post_content] => Having returned from the Serengeti Expedition, students embarked on the proposals for their individual research projects: conducting background literature research at the Camp, coming up with meaningful research questions and designing an adequate study design and field protocols.
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Only a few days later, students were already out in the field and started collecting data that would help answering important questions in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem. Students conducted interviews in Maasai bomas to investigate impacts of climate change on local livelihoods, interviewed farmers bordering Lake Manyara National Park about human-wildlife conflicts, tracked wildebeest on foot in the Maasai steppe and carried out extensive wildlife surveys in Lake Manyara National Park, the community area and a ranch where livestock and wildlife are managed to co-exist.
Within just 8 to 9 days out in the field, students managed to collect a considerable amount of data and gained a thorough understanding of wildlife and human livelihoods in the ecosystem. Some projects even continued previous Directed Research projects so that we now have data on wildlife populations over all seasons (short rains, long rains, dry season).
The past week was dedicated to data organization and analysis, or in other words – to provide substantial evidence for the patterns observed in the field. After a first small confusion about the meanings of F-, p-, and t-values, degrees of freedom, and logarithms, students have become very knowledgeable in statistical analysis of their data and are already writing up their papers now.
Completing the entire research circle – planning, data sampling, analysis, and write-up – in less than 4 weeks is very challenging but extremely rewarding and we look forward to presenting the results to local stakeholders at the end of this semester. As we are addressing many important questions, recommendations derived from SFS research may help to make a difference in the conservation of the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem.
[post_title] => Conducting Research and Making a Difference in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
[post_excerpt] => Having returned from the Serengeti Expedition, students embarked on the proposals for their individual research projects.
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[post_date] => 2013-03-27 06:42:00
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[post_content] => It is now about half-time in the SFS program, but instead of having a break, students are now really getting into the issues and challenges of conserving wildlife in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem. The week started off with an inspiring guest lecture given by Tom Morrison. Using data from his Ph.D. work, Tom presented a comprehensive overview on the wildebeest migration and illustrated how photographic capture-mark recapture methods can be used for applied wildlife conservation projects.
Wildebeest utilize Tarangire and Manyara National Park during the dry season and leave the parks during the wet season to give birth in the nutrient rich plains near Lake Natron (about 130km north of Tarangire) or in the Simanjiro plains to the east of Tarangire. These wet season ranges largely lack formal protection status and hence, wildebeest face serious threats during a critical time of the year.
Earlier this semester, SFS students conducted a wildlife survey in Manyara Ranch and met a part of the wildebeest migration (see picture). While wildebeest are protected in the ranch, other areas along the migration route are severely encroached by human settlements and agricultural expansions. Planned road constructions may accelerate these human developments and illegal hunting is widespread. The task that SFS staff, students, and other researchers in the ecosystem are now tackling collaboratively is to identify bottlenecks along the migratory route, so that these critical areas can be effectively protected.
Another recent highlight of the SFS program was a visit to the Hadzabe near Lake Eyasi. The Hadzabe live in small groups of 10-30 people and still maintain a hunter-and-gatherer lifestyle: the men hunt baboons and antelopes with bows and arrows and the women collect tubers, fruits, and seeds for their subsistence. This visit provided a rare insight into a culture that is so different from our modern “society,” and yielded an interesting perspective on how humans can live in and with nature.
[post_title] => Challenges of Conserving Migratory Wildlife Species
[post_excerpt] => Earlier this semester, SFS students conducted a wildlife survey in Manyara Ranch and met a part of the wildebeest migration.
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[post_content] => Just after final exams and Easter, the second SFS Tanzania expedition set off to Serengeti. In the short grass plains of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and southern Serengeti, the SFS convoy came across one of the most impressive sights in East Africa — the big migration. Thousands and thousands of wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles were grazing in the nutrient-rich and green plains. Spotted hyenas and jackals roamed around the plains in search of carcasses and once inside Serengeti National Park, we were greeted by Cheetahs.
Yet, upon setting up the camp, we were welcomed by another constant fellow of this expedition: heavy rains. Three days of heavy rains made driving in the Serengeti a real challenge but the entire expedition crew accepted this challenge and was reimbursed by impressive wildlife sightings: lions stalking gazelles, lions feeding on zebras, leopards with cubs climbing in trees, and many more unique wildlife observations. Three very informative lectures gave unique insights into the wild dog re-introduction program, the challenges of managing Tanzanaia’s second largest national park, and into the interplay between fire, herbivory and vegetation dynamics.
After this fulfilling expedition students and staff are now ready to start off with another exciting highlight of the SFS program: Directed Research.
[post_title] => Lions, Leopards, Cheetahs, and Rain
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[post_date] => 2013-07-24 06:42:04
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[post_content] => Summer session II in Tanzania is in full swing. So far, students have conducted vegetation assessments, assessed tracks and signs of wildlife around Lake Manyara, learned how to identify individuals within a population and how to track radio-collared animals, and established contours to prevent soil erosion in the highlands around the SFS camp in Rhotia.
In the last two weeks we have explored the protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem: Lake Manyara National Park and its rich woodland vegetation, diversity of primates and plains game; Tarangire National Park and its high density of African Elephants roaming around the Baobab trees; and Manyara Ranch, a crucial area for the seasonal wildlife migrations between the two National Parks and Lake Natron. In these three protected areas, SFS students conducted animal counts and utilized these data to improve their quantitative skills in wildlife ecology. The regular counting of animal populations is a crucial part for the center’s 5 Year Research Plan—using results from the regular animal counts, we are evaluating the performance of different protection schemes and the overall performance of wildlife populations in the entire ecosystem. Integrating this exercise into the syllabus allows students to gain hands-on experience and contribute to wildlife conservation in the ecosystem.
[post_title] => Conducting Wildlife Research in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
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[post_date] => 2013-10-11 06:00:41
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[post_content] => The past week at the Moyo Hill Center in Tanzania was filled with exciting activities. Students stayed a full day in an Iraquw (the local ethnic group around the center) family. Playing with kids, cooking food over open fireplaces, exchanging ideas, and being involved in a plethora of other activities allowed the students to fully experience life in rural Tanzania. Just two days later, a visit to a Maasai homestead near Mto Wa Mbu provided an insight into the life and culture of the Maasai—a pastoral ethnicity that mainly inhabits the Rift Valley and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and who have a very different way of life than the Iraquw.
Probably the highlight of the past week was a visit to the Ngorongoro Crater. The Crater—actually the largest inactive and intact caldera on the terrestrial earth surface—is a wildlife paradise. Black rhinos are well protected in the caldera and frequently spotted (albeit often from a distance) and thousands of grazing animals (wildebeest, zebras, cape buffaloes, and gazelles) feed on the productive grasslands and swamps. High herbivore densities, in turn, support high densities of spotted hyenas and African lions. SFS students were happy to see multiple hyena and lion sightings even though the lions were mainly doing what they do for most of the day: sleeping in the grass.
In contrast to the lions in the Ngorongoro Crater, students are very active in the camp: busy working on assignments, enthusiastically organizing and participating in a very ambitious and fun volleyball tournament and warmly welcoming SFS President Dr. Cramer who is currently visiting our camp.
[post_title] => Tanzanian Culture, Lions & Volleyball
[post_excerpt] => The past week at the Moyo Hill Center in Tanzania was filled with exciting activities.
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[post_date] => 2013-11-18 08:26:40
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[post_content] => Directed Research is the academic highlight of the SFS semester program. In Tanzania, fieldwork started earlier this week. Students and faculty are currently collecting data on forest structure and rural livelihoods in the remote Endabash area, and assessing the distribution, density, demography, and behavior of African elephants, giraffes, wildebeest, impala and zebra. Studies are being conducted in Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Park, Manyara Ranch and the Mto wa Mbu game controlled area.
The pace of the program has notably changed—in the early morning everyone is hurrying up to get to the field sites as soon as possible, long hours are spent in the field, and in the evening data is digitalized as research proposals are being finalized.
Students are highly engaged in their individual projects and obviously enjoy the process of conducting research in East Africa. Clearly, conducting field research in northern Tanzania comes along with some hardships—long and steep walks to reach sample plots in the forest, long drives on bumpy roads until one finds wildlife species to be studied, monotonous counting of huge livestock herds, and of course: heat and dust. At the same time all the effort is rewarded when observing elephant calves playing in the mud, zebras grazing next to wildebeests, and talking to the friendly people who live in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem.
The different sub-projects address critical questions of the Center’s 5-Year Research Plan: How effective are the different protected areas in protecting wildlife species? How can we harmonize forest resource extraction and human livelihoods?
