Camera Trap Set Up

As I mentioned before, Erica, another Master’s student from the States (Antioch University), is doing a study with camera traps. She’s testing different baits to lure cheetahs in. Usually, live goats are used as bait to lure cheetahs to trap stations (to be radio collared). The problem with live goats is that they attract other various animals more often than they attract cheetahs. Everything from baboons, jackals, hyenas, and even a village child have been trapped by ACK in their live traps when using goats as bait. Though I can’t really say with confidence that the village child was lured because of the goat, I think this was more a case of curiosity and humiliation (upon waiting to be released with his family surrounding the locked cage…).

In order to prevent these sorts of captures Erica is looking to find a bait that is more specifically catered to cheetahs. She has 6 different bait types (1 includes the live goat). The others are a predator decoy, robogoat (yes this is EXACTLY what you think it is… well, mostly), two different specially formulated scents that in zoo studies with cheetahs was shown to be a great attractant (they spent a lot of time rolling in the perfume, and let me say they have very expensive taste in perfume), and finally used cheetah bedding provided by a wild animal orphanage in Nairobi.

Setting up these cameras, if you do recall, is when I stabbed myself in the hand with a thorn and later sawed into my finger. That’s right Erica, I GAVE MY SWEAT AND BLOOD FOR YOUR PROJECT! : ) Anyways, here is Deanna being a bit more successful at keeping her hand intact while panga-ing some branches off these stupid, stupid trees.

The area of her bait station needs to be cleared so that nothing interferes with the camera’s angles when something walks into view. Thus, us girls took to removing a bush in the middle of a bait site.

After areas were cleared, 4 cameras were installed at each bait station.

Then it was time to transport the baits! One truck, three cages, one live goat, and one robo-goat gave us a bit of a load to trek across the bush but we managed to make a pretty sweet Jenga puzzle of it.

Making it secure as possible...

Erica is counting any animal that wonders into her bait station within 6 feet of the bait as “trapped” by a traditional live trap that would normally be placed adjacent to the bait.

Measuring out 6 feet from the bait station.

It was a long day of putting out all these bait stations, but it was good fun!

Bait one... predator decoy.

 

Meet DUMA GOAT! He’s our first live goat (we have three on weekly rotations because it tends to stress them out and give them PTSD if they are out there alone too long). This guy is a bit of a bad ass. He didn’t even care that he was being left out there all alone. As long as he had food and some of his favorite branches he was SET. We surround the cage with VERY thorny acacia branches to keep leopards and hyenas from getting to the goat. He’s in a cage but they have been known to rip legs and various body parts off the goat through the cage. As Duma Goat learned all too well his first night alone in the bush… he had a chunk of his ear bit off by a hyena. Two hyenas spent a great deal of time removing the thorny branches at an attempt to get to Duma. Luckily, he survived and we increased the amount of branches around Duma and from then on the hyenas could only gaze longingly. Duma was unphased.

Duma before he lost part of his ear... :)

Another bait is ROBO-Goat. He is a robotic goat, made from those weird animatronic Christmas reindeer that your crazy neighbor puts out in his yard with about a thousand of those creepy blow up decorations that decrepitly deflate during the daylight hours… seriously, what the shit. ANYWAYS, so take the reindeer, cover it in goat skin/fur, hook it up to an ipod with speakers that play a shuffle of different goat sounds and BOOM you’ve got a robotic goat. Even Duma seemed fooled for a moment…

Duma checking out Robo...

Behold... Robo-Goat!!!

After setting up all the caged bait stations the rest were a breeze. Two of them Erica just sprayed some fancy perfumes… mmm (not really…).

Spraying the exclusive scent de duma.

The last station, cheetah bedding, was set up in the dark (it gets dark here around 6:30-7).  Since we didn’t plan on being out after dark no one had a flashlight and we had to depend on strategically placed truck headlights to aid us in the preparation.

Attempting to set up the last station in the DARK!

Then the traps were set! So far she’s seen lots of hyenas (especially around Duma goat), a giraffe meandering through, ostrich, jackals, eland and gerenuk close ups of them sniffing the camera (hilarious) and an equally hilarious photo montage of a herder walking through with his cows all mystified by the predator decoy. She has a nice close up of his face as he stares, confused into the camera. Hopefully I can share some of those photos with you!

