GVI Kenya

Hello everyone

Just a quick note to apologise for the lack of blogs this week We have been having serious electricity issues down here in Shimoni – almost no power for the whole of this week! Now the power is back (hopefully fo good!) we are having technical issues with posting our blogs. We hope to get this sorted as soon as possible, so will be business as usual soon I promise!

Regards

Matt
GVI Kenya

Jambo!

I’d like to start by saying I hope you all had a fantastic Christmas and a merry new year!  I know we did; many of the GVI team were in Kenya over the holiday period, enjoying the festivities under the warm African sun, whilst others jetted off back home to see family and friends to slightly cooler parts of the world such as Englnd, Scotland and Portugal. 

We are all back together again however, and raring to get back out on the boat, into the forest and continue our work with the communities.  January marks the start of our first 3 month research period for 2010, and we have a rather large, brand new team of dedicated volunteers from all over the world to help us achieve the aims and objectives for this year.

2009 was an excellent year for us here on the south coast of Kenya.  Firstly, it’s always a good feeling to get another full years worth of marine and terrestrial research added to the databases.  We now have a solid 3 years of data establishing and monitoring the bottlenose and humpback dolphin populations in and around the Kisitie-Mpunguti Marine Protected Area, as well as 3 years establishing and monitoring the population of the rare subspecies of the Angolan black and white colobus monkey that is found in Shimoni’s coastal forests. 

 GVI staff, volunteers, and members of the Funzi Turtle Club 

In addition to that, we’ve got some great data recording some amazing sightings, including humpback whales with their calves (15 sightings!), rays, nesting turtles, elephant shrews and endangered birds such as the southern banded snake eagle.  And that is naming a mere handful!  If you want to have a look back at some of the blogs we’ve written about these amazing experiences, feel free to search for them in the categories section.

 Green turtle spotted in the Marine Park

2009 also saw some amazing achievements for us and the people we work with.  Just a couple of examples would include the Permanent Secretary to the Minister for Forests and Wildlife coming down to speak to the secretary of Friends of Shimoni Forest about the destruction in the forest.  Or the amazing donations made by you all on www.justgiving.co.uk/shimoni which has allowed the launch of the Friends of Shimoni Forest Scholarship Fund which will pay for local children to go to secondary school, and get them and their families involved in local conservation. 

 East African subspecies of the Angolan black and white colobus

On the marine side of things some highlights would include providing environmental education courses, one to the Funzi Turtle Conservation Group and one to the Nyuli Committee, training local guides and rangers on sea turtle biology and conservation, with over 30 people taking exams and gaining certificates.  GVI had its first ever sighting of the Pantropical spotted dolphins, and also became a member of East African Whale Watching which tracks whales travelling up and down the east African coast.  

One of the pantropical spotted dolphins

Despite all of the great things that happened last year, there is still plenty of work to do.  This stunning area and its amazing people still face many problems, some of which we aim to try and help with over the coming year.  For many of us here the start of 2010 saw the one and a half year mark since we first arrived in Shimoni and Mkwiro, and I think I can speak for everyone when I say it has been our home since we arrived, one which has won a special place in our hearts.  Personally I feel extremely lucky and privileged to step into a new decade here, and I am so excited at the thought of what can be achieved this year.

I look forward to keeping you updated on progress as things move forward, and please feel free to contact us and leave comments and messages.  We love hearing your thoughts and ideas!

Happy 2010

Best wishes

GVI Team, Kenya

Friday the 27th of November celebrated the Muslim holiday Ede.  The Mkwiro villagers were busy all day cooking feasts with their families, and to join in the fun we decided to dedicate our day to cleaning up their beautiful mangroves.  Mangroves are home to many critters and we spent much of our clean-up avoiding crab holes and watching the crabs scurry out of our way.  We spent about two hours cleaning up garbage and debris that has accumulated over many years on the beach.  At high tide the water reaches up high enough to carry this garbage back out to sea and so it is important to keep it as clean as possible.  In the future, the villagers will participate in the clean-ups and learn the importance of protecting their beaches.  After seeing the amount of garbage we collected in just a small area in a short time I think it will occur to them how much is actually littered. Hopefully it will come as a shock and they will want to change their habits.