SFS students are actively involved in these big questions and one easily feels that students are engaged in meaningful projects that not only enhances their academic learning experience, but also constitute a valuable contribution to the environment and the human population in northern Tanzania.
[post_title] => Directed Research in Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Directed Research is the academic highlight of the SFS semester program. In Tanzania, fieldwork started earlier this week.
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[post_date] => 2014-03-12 05:00:55
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[post_content] => It’s been more than a month that students have arrived at the Tanzanian field station. The last several weeks were filled with lectures inside and outside the classroom, various exercises in the field, a full day spent in an Iraqwi homestead, and field trips to different protected areas.
Field trips brought us to baboon-packed and scenic Lake Manyara National Park, and elephant-loaded Tarangire National Park with its large baobab trees. We also visited rural areas adjacent to the national parks where humans utilise the same resources as wildlife species. In these rural areas, disease transmission between livestock and wildlife species, competition for resources (wildlife species damaging crops or carnivores killing livestock), and illegal and unsustainable hunting of wildlife are negatively affecting wildlife populations.
Today, we visited Ngorongoro Conservation Area and its world famous Ngorongoro Crater (actually world’s largest continuous caldera) with its enormous densities of grazing wildlife, associated carnivores (mainly spotted hyenas and lions), and well-protected black rhinoceros population. The Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority implements an interesting approach that tries to harmonize human utilization of the landscape and wildlife conservation. Clearly, such a multiple-use approach only works with clear laws and limits, capacity to enforce these rules, and a solid economic basis (principally funded by photographic tourism).
So far, this approach seems to work well and other areas in Northern Tanzania (such as Manyara Ranch located between Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks) employ similar approaches that aim at harmonizing human livelihoods and wildlife conservation. Clearly, co-existence of large mammals and humans remains difficult at times even in these well-managed areas, but overcoming the challenges will be worthwhile for both the environment and humans inhabiting these fascinating landscapes.
[post_title] => Human Livelihoods and Conservation
[post_excerpt] => Field trips brought us to baboon-packed and scenic Lake Manyara National Park, and elephant-loaded Tarangire National Park with its large baobab trees.
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[post_content] => The fall semester in Tanzania is running at a fast pace. Students have explored and experienced many facets of Northern Tanzania: the daily livelihoods of different rural communities, wildlife-packed Ngorongoro Crater, and different protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem. During a 5 day expedition, we explored Tarangire National Park and its surrounding buffer zones that are so vital for sustaining the migratory wildlife species (mainly wildebeest and zebra) in the ecosystem and at the same time provide opportunities for rural communities to benefit directly from wildlife conservation.
During the expedition, we completed the seasonal animal survey of the entire ecosystem. For four years, SFS students have been involved in the regular wildlife monitoring of four different protected areas (Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks, Manyara Ranch and Mto wa Mbu game controlled areas) – a truly unique monitoring scheme in terms of temporal and spatial scale. And all largely run by SFS students!
Students used data from this exercise to accomplish a small quantitative research project and are already preparing research proposals for the upcoming Directed Research (DR). This semester, DR will span from the Ngorongoro Conservation Area all the way to Burunge Wildlife Management Area and students will work on topics as diverse as range assessment, human-wildlife conflict, wildlife population dynamics, connectivity of protected areas, and ethnozoology.
Before this exciting research phase starts, we will explore the Serengeti during our second expedition and hopefully come back to our Center with great memories and pictures of exciting wildlife encounters.
[post_title] => Many Facets of Northern Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Students have explored and experienced many facets of Northern Tanzania: the daily livelihoods of different rural communities, wildlife-packed Ngorongoro Crater, and different protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem.
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[post_date] => 2015-04-14 07:27:50
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[post_content] => In the week before Easter, the "classroom" of the Wildlife Management Studies program was shifted to the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem. On our way to Serengeti we drove through the Ngorongoro Crater, the largest unbroken and un-flooded caldera in the world where thousands of animals live off the grass that grows on the nutritious volcanic soils. Besides huge herds of Cape buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles, a family herd of African elephants, spotted hyena clans and several lion prides, students observed several Black rhinoceroses that are well protected from poaching in this Garden of Eden of Tanzania.
On our way back, some students even witnessed a lion attack on Cape buffalo. However, this time the lions remained hungry as the buffaloes fought off the lions successfully. Then, the long-awaited rain finally set in. It had been unusually dry this March and the vegetation, animals, and humans were longing for this rain. The main highlight on our way to the campsite was observing a serval cat hunting for rodents in the high grass and shortly thereafter, some students even caught a glimpse of a caracal – another first-time sighting for SFS Tanzania!
During the next days in Serengeti, students conducted exercises on carnivore species, tourist behavior, and got to know the diverse bird life of Serengeti. Besides memorable observations of antelopes, elephants, giraffes and hippos, lions, cheetahs and spotted hyenas, students also observed a female leopard and its two tiny cubs on two consecutive days. This semester we were truly blessed with special sightings of large carnivores!
After a long journey through muddy Serengeti roads, we returned to our Moyo Hill campus, and are now focusing on exams and looking forward to the next adventure: Directed Research in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem!
[post_title] => Wild Cats in Serengeti
[post_excerpt] => The "classroom" of the Wildlife Management Studies program was the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem.
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[post_content] => Life has been very busy since Directed Research (DR) projects have started a few days ago. This semester, students and faculty are running a highly diverse set of research projects: some students are working on a human-elephant conflict project in villages nearby the center; others are studying baboon behavior along roads; others are conducting playback experiments to investigate how elephants and cattle interact; others are assessing the relative density and activity patterns of mammals that were "caught" in camera traps. One group is investigating how local people adapt to variable climatic conditions and how local residents perceive a recently initiated community-based conservation scheme.
One DR group spent the last week in the Yaeda Valley. This area is home to the Hadzabe, a hunter-and-gatherer society that still largely depends on natural resources. With the help of highly skilled Hadzabe and Wildlife Division guides, SFS students conducted the first wildlife count in this area. Walking through thick bush, up and down hill, and recording animal sightings and mammal signs was highly challenging but clearly an unforgettable experience. Days in the field start early and end late and are fulfilled with new experiences and unexpected encounters; the heavy rain in the last week added some additional challenges with cars being stuck in the mud for hours. In the evenings, the experiences of the day are being shared at dinner and one can literally sense the enthusiasm and passion for the research projects.
Yaeda Valley
In the next few days, we will start analyzing the data and write up the different research projects. Considering the dedication shown by each student, I’m sure that projects will progress very quickly and smoothly. It is particularly rewarding to see that our work is highly appreciated by the communities we work in and by our local stakeholders. Many projects directly touch on problems at the interface of wildlife conservation and human livelihoods, and our projects aim to provide solutions to some of these problems. This is what makes Directed Research so unique and valuable for students, faculty, and local communities and stakeholders.
→ Wildlife Management Studies Semester Program in Tanzania
[post_title] => Directed Research in Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Days in the field start early and end late and are fulfilled with new experiences and unexpected encounters.
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[post_content] => During the last week we shifted our classroom from the Moyo Hill Campus to the Ngorongoro caldera and the vast plains of the Serengeti. Within the Ngorongoro caldera we spotted and observed several black rhinoceros, prides of lions, elephant bulls, and thousands of wildebeests and zebras grazing next to Maasai livestock herds. As we continued our way to the Serengeti plains, it started raining. Yet, the timing of this semester’s expedition could not have been better as the rain attracted a major portion of the 1.3 million wildebeest and 200,000 zebras to the central part of Serengeti. From our tented base camp in the Seronera area, we explored the vast plains and woodlands of the Serengeti that were covered with huge ungulate herds. Moreover, we were lucky enough to spot cheetahs and leopards on several occasions. Each student completed spotting the Big Five (elephant, rhinoceros, Cape buffalo, lion and leopard) on the second day!
Photo by Christian KiffnerPhoto by Christian Kiffner
During the expedition, we observed stunning interactions between large carnivores and their prey. In particular, the lions were feasting on the migrating zebra and wildebeest and students in one car even observed a kill. During our exercises on predator-prey interactions, tourism preferences and birds, we experienced wilderness and wildlife encounters first hand, and upon returning to camp in the evenings, had lots of exciting observations to share.
Photo by Christian Kiffner
Having returned from our Serengeti classroom to our Moyo hill home, students are now eagerly preparing for the final exams before we start our directed research next week.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Wildebeests, Lions, and Exams
[post_excerpt] => Within the Ngorongoro caldera we spotted several black rhinoceros, prides of lions, elephant bulls, and thousands of wildebeests and zebras.