For more accurate information on her project visit her fund raising website and feel free to donate! But also save some for me as I will be launching one as soon as I collect enough poop to transport to the Smithsonian! ;)

http://www.petridish.org/projects/here-kitty-kitty-luring-cheetahs-for-conservation-research
 

ZOMG!

You guys... as I posted yesterday, things have not been going well in my search for fresh poops. Not only were we not finding fresh poops, I was beginning to doubt my abilities in the field. I've done little tidbits of field work here and there in various classes throughout college. I know how to use a compass, find a point on GPS (unless we are geocaching with a particular German), even classify a few Wisconsin type trees/plants/animal tracks. That being said I am no Bear Grylls (don't even hate). I have spent the past year and a half pipetting to my heart's content in laboratories. I love it (most days). Lab benches, new box of pipette tips, colorful lab tape, and best of all... perfect CV and control values. Ahh... the confined chaos of the lab. But now I find myself thrown to the hyenas in the world of the Kenyan bush. It all began when the real field work started... looking for poop and helping Erica set up camera traps for her project (more on this later). Beginning of the day we are using pangas (large machete type things) to whack branches from the tree so they don't block the camera's view of the bait stations. FIRST BRANCH: Mind you before I begin this story... these trees have HUGE thorns all over them (instead of leaves), like over 2 inches long sized thorns. So I'm about to go all Xena on this branch, flailing about with my panga. I forget to take into account that this is indeed a tree and there are other branches... when I bring my hand up to get some momentum a giant thorn goes into the back of my hand, right about where the wrist begins. At first it was not a big deal, I only felt a prick of pain and saw some blood. As time passed my hand began to throb and I found myself no longer able to move my fingers. These thorns have some nasty toxin on them that causes some crazy swelling and reactions in people. So I spent the rest of the day only using my right hand, taking an anti-histamine, and icing my hand.

By the next day the swelling had gone down enough that I could grasp things but not straighten out my fingers. Meh, good enough. So we continued setting up camera stations... all the way til dark. The last station we put up in the dark using the headlights of the truck. There are probably some hyenas around, maybe a leopard... let's do this shit and get the heck out of here. Ahh more branches to be cut down. Great. Damn you panga, you betrayed me. This time I shall choose the handsaw! One branch down... Yes! Second branch. It's really dark. What was that sound? I'm not sure... Everyone is still here right? Ouch. The saw slipped from the branch and landed on my index finger of my left hand (yes the same one I paralyzed the previous day). It took my brain about 5 seconds to realize what was happening so for those 5 seconds I had started sawing away some of my flesh. Yay. Again, it didn't really hurt or bleed right away. But then... it was dripping everywhere. With that I was given the ever important job of holding the flashlight near the car when people needed to get supplies. I can handle dangerous lab equipment, radioactive and mutagenic chemicals, and broken glass containers but give me sharp tools and toxic plants and all hell breaks loose.

BUT TODAY I WAS JUSTIFIED.

Today, my friends, marks a glorious day in history. Well at least in my history, and the history of this blog. Congratulations. WE HAVE FOUND OUR FIRST FRESH CHEETAH POOP SAMPLE. Tho having found it without Nelson (the poo guru) or Ginger (sniffer dog champion of wanting treats) I suppose I should be careful... but I'm PRETTY positive that it's cheetah. YAYAYAY! Some AWESOME FANTASTIC AND AMAZING herders walking around one of the ranches called and said they had a fresh one! We made it over there (of course I had forgotten to bring the cooler, which had been temporarily converted to the lunch storage unit) and found 4 dry poops and 1 FRESH! These cheetahs love to poop on this road... I couldn't believe how close together they all were considering we had driven down that road 2 days ago and didn't see ANYTHING. Crazy, these herders know their shit. Literally. And for that... they are priceless.

Because it was so awesome here is a play by play... just so you can feel the excitement from home, AS IF YOU WERE ACTUALLY THERE. You're welcome.

P.S. Sorry some of the pictures are weird/distorted/unclear... my internet is super crappy right now and this is the best I can do. When I can I will reload them for clearer ones!

Checking out the freshness of the scat by mushing it with a stick... could it be? Is it too good to be true?

Writing down all the important information like the GPS point!

My first fresh cheetah poop!

Poop collection in action!

Into the poop bag with you...

Success!

What the hell am I doing here?

The ACK team of students! Erica and I on the car and Mandela and Nelson standing below.

 

WARNING: Sciencey, too long and probably boring. Only read if you are THAT bored. Or if you want to learn more about cheetah poops.