 Beach clean up

Two hours in the hot sun was hard work, but it was very rewarding to know we were directly affecting the environment. Among the trash was some pretty neat stuff too! I found a shipwreck emergency packet of drinking water from a Chinese ship and there were plastic bottles that would crumple at your touch, they must have been decades old.  The trash we found can be burned, and the glass can be recycled.  Mohammed, a man in the village, uses flip flops for jewellery and so we donated the ones we found to his workshop!

 Marine team in the mangroves

I look forward to doing more clean-ups with the community involved and passing on the awareness of the environment. If only twelve of us participated in the beach clean-up and left with over 15 bags full of trash, old flip flops and glass bottles, imagine what the community could do. A little bit will certainly go a long way. 

Sarah Watson collecting flip flops and water bottles

As part of the socio-economic impact of the dolphin-watching industry in Kisite-Mpunguti Marine Protected Area, GVI carried out a study to evaluate the quality of the talks offered during the dolphin-watching tours. The aim was to find out the knowledge of the tour guides and captain on numerous areas and indicators. This study was undertaken between July and September of 2009 by GVI staff and volunteers, which accompanied 12 tourist dhow trips, assessing 15 guides and captains. 

Unfortunately when analysing the assessment forms and categorising the areas into either insufficient or sufficient, the vast majority of trips proved to be overall insufficient.  In fact only 3 areas – presentation, duration and route and information on KMMPA – were deemed as sufficient in over half of the trips.

The first assessment was on the presentation relating to information provided on the company, crew and boat given at the beginning of the trip.  In 5 of the 12 trips only the names of the crew were given.  However, 7 proved to be sufficient providing information in a very warm and friendly manner covering all three areas.  

The information provided on the duration and route of the trip is the second area deemed to be overall sufficient.  Ten trips gave full details regarding the structure of the day, detailing the period spent searching for dolphins, snorkelling and the break for lunch.  However, 2 trips failed to mention this area at all!

The final area assessed as sufficient was for information provided on the Kisite-Mpunguti Marine Protect Area.  In this area 7 of the 12 trips provided good information on the difference between the Marine Park and the Marine Reserve (three of them offered by the same tour guide).  However, again 5 trips failed to provide information, merely pointing out where the MPA was.

 GVI volunteers on board a tourist dhow

Information provided on the local area also proved to be very insufficient.  With only 6 trips mentioning Shimoni, by providing a brief history and information relating to the slave caves.  Additionally, only 6 made mention of Wasini, detailing the coral board walk and village tour.  Only 1 trip discussed Mkwiro, and even that it was only to advice that it was a fisherman village.   The remainder of the tours provided no information whatsoever on the surrounding areas.

Similarly, not one of the tourist dhows discussed anything to do with the local oceanography.  For example no information was given regarding the geographical location in the Indian Ocean, of the important nesting turtle site in Funzi Bay, nor the important fishing ground of the Nyuli Reef.

Insufficient information was also provided in the area of health and safety, with the average time spent discussing this being less than 30 seconds.  Advice was given to maintain the balance of the boat, however nothing was discussed relating to the life jackets, life rings, first aid or fire extinguishers.  All 12 dhows failed to provide sufficient information. 

Another area in which most of the tourist dhows surprising failed to provide sufficient information on was that of the marine species.  Considering the tourist dhows were actually providing a dolphin-watching tour only 2 of them provided detailed information relating to the species of dolphins that could be found in the area and their habitats.  However 10 of them failed to spend even 30 seconds doing this.  Furthermore, not one of the dhows mentioned the possibility of sighting humpback whales, their characteristics or of their migration pattern through KMMPA.  With GVI having 7 sighting of humpback whales during this study period, there is clear evidence of this migration!  Similarly, when discussing the snorkelling that would be taking place as part of the tour none of them mentioned the likelihood of spotting turtles or of the species they may see in the area. 