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[post_content] => After a short break from the Summer I program, the SFS Tanzania Summer II session started last week. With many returning Summer I students and new students from the US and Tanzania, we have a diverse and very enthusiastic group of students living at our field site in Rhotia. We already explored nearby Lake Manyara National Park and students did focal observations on giraffes. For example, we observed red-billed oxpeckers feeding on the ectoparasites of giraffes - one of the many fascinating mutualisms in East African animal communities.
In the morning of this exciting field trip, students completed the dry season animal count in the park. Students record numbers, habitat usage and behavior of all mammal species in four protected areas of the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem. This seasonal monitoring system is a very valuable source of data. Students use this dataset to train in quantitative data analysis and we also use this data for research and to compare how wildlife populations are doing in areas with variable conservation status. In another series of lectures and field trips to the shores of Lake Manyara, students learned how to identify and interpret signs of wildlife and explored participatory learning approaches in communities around our field site.
The current week will be filled with field trips to learn about soil conservation techniques, vegetation survey techniques, Maasai culture and two more animal surveys in Manyara Ranch and Tarangire National Park, thus offering insights and active participation in a diverse range of field research.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Out in the Field in Tanzania
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[post_content] => The highlight of the last weeks was our five-day expedition to Tarangire National Park and its surroundings. Exchanging the comfort of our Moyo Hill center for sleeping in tents and dining under the stars allowed us to discover and experience the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem in more detail. We explored wildlife-packed Tarangire National Park, observed hunting attempts by a cheetah and by a single lioness, studied elephant behavior, enjoyed the beauty of the stunning savannah landscape and completed this season’s animal count within the park. Now, at the end of the dry season, wildlife is highly concentrated around the few water sources inside the park, which makes wildlife observations particularly spectacular.
However, during the wet season, many wildlife species leave the park and migrate or disperse into adjacent human-inhabited areas. During the second half of the expedition, we explored these adjacent areas to see and experience how wildlife and humans co-exist. For example, we visited Manyara Ranch, a key stepping stone for the annual wildebeest and zebra migration, and counted livestock and wildlife species as part of our ecosystem-wide monitoring program. We were welcomed by the Burunge Wildlife Management Area - a community-based conservation scheme- and enjoyed a thorough explanation of how this inclusive conservation approach benefits both wildlife and local people. Finally, we walked through the Kwakuchinja wildlife corridor that connects Tarangire National Park and Manyara Ranch and interviewed local residents about their struggles and solutions to living in close proximity to large wildlife.
Having returned from the expedition with thousands of pictures, data on wildlife counts, and lots of experience and memories, student life at the center is back to “daily routine”; a full day home stay, lectures inside and outside the classroom, and computer labs to analyze animal count data.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
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[post_title] => Christian Kiffner, Ph.D.
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[post_content] => Starting early in the morning, we made our way through the clouds and the Afromontane forest and arrived at the rim of the Ngorongoro Caldera. After taking some pictures of the breathtaking views over this large and complete caldera, we descended with our Landcruisers via a steep road and explored the vast grasslands of the Ngorongoro. We were fortunate as we all spotted at least one of the well-protected black rhinoceros – a species that was once widely distributed but has been decimated in many parts of Africa because of illegal hunting to satisfy the demand for its horn. It's difficult to comprehend that the deep-rooted but illogical belief in the curing powers associated with its horn still threatens this majestic species, of which there are only 5000 individuals left in the world.
We were amazed by the sightings of lions feeding on a wildebeest kill, a rare elephant bull whose tusks almost reached the ground, and numerous herbivores in the grasslands of the Ngorongoro Caldera. Additionally the Serengeti welcomed us with an incredible sight: a large fraction of the 1.3 million wildebeest and numerous zebras and gazelles were in the nutrient-rich short grass plains of the southern Serengeti and it was a delight driving past them as we made our way to our campsite in the central part of the Serengeti.
Although the majority of the grazing animals (following their annual movement routine) were located in the southern plains, the central part of the Serengeti did not fail to impress either. Even before leaving the campsite on the first morning, we observed a leopard feeding on a baboon while other baboons were mobbing the predator.
While studying and counting the diverse bird community and assessing the impact of tourist vehicles on animal behavior, we had numerous observations of small and large wildlife species ranging from chameleons and leopard tortoises crossing the roads to family herds of elephants enjoying the long, fresh grasses that flourished well after some substantial rains revived the landscape from the long drought lasting from November to February.
On our way back to the SFS Center, thousands of zebra and wildebeest as well as a sleepy lioness fringed the road in the southern plains. Our journey was halted at Oldupai Gorge where we had a short lecture on this archaeological site which includes the remains of several early hominids. After crossing the Ngorongoro Highlands – this time with clear views over the amazing landscape – we returned to Moyo Hill, where students are now eagerly studying for their final exams.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Serengeti Expedition
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[post_content] => How many elephants, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeest roam in Tarangire National Park? Which habitats are used by each species? How many mammalian wildlife species are found in this area?
To address these central questions students conducted a vehicle transect count in the northern part of this 2850 km2 (1,096 mi2) protected area. Driving more than 100 km of transects on rough roads, SFS students had counted and recorded numerous herds of elephants, zebras, wildebeest, waterbuck, impala, other antelope species and even encountered two lion prides along the transects.
After a relaxing lunch break at the pool of the Safari lodge with amazing views over a valley packed with wildebeest and zebra, we enjoyed a game drive along the Tarangire River with wonderful close up views of Elephant herds.
The following day, students entered the total of 270 animal sightings made by the five counting groups and started analyzing the data with respect to animal density, habitat use and species diversity using state-of-the-art statistical methods. The results of this exciting exercise will be presented in scientific posters illustrating the abundance and diversity of wildlife found in the Tarangire National Park.
[post_title] => Student Animal Counts Make Scientific Posters
[post_excerpt] => How many elephants, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeest roam in Tarangire National Park?
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[post_content] => What are the consequences of climate change for local livelihoods in northern Tanzania? Which wildlife species are used by traditional healers? Which wildlife species compete most for scarce resources with the abundant livestock? How many elephants, wildebeest, zebra and other species are in this ecosystem? Which areas do wildlife species use for migrating between protected areas? Do different forms of protection affect behavior and demography of wildlife?
To address these and related issues, SFS students went out to the field, counted and observed animals, interviewed local stakeholders and compiled a wealth of data. Surely, the nine days of fieldwork were packed with memorable experiences: exploring largely unbeaten tracks in the wilderness, close encounters with elephants, conversations with local stakeholders which opened new perspectives and views, and great teamwork among students, drivers, guides and faculty. To the end, heavy rain made fieldwork more challenging and occasionally field crews had to work hard to get cars out off the mud. Despite all the positive, adventurous experiences, we also directly experienced the challenges of this ecosystem at first hand. In one study area, we recorded several elephant carcasses that had been poached recently. This range of experiences, however, enables students to put their research into perspective.
Currently, we are analyzing the data and will soon start writing up the reports. Much of our research has direct relevance to the conservation of wildlife in this amazing ecosystem and to the livelihood of its people. We are looking forward to present the results to all local stakeholders in the end of the semester.
[post_title] => Research in the Maasai Steppe
[post_excerpt] => What are the consequences of climate change for local livelihoods in northern Tanzania?
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[post_date] => 2012-12-10 08:47:49
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[post_content] => Having returned from the Serengeti Expedition, students embarked on the proposals for their individual research projects: conducting background literature research at the Camp, coming up with meaningful research questions and designing an adequate study design and field protocols.
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Only a few days later, students were already out in the field and started collecting data that would help answering important questions in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem. Students conducted interviews in Maasai bomas to investigate impacts of climate change on local livelihoods, interviewed farmers bordering Lake Manyara National Park about human-wildlife conflicts, tracked wildebeest on foot in the Maasai steppe and carried out extensive wildlife surveys in Lake Manyara National Park, the community area and a ranch where livestock and wildlife are managed to co-exist.
Within just 8 to 9 days out in the field, students managed to collect a considerable amount of data and gained a thorough understanding of wildlife and human livelihoods in the ecosystem. Some projects even continued previous Directed Research projects so that we now have data on wildlife populations over all seasons (short rains, long rains, dry season).
The past week was dedicated to data organization and analysis, or in other words – to provide substantial evidence for the patterns observed in the field. After a first small confusion about the meanings of F-, p-, and t-values, degrees of freedom, and logarithms, students have become very knowledgeable in statistical analysis of their data and are already writing up their papers now.