Recently I’ve realized that here I am going on and on about running amok in the Kenyan bush without ever really explaining what the hell I’m doing here. Most of you have come to the conclusion that I am chasing cheetahs around with a plastic bag just waiting for them to take a dump (if only it were that easy…). This conclusion is partially accurate. I am chasing any hint of cheetah signs or sightings that are reported and I do have plastic bags in tow. That being said here is WHY I’m doing this and what exactly is making this a little more difficult than expected (le poos).

As most of you know I am about to start graduate school at North Carolina State University in pursuit of a Master’s degree in Animal Science with a focus in Physiology (that’s a mouthful, apologies). My plan is to work with Action for Cheetahs in Kenya (here in Kenya, obvi) looking for poops and then to take said poops back to the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute to do all my lab work. Sounds pretty good right? Right. But I still haven’t said WHY. Why the hell am I picking up all the poops with a stick and dissecting and sniffing them to help determine whether they belong to the elusive “duma” (cheetah in Kiswahili)? As I said before the area I am studying is comprised of large ranches with moving livestock (domestic… goats, sheep, cattle) herds. The land is also host to a variety of wildlife species taking advantage of the undeveloped land. However, a few of these large ranches have decided to become subdivided. What does this mean? They are being divided up into plots for individual families (subsistence farming instead of commercial ranching) to create households and gardens/crop fields. My study is looking at whether the cheetahs inhabiting these newly developed landscapes are becoming more stressed. Why is stress a concern? Chronic stress has been shown in many species to cause infertility and immuno-suppression making them more susceptible to diseases. The cheetahs in this area face local extinction with the rate the land is being developed. There are plans to establish a new city in these gorgeous plains by 2030. The idea behind this project is that while we are probably too late to help these cheetahs from being extirpated from their current habitat, we can use the information to help educate and influence other urban development plans so they may be more suitable for continued cheetah existence.

Why the poop? Stress hormones, also called glucocorticoids (if you want to get sciencey) are steroids that can be measured in blood, urine, and feces. Because fecal material is the least invasive method (besides urine, but in the wild that’s virtually impossible to find) I am collecting cheetah scats from across these study sites to extract and measure the stress hormones. Then I will compare the various stress levels with the location and proximity of the sample to high human settlement density.

The PROBLEM: Because steroids breakdown in UV light (aka THE SUN) I need FRESH poops. They don’t have to be steaming but they need to be moist and plentiful (about a golf ball size) and not too hairy (makes the extraction of the hormones difficult). Kind of demanding right? So far we’ve found about 30 cheetah poops but they have all been dry and hairy. This is perfect for the other half of Team Duma Poops, Nelson Owange. He’s a Master’s student at the University of Nairobi and is looking at prey base. He wants to know what the cheetahs are eating so he is analyzing the hairs found in cheetah scats. Yeah we’re weird. We know.

Nelson and I collecting some dry cheetah poops we found on a rock!

Hopefully with all the GPS points we have from the dry scats, if we keep checking those places we’ll start finding fresh ones (cheetahs, especially males, often poop and mark in the same places to mark territories).

Wow… that was boring and probably totally inaccurate. : ) Just for your patience here is a picture of two male ostriches we came across yesterday who were having what seemed to be a dance off in front of the lady ostriches.

Another giraffe photo for my mother...

A nice sunset from the tree house at camp to finish off a long day of searching for poops.

Training Day

The collection has finally begun! Staff training has commenced and cheetah poop here we come, full force!


Nelson (student from University of Nairobi) and I had a staff training day where we taught the cheetah scouts what we were looking for and how to collect different types of samples. 


It started off slow, it's hard to train people on how to collect cheetah fecals when you can't find any... But then FINALLY... POOP! And man did we hit the dried, hairy cheetah poop jackpot. FIVE POOPS on ONE ROCK! Unfortunately, for my project I can only use fresh scats but for Nelson's project, these were PERFECTION. And with that, scouts... prepare to be trained! 

Training the cheetah scouts (Thanks to Reinier for the photo)!

Cheetah scouts collecting their first samples... YAY!

Jimmy (left) and Nelson (right) going over the fecal forms.

We spent the day out in the bush, continuing to search for poops, only found one more but at least it was a good start! It was great to meet all the cheetah scouts. Each one is assigned to a certain ranch area. They look for poop and field calls from herders on recent cheetah sightings or fecal findings. They collect the poop and then eventually it gets back to Nelson and I. This way we have a little more man power than just the two of us covering thousands of acres!