All 12 tourist dhows also failed to discuss KWS or the Code of Conduct introduced in 2007.  No mention was made of the requirement of dolphin watching dhows to maintain a distance of 100m from groups of dolphins, that they should try and have only 2 boats around a group at one time, and to steer around a group.

 Tour guide approaching a tourist

However, on a positive note the analysis on the interaction of the tour guides is good.  The vast majority of guides were answering questions raised, and there were being interactive with the tourists.  They had a good approach and were very friendly.  Friendly suggestions were to spend less time on personal phones and not to throw cigarette ends into the MPA.

This study showed an urgent need to train the dolphin-watching guides and captains on different areas, mainly on health & safety, history of Shimoni area (Shimoni, Wasini and Mkwiro), Kisite-Mpunguti Marine Protected Area boundaries and regulations and dolphin and whales identification, biology and ecology.

The activity of dolphin (whale)-watching is described as “the commercial observation of cetaceans in their habitat from a platform on land, sea or air” (Hoyt 2001).
The dolphin-watching industry constitutes an emergent business in many coastal areas around the world and has seen spectacular growth over the last fifteen years. The industry began in the 1950’s in San Diego (California) and has since expanded as far as Antarctica. During the 1960’s, the industry grew significantly in the United States and Canada, followed by Australia, New Zealand, the Canary Islands, Japan and Norway in the 1980’s (Hoyt 1995, 1996) and, Iceland, Philippines, Indonesia, Hong Kong and Tonga in the middle of 1990’s.

 
In 1998, the number of dolphin-watching tourists totalled around 9 million, estimating the volume of income generated to be 1 billion US Dollars, doubling the income in 1994 (Hoyt, 2001). In 1998, of those nine million participating in dolphin-watching trips, one million were from the United States alone. More recently, other countries and regions such as the Canary Islands and Canada have reached similar volumes. Australia and South Africa are expected to double their numbers from 500,000. (Hoyt, 2001)
This activity has been developed in more than 492 communities with the majority experiencing a real transformation. Dolphin-watching provides important incomes, creates new activities which generate new employment and moreover, constitutes a very useful tool to study marine mammals and marine environments.
Whale and dolphin watching have become an increasingly popular and financially important tourist activity along the East African coast.  Currently, dolphin research and conservation efforts are being undertaken in Tanzania (Zanzibar) and Mozambique within the Sustainable Dolphin Tourism in East Africa Project. However, to date, few studies of cetaceans have been undertaken in Kenya and there is an urgent need to initiate research to aid future conservation and management of the species found in Kenyan coastal waters.

A bottlenose dolphin being watched by tourists in the KMMPA 
Global Vision International (GVI) Kenya has set up a new project focused on the dolphin-watching activity of Kisite-Mpunguti Marine Protected Area (KMMPA). The objectives of this project are to collect information about the socio-economic impact of tourism operation on the area and to analyze the sustainability of increased levels of human-dolphin interaction.  Further, to identify existing problems and to propose constructive changes to respective government institutions that would help boat operators, tour companies, and the local residents in running the activity sustainably. These objectives will in turn add value to the Code of Conduct for KMMPA, developed by Kenya Wildlife Service in 2007.
Aims:
 1. Analysis of the socio-economic activity (dolphin-watching) in KMMPA.
 2. Impact of tourist dhow boats on the cetacean population.
 3. Education and awareness of boat operators and tour guides.

The data will be collected through interviews to tourist, boat operators, hoteliers and local community members in Mkwiro, Shimoni and Wasini. Also, GVI research vessel will assess the impact of this tourism investigating the abundance, distribution and behaviour of Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops aduncus). Moreover, we will compare sightings and behaviour on different areas and with different levels of tourism activity that will allow us to evaluate the Code of Conduct. And finally, GVI will create awareness and education of local dolphin species and habitats engaging the boat operators and tour guides in different projects so as to promote conservation issues.