Completing the entire research circle – planning, data sampling, analysis, and write-up – in less than 4 weeks is very challenging but extremely rewarding and we look forward to presenting the results to local stakeholders at the end of this semester. As we are addressing many important questions, recommendations derived from SFS research may help to make a difference in the conservation of the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem.
[post_title] => Conducting Research and Making a Difference in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
[post_excerpt] => Having returned from the Serengeti Expedition, students embarked on the proposals for their individual research projects.
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[post_date] => 2013-03-27 06:42:00
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[post_content] => It is now about half-time in the SFS program, but instead of having a break, students are now really getting into the issues and challenges of conserving wildlife in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem. The week started off with an inspiring guest lecture given by Tom Morrison. Using data from his Ph.D. work, Tom presented a comprehensive overview on the wildebeest migration and illustrated how photographic capture-mark recapture methods can be used for applied wildlife conservation projects.
Wildebeest utilize Tarangire and Manyara National Park during the dry season and leave the parks during the wet season to give birth in the nutrient rich plains near Lake Natron (about 130km north of Tarangire) or in the Simanjiro plains to the east of Tarangire. These wet season ranges largely lack formal protection status and hence, wildebeest face serious threats during a critical time of the year.
Earlier this semester, SFS students conducted a wildlife survey in Manyara Ranch and met a part of the wildebeest migration (see picture). While wildebeest are protected in the ranch, other areas along the migration route are severely encroached by human settlements and agricultural expansions. Planned road constructions may accelerate these human developments and illegal hunting is widespread. The task that SFS staff, students, and other researchers in the ecosystem are now tackling collaboratively is to identify bottlenecks along the migratory route, so that these critical areas can be effectively protected.
Another recent highlight of the SFS program was a visit to the Hadzabe near Lake Eyasi. The Hadzabe live in small groups of 10-30 people and still maintain a hunter-and-gatherer lifestyle: the men hunt baboons and antelopes with bows and arrows and the women collect tubers, fruits, and seeds for their subsistence. This visit provided a rare insight into a culture that is so different from our modern “society,” and yielded an interesting perspective on how humans can live in and with nature.
[post_title] => Challenges of Conserving Migratory Wildlife Species
[post_excerpt] => Earlier this semester, SFS students conducted a wildlife survey in Manyara Ranch and met a part of the wildebeest migration.
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[post_content] => Just after final exams and Easter, the second SFS Tanzania expedition set off to Serengeti. In the short grass plains of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and southern Serengeti, the SFS convoy came across one of the most impressive sights in East Africa — the big migration. Thousands and thousands of wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles were grazing in the nutrient-rich and green plains. Spotted hyenas and jackals roamed around the plains in search of carcasses and once inside Serengeti National Park, we were greeted by Cheetahs.
Yet, upon setting up the camp, we were welcomed by another constant fellow of this expedition: heavy rains. Three days of heavy rains made driving in the Serengeti a real challenge but the entire expedition crew accepted this challenge and was reimbursed by impressive wildlife sightings: lions stalking gazelles, lions feeding on zebras, leopards with cubs climbing in trees, and many more unique wildlife observations. Three very informative lectures gave unique insights into the wild dog re-introduction program, the challenges of managing Tanzanaia’s second largest national park, and into the interplay between fire, herbivory and vegetation dynamics.
After this fulfilling expedition students and staff are now ready to start off with another exciting highlight of the SFS program: Directed Research.
[post_title] => Lions, Leopards, Cheetahs, and Rain
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[post_date] => 2013-07-24 06:42:04
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[post_content] => Summer session II in Tanzania is in full swing. So far, students have conducted vegetation assessments, assessed tracks and signs of wildlife around Lake Manyara, learned how to identify individuals within a population and how to track radio-collared animals, and established contours to prevent soil erosion in the highlands around the SFS camp in Rhotia.
In the last two weeks we have explored the protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem: Lake Manyara National Park and its rich woodland vegetation, diversity of primates and plains game; Tarangire National Park and its high density of African Elephants roaming around the Baobab trees; and Manyara Ranch, a crucial area for the seasonal wildlife migrations between the two National Parks and Lake Natron. In these three protected areas, SFS students conducted animal counts and utilized these data to improve their quantitative skills in wildlife ecology. The regular counting of animal populations is a crucial part for the center’s 5 Year Research Plan—using results from the regular animal counts, we are evaluating the performance of different protection schemes and the overall performance of wildlife populations in the entire ecosystem. Integrating this exercise into the syllabus allows students to gain hands-on experience and contribute to wildlife conservation in the ecosystem.
[post_title] => Conducting Wildlife Research in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
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[post_date] => 2013-10-11 06:00:41
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[post_content] => The past week at the Moyo Hill Center in Tanzania was filled with exciting activities. Students stayed a full day in an Iraquw (the local ethnic group around the center) family. Playing with kids, cooking food over open fireplaces, exchanging ideas, and being involved in a plethora of other activities allowed the students to fully experience life in rural Tanzania. Just two days later, a visit to a Maasai homestead near Mto Wa Mbu provided an insight into the life and culture of the Maasai—a pastoral ethnicity that mainly inhabits the Rift Valley and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and who have a very different way of life than the Iraquw.
Probably the highlight of the past week was a visit to the Ngorongoro Crater. The Crater—actually the largest inactive and intact caldera on the terrestrial earth surface—is a wildlife paradise. Black rhinos are well protected in the caldera and frequently spotted (albeit often from a distance) and thousands of grazing animals (wildebeest, zebras, cape buffaloes, and gazelles) feed on the productive grasslands and swamps. High herbivore densities, in turn, support high densities of spotted hyenas and African lions. SFS students were happy to see multiple hyena and lion sightings even though the lions were mainly doing what they do for most of the day: sleeping in the grass.
In contrast to the lions in the Ngorongoro Crater, students are very active in the camp: busy working on assignments, enthusiastically organizing and participating in a very ambitious and fun volleyball tournament and warmly welcoming SFS President Dr. Cramer who is currently visiting our camp.
[post_title] => Tanzanian Culture, Lions & Volleyball
[post_excerpt] => The past week at the Moyo Hill Center in Tanzania was filled with exciting activities.
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[post_date] => 2013-11-18 08:26:40
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[post_content] => Directed Research is the academic highlight of the SFS semester program. In Tanzania, fieldwork started earlier this week. Students and faculty are currently collecting data on forest structure and rural livelihoods in the remote Endabash area, and assessing the distribution, density, demography, and behavior of African elephants, giraffes, wildebeest, impala and zebra. Studies are being conducted in Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Park, Manyara Ranch and the Mto wa Mbu game controlled area.
The pace of the program has notably changed—in the early morning everyone is hurrying up to get to the field sites as soon as possible, long hours are spent in the field, and in the evening data is digitalized as research proposals are being finalized.
Students are highly engaged in their individual projects and obviously enjoy the process of conducting research in East Africa. Clearly, conducting field research in northern Tanzania comes along with some hardships—long and steep walks to reach sample plots in the forest, long drives on bumpy roads until one finds wildlife species to be studied, monotonous counting of huge livestock herds, and of course: heat and dust. At the same time all the effort is rewarded when observing elephant calves playing in the mud, zebras grazing next to wildebeests, and talking to the friendly people who live in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem.
The different sub-projects address critical questions of the Center’s 5-Year Research Plan: How effective are the different protected areas in protecting wildlife species? How can we harmonize forest resource extraction and human livelihoods?
SFS students are actively involved in these big questions and one easily feels that students are engaged in meaningful projects that not only enhances their academic learning experience, but also constitute a valuable contribution to the environment and the human population in northern Tanzania.
[post_title] => Directed Research in Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Directed Research is the academic highlight of the SFS semester program. In Tanzania, fieldwork started earlier this week.
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[post_date] => 2014-03-12 05:00:55
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[post_content] => It’s been more than a month that students have arrived at the Tanzanian field station. The last several weeks were filled with lectures inside and outside the classroom, various exercises in the field, a full day spent in an Iraqwi homestead, and field trips to different protected areas.
Field trips brought us to baboon-packed and scenic Lake Manyara National Park, and elephant-loaded Tarangire National Park with its large baobab trees. We also visited rural areas adjacent to the national parks where humans utilise the same resources as wildlife species. In these rural areas, disease transmission between livestock and wildlife species, competition for resources (wildlife species damaging crops or carnivores killing livestock), and illegal and unsustainable hunting of wildlife are negatively affecting wildlife populations.