Poops! and some bone shards... mmm.

We saw a ton of wildlife on our poop search (even a jackal and hyena, tho they were too quick to get a photo of sorry). Lots of zebra, ostrich, and various ungulates. My favorite had to be the herd of giraffes we scared. They took off running up the hillside. SO MANY GIRAFFES. insanity. And for those wanting to see animal pics, I was planning on doing a blog entry specifically about wildlife AND BUGS I've seen, so BE PATIENT DAMMIT. But in the mean time... here's a giraffe from that day :)

Oh yeah, and then Cosmas took home a puppy :) 

Jet and I :) He's so freaking adorable.

Bottling

We spent an afternoon bottling this past week. What's bottling, you ask? Well let me tell you all aboot it. Many of the ranches, government, what have yous, put up giant fences to keep squatters (herders and their animals) out or prevent poachers from getting all the game. However, a lot of the animals are fairly dense and tend to run directly into the fence thus ending in serious injury or even death (not good for conservation). To help the animals see the fence we tie plastic bottles to the fence. They move and rattle in the wind informing the animals to abort their kamikaze mission. Also it gives all those used plastic bottles a purpose here, other than filling landfills (aka random ditches and pits). Many of the farmers have also noticed and started tying up bottles or even cloth on their smaller fences as well (AWESOME).

While we were tying bottles we found a place where a zebra had tried to get through. There was a giant dent in the fence. How did we know it was a zebra? It had left some hair behind...

After we ran out of bottles we did a fence line drive checking the area. On our drive we found a snare. Poachers had rigged some wire in a loop trying to snag some wild game running along the fence. We took down the snare and stole the wire :) Win for conservation. Unfortunately, there are probably many more out there... but it's a start!

But to end with a positive here's Ginger enjoying the ride home :)

Looking for Cheetah Signs

Yesterday we went out on some ranchlands that are a part of our study area with a cheetah scout to search for any signs of cheetahs. Erica is another Master's student from the U.S. and she is doing a project with camera traps. We are trying to figure out the best place to place her camera traps to ensure some cheetah action!

Looking for tracks in the mud.

Erica is using different types of lures to get cheetahs to come to the camera traps. The most interesting being a cologne that previous zoo studies have shown to be a favorite of cheetahs (they have expensive taste). She's testing a variety of different lures to attract cheetahs. I'm hoping they ALL work so we have a lot of pooping cheetahs around. Finding scat is going to be very difficult, especially for those who are searching without a dog!

We searched a bunch of different places yesterday without any sign of cheetahs. I was beginning to get discouraged. How the hell am I supposed to find cheetah shit in this HUGE area!?!?! Not to mention we got the run down on what to do when you come across a charging water buffalo. Awesome. In case you are wondering the best solution is to climb a sturdy tree, fast. If there are no trees lay as flat as possible on the ground (they have shitty eyesight) and hope like hell that they don't trample you to death. A few broken ribs > death by being gored. Yay. So we were walking around and I was going between being paranoid of baboons, to looking for cheetah poop, thinking I hear buffalo in the bushes, and searching for the best climbing tree. It was exhausting.

While searching I also came across this huge chunk of millipede. Kind of awesome, but terrifying to think of what it looked like when it was alive.

Finally at the last place we stopped on one of the ranches we found a plethora of different species tracks.

Serval print in the upper right (sorry I had nothing to scale it with).

Genet cat. So tiny and adorable!

After numerous small felid species, dog, and many many cow tracks we found...

A cheetah track!

All hope was not lost! Hooray! I have to get better at identifying tracks... it's really hard in such thick mud. It was great to end on a positive note. After that we went back to camp and massive thunderstorms rolled in as I attempted to do laundry in the rain. I gave up and retired inside the kitchen to a cup of Cosmas' kick ass chai. All in all, not a bad day :)

Camp Salama

Welcome to Camp Salama! This is where I will be staying the majority of my time in Kenya (though as I write this I am currently at the house in Nairobi... Muahahaha!). Camp is pretty sweet though, I actually enjoy it more than being in the city.

At camp we have no running water (we collect rainwater and during the dry season there is a pipeline that brings it to us). We have electricity only in the office/kitchen building. This is where we cook/prepare most of the food and also where we do our computer/data entry work.