Today, we visited Ngorongoro Conservation Area and its world famous Ngorongoro Crater (actually world’s largest continuous caldera) with its enormous densities of grazing wildlife, associated carnivores (mainly spotted hyenas and lions), and well-protected black rhinoceros population. The Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority implements an interesting approach that tries to harmonize human utilization of the landscape and wildlife conservation. Clearly, such a multiple-use approach only works with clear laws and limits, capacity to enforce these rules, and a solid economic basis (principally funded by photographic tourism).
So far, this approach seems to work well and other areas in Northern Tanzania (such as Manyara Ranch located between Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks) employ similar approaches that aim at harmonizing human livelihoods and wildlife conservation. Clearly, co-existence of large mammals and humans remains difficult at times even in these well-managed areas, but overcoming the challenges will be worthwhile for both the environment and humans inhabiting these fascinating landscapes.
[post_title] => Human Livelihoods and Conservation
[post_excerpt] => Field trips brought us to baboon-packed and scenic Lake Manyara National Park, and elephant-loaded Tarangire National Park with its large baobab trees.
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[post_content] => The fall semester in Tanzania is running at a fast pace. Students have explored and experienced many facets of Northern Tanzania: the daily livelihoods of different rural communities, wildlife-packed Ngorongoro Crater, and different protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem. During a 5 day expedition, we explored Tarangire National Park and its surrounding buffer zones that are so vital for sustaining the migratory wildlife species (mainly wildebeest and zebra) in the ecosystem and at the same time provide opportunities for rural communities to benefit directly from wildlife conservation.
During the expedition, we completed the seasonal animal survey of the entire ecosystem. For four years, SFS students have been involved in the regular wildlife monitoring of four different protected areas (Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks, Manyara Ranch and Mto wa Mbu game controlled areas) – a truly unique monitoring scheme in terms of temporal and spatial scale. And all largely run by SFS students!
Students used data from this exercise to accomplish a small quantitative research project and are already preparing research proposals for the upcoming Directed Research (DR). This semester, DR will span from the Ngorongoro Conservation Area all the way to Burunge Wildlife Management Area and students will work on topics as diverse as range assessment, human-wildlife conflict, wildlife population dynamics, connectivity of protected areas, and ethnozoology.
Before this exciting research phase starts, we will explore the Serengeti during our second expedition and hopefully come back to our Center with great memories and pictures of exciting wildlife encounters.
[post_title] => Many Facets of Northern Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Students have explored and experienced many facets of Northern Tanzania: the daily livelihoods of different rural communities, wildlife-packed Ngorongoro Crater, and different protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem.
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[post_date] => 2015-04-14 07:27:50
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[post_content] => In the week before Easter, the "classroom" of the Wildlife Management Studies program was shifted to the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem. On our way to Serengeti we drove through the Ngorongoro Crater, the largest unbroken and un-flooded caldera in the world where thousands of animals live off the grass that grows on the nutritious volcanic soils. Besides huge herds of Cape buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles, a family herd of African elephants, spotted hyena clans and several lion prides, students observed several Black rhinoceroses that are well protected from poaching in this Garden of Eden of Tanzania.
On our way back, some students even witnessed a lion attack on Cape buffalo. However, this time the lions remained hungry as the buffaloes fought off the lions successfully. Then, the long-awaited rain finally set in. It had been unusually dry this March and the vegetation, animals, and humans were longing for this rain. The main highlight on our way to the campsite was observing a serval cat hunting for rodents in the high grass and shortly thereafter, some students even caught a glimpse of a caracal – another first-time sighting for SFS Tanzania!
During the next days in Serengeti, students conducted exercises on carnivore species, tourist behavior, and got to know the diverse bird life of Serengeti. Besides memorable observations of antelopes, elephants, giraffes and hippos, lions, cheetahs and spotted hyenas, students also observed a female leopard and its two tiny cubs on two consecutive days. This semester we were truly blessed with special sightings of large carnivores!
After a long journey through muddy Serengeti roads, we returned to our Moyo Hill campus, and are now focusing on exams and looking forward to the next adventure: Directed Research in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem!
[post_title] => Wild Cats in Serengeti
[post_excerpt] => The "classroom" of the Wildlife Management Studies program was the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem.
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[post_content] => Life has been very busy since Directed Research (DR) projects have started a few days ago. This semester, students and faculty are running a highly diverse set of research projects: some students are working on a human-elephant conflict project in villages nearby the center; others are studying baboon behavior along roads; others are conducting playback experiments to investigate how elephants and cattle interact; others are assessing the relative density and activity patterns of mammals that were "caught" in camera traps. One group is investigating how local people adapt to variable climatic conditions and how local residents perceive a recently initiated community-based conservation scheme.
One DR group spent the last week in the Yaeda Valley. This area is home to the Hadzabe, a hunter-and-gatherer society that still largely depends on natural resources. With the help of highly skilled Hadzabe and Wildlife Division guides, SFS students conducted the first wildlife count in this area. Walking through thick bush, up and down hill, and recording animal sightings and mammal signs was highly challenging but clearly an unforgettable experience. Days in the field start early and end late and are fulfilled with new experiences and unexpected encounters; the heavy rain in the last week added some additional challenges with cars being stuck in the mud for hours. In the evenings, the experiences of the day are being shared at dinner and one can literally sense the enthusiasm and passion for the research projects.
Yaeda Valley
In the next few days, we will start analyzing the data and write up the different research projects. Considering the dedication shown by each student, I’m sure that projects will progress very quickly and smoothly. It is particularly rewarding to see that our work is highly appreciated by the communities we work in and by our local stakeholders. Many projects directly touch on problems at the interface of wildlife conservation and human livelihoods, and our projects aim to provide solutions to some of these problems. This is what makes Directed Research so unique and valuable for students, faculty, and local communities and stakeholders.
→ Wildlife Management Studies Semester Program in Tanzania
[post_title] => Directed Research in Tanzania
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[post_content] => During the last week we shifted our classroom from the Moyo Hill Campus to the Ngorongoro caldera and the vast plains of the Serengeti. Within the Ngorongoro caldera we spotted and observed several black rhinoceros, prides of lions, elephant bulls, and thousands of wildebeests and zebras grazing next to Maasai livestock herds. As we continued our way to the Serengeti plains, it started raining. Yet, the timing of this semester’s expedition could not have been better as the rain attracted a major portion of the 1.3 million wildebeest and 200,000 zebras to the central part of Serengeti. From our tented base camp in the Seronera area, we explored the vast plains and woodlands of the Serengeti that were covered with huge ungulate herds. Moreover, we were lucky enough to spot cheetahs and leopards on several occasions. Each student completed spotting the Big Five (elephant, rhinoceros, Cape buffalo, lion and leopard) on the second day!
Photo by Christian KiffnerPhoto by Christian Kiffner
During the expedition, we observed stunning interactions between large carnivores and their prey. In particular, the lions were feasting on the migrating zebra and wildebeest and students in one car even observed a kill. During our exercises on predator-prey interactions, tourism preferences and birds, we experienced wilderness and wildlife encounters first hand, and upon returning to camp in the evenings, had lots of exciting observations to share.
Photo by Christian Kiffner
Having returned from our Serengeti classroom to our Moyo hill home, students are now eagerly preparing for the final exams before we start our directed research next week.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Wildebeests, Lions, and Exams
[post_excerpt] => Within the Ngorongoro caldera we spotted several black rhinoceros, prides of lions, elephant bulls, and thousands of wildebeests and zebras.
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[post_content] => After a short break from the Summer I program, the SFS Tanzania Summer II session started last week. With many returning Summer I students and new students from the US and Tanzania, we have a diverse and very enthusiastic group of students living at our field site in Rhotia. We already explored nearby Lake Manyara National Park and students did focal observations on giraffes. For example, we observed red-billed oxpeckers feeding on the ectoparasites of giraffes - one of the many fascinating mutualisms in East African animal communities.
In the morning of this exciting field trip, students completed the dry season animal count in the park. Students record numbers, habitat usage and behavior of all mammal species in four protected areas of the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem. This seasonal monitoring system is a very valuable source of data. Students use this dataset to train in quantitative data analysis and we also use this data for research and to compare how wildlife populations are doing in areas with variable conservation status. In another series of lectures and field trips to the shores of Lake Manyara, students learned how to identify and interpret signs of wildlife and explored participatory learning approaches in communities around our field site.
The current week will be filled with field trips to learn about soil conservation techniques, vegetation survey techniques, Maasai culture and two more animal surveys in Manyara Ranch and Tarangire National Park, thus offering insights and active participation in a diverse range of field research.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Out in the Field in Tanzania
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[post_content] => The highlight of the last weeks was our five-day expedition to Tarangire National Park and its surroundings. Exchanging the comfort of our Moyo Hill center for sleeping in tents and dining under the stars allowed us to discover and experience the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem in more detail. We explored wildlife-packed Tarangire National Park, observed hunting attempts by a cheetah and by a single lioness, studied elephant behavior, enjoyed the beauty of the stunning savannah landscape and completed this season’s animal count within the park. Now, at the end of the dry season, wildlife is highly concentrated around the few water sources inside the park, which makes wildlife observations particularly spectacular.
However, during the wet season, many wildlife species leave the park and migrate or disperse into adjacent human-inhabited areas. During the second half of the expedition, we explored these adjacent areas to see and experience how wildlife and humans co-exist. For example, we visited Manyara Ranch, a key stepping stone for the annual wildebeest and zebra migration, and counted livestock and wildlife species as part of our ecosystem-wide monitoring program. We were welcomed by the Burunge Wildlife Management Area - a community-based conservation scheme- and enjoyed a thorough explanation of how this inclusive conservation approach benefits both wildlife and local people. Finally, we walked through the Kwakuchinja wildlife corridor that connects Tarangire National Park and Manyara Ranch and interviewed local residents about their struggles and solutions to living in close proximity to large wildlife.
Having returned from the expedition with thousands of pictures, data on wildlife counts, and lots of experience and memories, student life at the center is back to “daily routine”; a full day home stay, lectures inside and outside the classroom, and computer labs to analyze animal count data.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Exploring the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
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Wild Cats in Serengeti
Posted: April 14, 2015
By: Christian Kiffner, Ph.D. - Lecturer in Techniques of Wildlife Management
Tanzania
In the week before Easter, the “classroom” of the Wildlife Management Studies program was shifted to the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem. On our way to Serengeti we drove through the Ngorongoro Crater, the largest unbroken and un-flooded caldera in the world where thousands of animals live off the grass that grows on the nutritious volcanic soils. Besides huge herds of Cape buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles, a family herd of African elephants, spotted hyena clans and several lion prides, students observed several Black rhinoceroses that are well protected from poaching in this Garden of Eden of Tanzania.
On our way back, some students even witnessed a lion attack on Cape buffalo. However, this time the lions remained hungry as the buffaloes fought off the lions successfully. Then, the long-awaited rain finally set in. It had been unusually dry this March and the vegetation, animals, and humans were longing for this rain. The main highlight on our way to the campsite was observing a serval cat hunting for rodents in the high grass and shortly thereafter, some students even caught a glimpse of a caracal – another first-time sighting for SFS Tanzania!
During the next days in Serengeti, students conducted exercises on carnivore species, tourist behavior, and got to know the diverse bird life of Serengeti. Besides memorable observations of antelopes, elephants, giraffes and hippos, lions, cheetahs and spotted hyenas, students also observed a female leopard and its two tiny cubs on two consecutive days. This semester we were truly blessed with special sightings of large carnivores!
After a long journey through muddy Serengeti roads, we returned to our Moyo Hill campus, and are now focusing on exams and looking forward to the next adventure: Directed Research in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem!
Although the majority of the grazing animals (following their annual movement routine) were located in the southern plains, the central part of the Serengeti did not fail to impress either. Even before leaving the campsite on the first morning, we observed a leopard feeding on a baboon while other baboons were mobbing the predator.
While studying and counting the diverse bird community and assessing the impact of tourist vehicles on animal behavior, we had numerous observations of small and large wildlife species ranging from chameleons and leopard tortoises crossing the roads to family herds of elephants enjoying the long, fresh grasses that flourished well after some substantial rains revived the landscape from the long drought lasting from November to February.
On our way back to the SFS Center, thousands of zebra and wildebeest as well as a sleepy lioness fringed the road in the southern plains. Our journey was halted at Oldupai Gorge where we had a short lecture on this archaeological site which includes the remains of several early hominids. After crossing the Ngorongoro Highlands – this time with clear views over the amazing landscape – we returned to Moyo Hill, where students are now eagerly studying for their final exams.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Serengeti Expedition
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[post_content] => How many elephants, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeest roam in Tarangire National Park? Which habitats are used by each species? How many mammalian wildlife species are found in this area?
To address these central questions students conducted a vehicle transect count in the northern part of this 2850 km2 (1,096 mi2) protected area. Driving more than 100 km of transects on rough roads, SFS students had counted and recorded numerous herds of elephants, zebras, wildebeest, waterbuck, impala, other antelope species and even encountered two lion prides along the transects.
After a relaxing lunch break at the pool of the Safari lodge with amazing views over a valley packed with wildebeest and zebra, we enjoyed a game drive along the Tarangire River with wonderful close up views of Elephant herds.
The following day, students entered the total of 270 animal sightings made by the five counting groups and started analyzing the data with respect to animal density, habitat use and species diversity using state-of-the-art statistical methods. The results of this exciting exercise will be presented in scientific posters illustrating the abundance and diversity of wildlife found in the Tarangire National Park.
[post_title] => Student Animal Counts Make Scientific Posters
[post_excerpt] => How many elephants, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeest roam in Tarangire National Park?
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[post_date] => 2012-05-02 08:48:46
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[post_content] => What are the consequences of climate change for local livelihoods in northern Tanzania? Which wildlife species are used by traditional healers? Which wildlife species compete most for scarce resources with the abundant livestock? How many elephants, wildebeest, zebra and other species are in this ecosystem? Which areas do wildlife species use for migrating between protected areas? Do different forms of protection affect behavior and demography of wildlife?
To address these and related issues, SFS students went out to the field, counted and observed animals, interviewed local stakeholders and compiled a wealth of data. Surely, the nine days of fieldwork were packed with memorable experiences: exploring largely unbeaten tracks in the wilderness, close encounters with elephants, conversations with local stakeholders which opened new perspectives and views, and great teamwork among students, drivers, guides and faculty. To the end, heavy rain made fieldwork more challenging and occasionally field crews had to work hard to get cars out off the mud. Despite all the positive, adventurous experiences, we also directly experienced the challenges of this ecosystem at first hand. In one study area, we recorded several elephant carcasses that had been poached recently. This range of experiences, however, enables students to put their research into perspective.
Currently, we are analyzing the data and will soon start writing up the reports. Much of our research has direct relevance to the conservation of wildlife in this amazing ecosystem and to the livelihood of its people. We are looking forward to present the results to all local stakeholders in the end of the semester.
[post_title] => Research in the Maasai Steppe
[post_excerpt] => What are the consequences of climate change for local livelihoods in northern Tanzania?
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[post_content] => Having returned from the Serengeti Expedition, students embarked on the proposals for their individual research projects: conducting background literature research at the Camp, coming up with meaningful research questions and designing an adequate study design and field protocols.
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Only a few days later, students were already out in the field and started collecting data that would help answering important questions in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem. Students conducted interviews in Maasai bomas to investigate impacts of climate change on local livelihoods, interviewed farmers bordering Lake Manyara National Park about human-wildlife conflicts, tracked wildebeest on foot in the Maasai steppe and carried out extensive wildlife surveys in Lake Manyara National Park, the community area and a ranch where livestock and wildlife are managed to co-exist.
Within just 8 to 9 days out in the field, students managed to collect a considerable amount of data and gained a thorough understanding of wildlife and human livelihoods in the ecosystem. Some projects even continued previous Directed Research projects so that we now have data on wildlife populations over all seasons (short rains, long rains, dry season).
The past week was dedicated to data organization and analysis, or in other words – to provide substantial evidence for the patterns observed in the field. After a first small confusion about the meanings of F-, p-, and t-values, degrees of freedom, and logarithms, students have become very knowledgeable in statistical analysis of their data and are already writing up their papers now.
Completing the entire research circle – planning, data sampling, analysis, and write-up – in less than 4 weeks is very challenging but extremely rewarding and we look forward to presenting the results to local stakeholders at the end of this semester. As we are addressing many important questions, recommendations derived from SFS research may help to make a difference in the conservation of the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem.
[post_title] => Conducting Research and Making a Difference in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
[post_excerpt] => Having returned from the Serengeti Expedition, students embarked on the proposals for their individual research projects.
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[post_content] => It is now about half-time in the SFS program, but instead of having a break, students are now really getting into the issues and challenges of conserving wildlife in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem. The week started off with an inspiring guest lecture given by Tom Morrison. Using data from his Ph.D. work, Tom presented a comprehensive overview on the wildebeest migration and illustrated how photographic capture-mark recapture methods can be used for applied wildlife conservation projects.