Office/kitchen building. Ginger standing in the doorway :)

Everyone sleeps in tents, but I have a nice twin bed in my tent (sort of fancy camping?). We also have this great little shower system. If you want hot water you heat it up on the fire and then pour it in a bucket with a spout attached and raise it up on a pulley. They toilets are pit toilets but they are very deep and don't smell at all.

Shower system

Entry way to the pit toilet! :) On the other side of the wall is the shower.

For now Florus is in a kennel in the middle of camp near the fire pit. When we aren't out in the field and he isn't resting from getting back we tie him to a post just outside the kennel so he can relax in the grass and say hi to everyone who passes by!

Florus resting after a training session. My tent is the one off to the right (I share it with another student).

The neighbors keep finding tortoises in their bean plant garden so they bring them down to release by our camp. This is one they brought down my first day at camp. She's super cute. I also pulled a huge tick off of her foot!

It's the end of the rainy season so we still get a few showers with a bit of sunshine. One early evening we were treated to a double rainbow (not all the way) broken up by clouds. Kind of awesome...

It was a double rainbow, but you can't really tell in the photos... :(

There is also the tree house/stand, where we have a snack and watch the sun go down. It's very peaceful and a great way to end the day, just don't have too many beers up there or you'll never make it down those slanty stairs alive. For real. Consider this your warning.

You can barely see the outline of the tree stand in the tree... great views from the top though!

Headed to camp tomorrow for a couple weeks so stay tuned for more updates!

Rhino Charge

  

Really pumped about being stranded on the side of the highway...

This past weekend we went to Rhino Charge (you’re probably thinking what the shit is rhino charge?) I must state that there were no rhinos involved (or injured) in this event. It is an event that began as a fundraiser for building a fence around a rhino sanctuary. For the full story check out: www.rhinocharge.co.ke

Friday morning we woke up at 5 am try to get on the road by 6 (it’s roughly a 6 hour drive north of Nairobi). On the road at 7 am… one hour outside of Nairobi and Mary claims the gas pedal isn’t working… and suddenly the car just quits. Fantastic. Luckily it was literally at a police checkpoint (yay safety!). After spending roughly 3 exciting hours on the side of the road in BFE Kenya a new battery was brought to us and once again we were on our way!

 

I’ll begin by stating that I’m not much of a car junkie or a hick, so I was a little unsure of this event. First off, to find the event, we received a directional map from the check-in booth in the nearest town. This is the map, follow these directions carefully… Watch out for that borehole!

Once at the event we received another map with GPS points of all the checkpoints. The cars have 10 checkpoints, the car that reaches all 10 checkpoints in the shortest amount of distance (not time) wins. They have from 6am to 6pm to complete this task. Trying for the shortest distance means traversing over rocks, winching to trees to go up hills, and forging some rivers (no one lost any oxen, phew). This is what people come to watch. One area in particular is always eventful… THE GAUNTLET. 

Early in the morning at the start!

Team 49 attempting to get up the steep hill...

 

More gauntlet action!

There are 3 checkpoints in this area and it is chocked full of some rough terrain. This is also where most spectators hang out. It’s pretty impressive to watch these teams (one driver and 4 runners) finagle their trucks through these obstacles. One team backed into a beehive and they all sustained multiple bee stings, another team rolled 2 full rotations down a hill, and I watched one car struggle to get out of the river for more than an hour. It’s pure insanity. The other entertaining aspect to this event are the spectators themselves. Most of them are so completely wasted by noon it’s like trying to herd a bunch of UW-Madison students around after a football game. People themselves are drunkenly rolling down the hills, tripping on rocks, and falling in the rivers. Such good people watching.

It was quite an eventful weekend and other than the giant party tent as our neighbors (they played music on loud speakers from about 9 pm to 9 am, it was absolutely obnoxious), it was great. I saw my first secretary bird in the wild (google it, it’s AWESOME!!!). A cheetah with two cubs was spotted moments before we arrived at a checkpoint, but we never saw them : (.

I thought I was really tan from this weekend but after showering I realized I was just covered in about an inch of dust… I still can’t get it out of my nose. All in all, it was a last fun weekend before the real work begins! The student from the University of Nairobi that I am collaborating with on this project will be joining us tomorrow and hopefully we will be taking Florus back out to the bush on Tuesday (I’ll post about camp next time around, I promise)!

Hope everyone had a great weekend!