Wildebeest utilize Tarangire and Manyara National Park during the dry season and leave the parks during the wet season to give birth in the nutrient rich plains near Lake Natron (about 130km north of Tarangire) or in the Simanjiro plains to the east of Tarangire. These wet season ranges largely lack formal protection status and hence, wildebeest face serious threats during a critical time of the year.
Earlier this semester, SFS students conducted a wildlife survey in Manyara Ranch and met a part of the wildebeest migration (see picture). While wildebeest are protected in the ranch, other areas along the migration route are severely encroached by human settlements and agricultural expansions. Planned road constructions may accelerate these human developments and illegal hunting is widespread. The task that SFS staff, students, and other researchers in the ecosystem are now tackling collaboratively is to identify bottlenecks along the migratory route, so that these critical areas can be effectively protected.
Another recent highlight of the SFS program was a visit to the Hadzabe near Lake Eyasi. The Hadzabe live in small groups of 10-30 people and still maintain a hunter-and-gatherer lifestyle: the men hunt baboons and antelopes with bows and arrows and the women collect tubers, fruits, and seeds for their subsistence. This visit provided a rare insight into a culture that is so different from our modern “society,” and yielded an interesting perspective on how humans can live in and with nature.
[post_title] => Challenges of Conserving Migratory Wildlife Species
[post_excerpt] => Earlier this semester, SFS students conducted a wildlife survey in Manyara Ranch and met a part of the wildebeest migration.
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[post_content] => Just after final exams and Easter, the second SFS Tanzania expedition set off to Serengeti. In the short grass plains of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and southern Serengeti, the SFS convoy came across one of the most impressive sights in East Africa — the big migration. Thousands and thousands of wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles were grazing in the nutrient-rich and green plains. Spotted hyenas and jackals roamed around the plains in search of carcasses and once inside Serengeti National Park, we were greeted by Cheetahs.
Yet, upon setting up the camp, we were welcomed by another constant fellow of this expedition: heavy rains. Three days of heavy rains made driving in the Serengeti a real challenge but the entire expedition crew accepted this challenge and was reimbursed by impressive wildlife sightings: lions stalking gazelles, lions feeding on zebras, leopards with cubs climbing in trees, and many more unique wildlife observations. Three very informative lectures gave unique insights into the wild dog re-introduction program, the challenges of managing Tanzanaia’s second largest national park, and into the interplay between fire, herbivory and vegetation dynamics.
After this fulfilling expedition students and staff are now ready to start off with another exciting highlight of the SFS program: Directed Research.
[post_title] => Lions, Leopards, Cheetahs, and Rain
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[post_content] => Summer session II in Tanzania is in full swing. So far, students have conducted vegetation assessments, assessed tracks and signs of wildlife around Lake Manyara, learned how to identify individuals within a population and how to track radio-collared animals, and established contours to prevent soil erosion in the highlands around the SFS camp in Rhotia.
In the last two weeks we have explored the protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem: Lake Manyara National Park and its rich woodland vegetation, diversity of primates and plains game; Tarangire National Park and its high density of African Elephants roaming around the Baobab trees; and Manyara Ranch, a crucial area for the seasonal wildlife migrations between the two National Parks and Lake Natron. In these three protected areas, SFS students conducted animal counts and utilized these data to improve their quantitative skills in wildlife ecology. The regular counting of animal populations is a crucial part for the center’s 5 Year Research Plan—using results from the regular animal counts, we are evaluating the performance of different protection schemes and the overall performance of wildlife populations in the entire ecosystem. Integrating this exercise into the syllabus allows students to gain hands-on experience and contribute to wildlife conservation in the ecosystem.
[post_title] => Conducting Wildlife Research in the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
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[post_content] => The past week at the Moyo Hill Center in Tanzania was filled with exciting activities. Students stayed a full day in an Iraquw (the local ethnic group around the center) family. Playing with kids, cooking food over open fireplaces, exchanging ideas, and being involved in a plethora of other activities allowed the students to fully experience life in rural Tanzania. Just two days later, a visit to a Maasai homestead near Mto Wa Mbu provided an insight into the life and culture of the Maasai—a pastoral ethnicity that mainly inhabits the Rift Valley and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and who have a very different way of life than the Iraquw.
Probably the highlight of the past week was a visit to the Ngorongoro Crater. The Crater—actually the largest inactive and intact caldera on the terrestrial earth surface—is a wildlife paradise. Black rhinos are well protected in the caldera and frequently spotted (albeit often from a distance) and thousands of grazing animals (wildebeest, zebras, cape buffaloes, and gazelles) feed on the productive grasslands and swamps. High herbivore densities, in turn, support high densities of spotted hyenas and African lions. SFS students were happy to see multiple hyena and lion sightings even though the lions were mainly doing what they do for most of the day: sleeping in the grass.
In contrast to the lions in the Ngorongoro Crater, students are very active in the camp: busy working on assignments, enthusiastically organizing and participating in a very ambitious and fun volleyball tournament and warmly welcoming SFS President Dr. Cramer who is currently visiting our camp.
[post_title] => Tanzanian Culture, Lions & Volleyball
[post_excerpt] => The past week at the Moyo Hill Center in Tanzania was filled with exciting activities.
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[post_content] => Directed Research is the academic highlight of the SFS semester program. In Tanzania, fieldwork started earlier this week. Students and faculty are currently collecting data on forest structure and rural livelihoods in the remote Endabash area, and assessing the distribution, density, demography, and behavior of African elephants, giraffes, wildebeest, impala and zebra. Studies are being conducted in Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Park, Manyara Ranch and the Mto wa Mbu game controlled area.
The pace of the program has notably changed—in the early morning everyone is hurrying up to get to the field sites as soon as possible, long hours are spent in the field, and in the evening data is digitalized as research proposals are being finalized.
Students are highly engaged in their individual projects and obviously enjoy the process of conducting research in East Africa. Clearly, conducting field research in northern Tanzania comes along with some hardships—long and steep walks to reach sample plots in the forest, long drives on bumpy roads until one finds wildlife species to be studied, monotonous counting of huge livestock herds, and of course: heat and dust. At the same time all the effort is rewarded when observing elephant calves playing in the mud, zebras grazing next to wildebeests, and talking to the friendly people who live in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem.
The different sub-projects address critical questions of the Center’s 5-Year Research Plan: How effective are the different protected areas in protecting wildlife species? How can we harmonize forest resource extraction and human livelihoods?
SFS students are actively involved in these big questions and one easily feels that students are engaged in meaningful projects that not only enhances their academic learning experience, but also constitute a valuable contribution to the environment and the human population in northern Tanzania.
[post_title] => Directed Research in Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Directed Research is the academic highlight of the SFS semester program. In Tanzania, fieldwork started earlier this week.
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[post_content] => It’s been more than a month that students have arrived at the Tanzanian field station. The last several weeks were filled with lectures inside and outside the classroom, various exercises in the field, a full day spent in an Iraqwi homestead, and field trips to different protected areas.
Field trips brought us to baboon-packed and scenic Lake Manyara National Park, and elephant-loaded Tarangire National Park with its large baobab trees. We also visited rural areas adjacent to the national parks where humans utilise the same resources as wildlife species. In these rural areas, disease transmission between livestock and wildlife species, competition for resources (wildlife species damaging crops or carnivores killing livestock), and illegal and unsustainable hunting of wildlife are negatively affecting wildlife populations.
Today, we visited Ngorongoro Conservation Area and its world famous Ngorongoro Crater (actually world’s largest continuous caldera) with its enormous densities of grazing wildlife, associated carnivores (mainly spotted hyenas and lions), and well-protected black rhinoceros population. The Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority implements an interesting approach that tries to harmonize human utilization of the landscape and wildlife conservation. Clearly, such a multiple-use approach only works with clear laws and limits, capacity to enforce these rules, and a solid economic basis (principally funded by photographic tourism).
So far, this approach seems to work well and other areas in Northern Tanzania (such as Manyara Ranch located between Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks) employ similar approaches that aim at harmonizing human livelihoods and wildlife conservation. Clearly, co-existence of large mammals and humans remains difficult at times even in these well-managed areas, but overcoming the challenges will be worthwhile for both the environment and humans inhabiting these fascinating landscapes.
[post_title] => Human Livelihoods and Conservation
[post_excerpt] => Field trips brought us to baboon-packed and scenic Lake Manyara National Park, and elephant-loaded Tarangire National Park with its large baobab trees.
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[post_content] => The fall semester in Tanzania is running at a fast pace. Students have explored and experienced many facets of Northern Tanzania: the daily livelihoods of different rural communities, wildlife-packed Ngorongoro Crater, and different protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem. During a 5 day expedition, we explored Tarangire National Park and its surrounding buffer zones that are so vital for sustaining the migratory wildlife species (mainly wildebeest and zebra) in the ecosystem and at the same time provide opportunities for rural communities to benefit directly from wildlife conservation.
During the expedition, we completed the seasonal animal survey of the entire ecosystem. For four years, SFS students have been involved in the regular wildlife monitoring of four different protected areas (Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks, Manyara Ranch and Mto wa Mbu game controlled areas) – a truly unique monitoring scheme in terms of temporal and spatial scale. And all largely run by SFS students!
Students used data from this exercise to accomplish a small quantitative research project and are already preparing research proposals for the upcoming Directed Research (DR). This semester, DR will span from the Ngorongoro Conservation Area all the way to Burunge Wildlife Management Area and students will work on topics as diverse as range assessment, human-wildlife conflict, wildlife population dynamics, connectivity of protected areas, and ethnozoology.
Before this exciting research phase starts, we will explore the Serengeti during our second expedition and hopefully come back to our Center with great memories and pictures of exciting wildlife encounters.
[post_title] => Many Facets of Northern Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Students have explored and experienced many facets of Northern Tanzania: the daily livelihoods of different rural communities, wildlife-packed Ngorongoro Crater, and different protected areas in the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem.
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[post_content] => In the week before Easter, the "classroom" of the Wildlife Management Studies program was shifted to the Serengeti-Ngorongoro ecosystem. On our way to Serengeti we drove through the Ngorongoro Crater, the largest unbroken and un-flooded caldera in the world where thousands of animals live off the grass that grows on the nutritious volcanic soils. Besides huge herds of Cape buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles, a family herd of African elephants, spotted hyena clans and several lion prides, students observed several Black rhinoceroses that are well protected from poaching in this Garden of Eden of Tanzania.
On our way back, some students even witnessed a lion attack on Cape buffalo. However, this time the lions remained hungry as the buffaloes fought off the lions successfully. Then, the long-awaited rain finally set in. It had been unusually dry this March and the vegetation, animals, and humans were longing for this rain. The main highlight on our way to the campsite was observing a serval cat hunting for rodents in the high grass and shortly thereafter, some students even caught a glimpse of a caracal – another first-time sighting for SFS Tanzania!
Yaeda Valley
In the next few days, we will start analyzing the data and write up the different research projects. Considering the dedication shown by each student, I’m sure that projects will progress very quickly and smoothly. It is particularly rewarding to see that our work is highly appreciated by the communities we work in and by our local stakeholders. Many projects directly touch on problems at the interface of wildlife conservation and human livelihoods, and our projects aim to provide solutions to some of these problems. This is what makes Directed Research so unique and valuable for students, faculty, and local communities and stakeholders.
→ Wildlife Management Studies Semester Program in Tanzania
[post_title] => Directed Research in Tanzania
[post_excerpt] => Days in the field start early and end late and are fulfilled with new experiences and unexpected encounters.
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[post_content] => During the last week we shifted our classroom from the Moyo Hill Campus to the Ngorongoro caldera and the vast plains of the Serengeti. Within the Ngorongoro caldera we spotted and observed several black rhinoceros, prides of lions, elephant bulls, and thousands of wildebeests and zebras grazing next to Maasai livestock herds. As we continued our way to the Serengeti plains, it started raining. Yet, the timing of this semester’s expedition could not have been better as the rain attracted a major portion of the 1.3 million wildebeest and 200,000 zebras to the central part of Serengeti. From our tented base camp in the Seronera area, we explored the vast plains and woodlands of the Serengeti that were covered with huge ungulate herds. Moreover, we were lucky enough to spot cheetahs and leopards on several occasions. Each student completed spotting the Big Five (elephant, rhinoceros, Cape buffalo, lion and leopard) on the second day!
Photo by Christian Kiffner
Photo by Christian Kiffner
During the expedition, we observed stunning interactions between large carnivores and their prey. In particular, the lions were feasting on the migrating zebra and wildebeest and students in one car even observed a kill. During our exercises on predator-prey interactions, tourism preferences and birds, we experienced wilderness and wildlife encounters first hand, and upon returning to camp in the evenings, had lots of exciting observations to share.
Photo by Christian Kiffner
Having returned from our Serengeti classroom to our Moyo hill home, students are now eagerly preparing for the final exams before we start our directed research next week.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Wildebeests, Lions, and Exams
[post_excerpt] => Within the Ngorongoro caldera we spotted several black rhinoceros, prides of lions, elephant bulls, and thousands of wildebeests and zebras.
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[post_content] => After a short break from the Summer I program, the SFS Tanzania Summer II session started last week. With many returning Summer I students and new students from the US and Tanzania, we have a diverse and very enthusiastic group of students living at our field site in Rhotia. We already explored nearby Lake Manyara National Park and students did focal observations on giraffes. For example, we observed red-billed oxpeckers feeding on the ectoparasites of giraffes - one of the many fascinating mutualisms in East African animal communities.
In the morning of this exciting field trip, students completed the dry season animal count in the park. Students record numbers, habitat usage and behavior of all mammal species in four protected areas of the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem. This seasonal monitoring system is a very valuable source of data. Students use this dataset to train in quantitative data analysis and we also use this data for research and to compare how wildlife populations are doing in areas with variable conservation status. In another series of lectures and field trips to the shores of Lake Manyara, students learned how to identify and interpret signs of wildlife and explored participatory learning approaches in communities around our field site.
The current week will be filled with field trips to learn about soil conservation techniques, vegetation survey techniques, Maasai culture and two more animal surveys in Manyara Ranch and Tarangire National Park, thus offering insights and active participation in a diverse range of field research.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Out in the Field in Tanzania
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[post_content] => The highlight of the last weeks was our five-day expedition to Tarangire National Park and its surroundings. Exchanging the comfort of our Moyo Hill center for sleeping in tents and dining under the stars allowed us to discover and experience the Tarangire-Manyara ecosystem in more detail. We explored wildlife-packed Tarangire National Park, observed hunting attempts by a cheetah and by a single lioness, studied elephant behavior, enjoyed the beauty of the stunning savannah landscape and completed this season’s animal count within the park. Now, at the end of the dry season, wildlife is highly concentrated around the few water sources inside the park, which makes wildlife observations particularly spectacular.
However, during the wet season, many wildlife species leave the park and migrate or disperse into adjacent human-inhabited areas. During the second half of the expedition, we explored these adjacent areas to see and experience how wildlife and humans co-exist. For example, we visited Manyara Ranch, a key stepping stone for the annual wildebeest and zebra migration, and counted livestock and wildlife species as part of our ecosystem-wide monitoring program. We were welcomed by the Burunge Wildlife Management Area - a community-based conservation scheme- and enjoyed a thorough explanation of how this inclusive conservation approach benefits both wildlife and local people. Finally, we walked through the Kwakuchinja wildlife corridor that connects Tarangire National Park and Manyara Ranch and interviewed local residents about their struggles and solutions to living in close proximity to large wildlife.
Having returned from the expedition with thousands of pictures, data on wildlife counts, and lots of experience and memories, student life at the center is back to “daily routine”; a full day home stay, lectures inside and outside the classroom, and computer labs to analyze animal count data.
→ Wildlife Management Studies in Tanzania
[post_title] => Exploring the Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem
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[post_date] => 2017-04-10 09:19:02
[post_date_gmt] => 2017-04-10 09:19:02
[post_content] => Starting early in the morning, we made our way through the clouds and the Afromontane forest and arrived at the rim of the Ngorongoro Caldera. After taking some pictures of the breathtaking views over this large and complete caldera, we descended with our Landcruisers via a steep road and explored the vast grasslands of the Ngorongoro. We were fortunate as we all spotted at least one of the well-protected black rhinoceros – a species that was once widely distributed but has been decimated in many parts of Africa because of illegal hunting to satisfy the demand for its horn. It's difficult to comprehend that the deep-rooted but illogical belief in the curing powers associated with its horn still threatens this majestic species, of which there are only 5000 individuals left in the world.
We were amazed by the sightings of lions feeding on a wildebeest kill, a rare elephant bull whose tusks almost reached the ground, and numerous herbivores in the grasslands of the Ngorongoro Caldera. Additionally the Serengeti welcomed us with an incredible sight: a large fraction of the 1.3 million wildebeest and numerous zebras and gazelles were in the nutrient-rich short grass plains of the southern Serengeti and it was a delight driving past them as we made our way to our campsite in the central part of the Serengeti.