References:
Hoyt, E. 1995. The Worldwide Value and Extent of Whale Watching: 1995. Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, Bath, UK. pp. 1-36.
Hoyt, E. 1996. Whale watching and community development around the world. Keynote lecture to the International Whale Watching Festa ’96. The International Whale Watching Forum (Japan). Zamami, Okinawa, Japan, 9 Mar. 1996.
Hoyt, E. 2001. Whale watching 2001:  Worldwide tourism numbers, expenditures and expanding socioeconomic benefits. International Fund for Animal Welfare, Yarmouth Port, MA, USA, pp. i –vi; 1-158.

On Sunday we were rewarded with yet another amazing sighting of Humpback Whales. It has been the sixth sighting since the beginning of 093 Expedition. This time, a mother Humpback Whale and its young calf were socializing in the channel between Mkwiro and Shimoni, so close to our Base Camp that we were able to see them from the land.

 The mother

It didn’t take us too long to prepare the cameras and GPS and jump into the boat to spend some time watching the pair as they slowly cruised in the channel. They seemed very relaxed in this calm and shallow waters; the young calf was lying on its back showing its distinctive white pectoral fins, while the mother rubbed her body from underneath. We were just overwhelmed by the beauty and the magnificence of the moment!

The calf showing its pectoral fin  

But the main show was yet to come…after a short diving period, the calf breached more than half of its body clearly out of the water just about 30m away from our boat…Whoww! Sunny Sunday Mornings at GVI’s Mkwiro Base.  

The pair together

During the last year (2008) we had a total of 6 sightings of 15 Humpback whales inside our study area. And from the start of July 2009, GVI has already seen 14 Humpback whales in 7 sightings. We are now sharing this data with other organizations collecting data on Humpback whales (a network that involves almost 100 whale-watchers along the East African Coast, from southern Mozambique to northern Unguja Island, Zanzibar) and contributing to have a better understanding of the migration pattern of this species.

Hello there! After a rough week of stormy seas and torrential (and somewhat mysterious!) ‘black rain’ brought by the Kusi monsoon winds, Friday left us with something to celebrate… well, a pair of somethings actually.

Monday was a training day for us, teaching our new researchers how to identify different turtle species, dolphin species and their larger cousins the humpback whales. Tuesday was… a total wash out! Torrential rain kept our research boat and research team firmly moored at Mkwiro. Wednesday and Thursday saw us out on the choppy water but the winds kept us confined to the Wasini channel. A brief sighting of a green turtle and bottlenose dolphin were all we got for our efforts and in rough seas following the dolphin sighting and undertaking photo identification surveys proved too difficult.

Friday was looking to be a similar story as the planned survey route to Funzi bay was abandoned and we turned back in to the Wasini channel, however it turned out that we didn’t need to venture as far as Funzi bay… we barely needed to venture off our base in Mkwiro village as it happened. On re-entering the eastern end of Wasini channel the research team were confronted by two seasonal visitors in front of Mkwiro… a pair of humpback whales! We’re not sure that this particular pair was a mother and calf, although one was smaller, it certainly wasn’t a new born and as this marks the beginning of Kenya’s 2009 humpback whale season, we’re expecting mothers to be on their migration north up the East African coastline before they calve.

However it is very exciting for us to see the humpback whales (the fourth largest animal in the world as I learned recently!) return and for those of us here last year, the significance of last Friday, 3rd July, wasn’t lost on us. Last year, the first sighting of humpback whales in the area relayed to us, was on 3rd July! We can’t wait to find out what else we can learn from them over the coming months and if we’re lucky we may have a chance of finding out if any of the individuals we photographed last year have returned for 2009.

 Stay tuned, we’ll be blogging our way through the 2009 humpback whale season for you!

Corti

Megan is working with GVI over the next few months and describes her experiences on our marine research project so far: 

Growing up in the central California desert, I developed a fascination for water. I followed my affinity to Washington State, where low clouds, mist and the Puget Sound shaped my existence for five years. I have come to know water in many ways. After only one week in Kenya, the unique anthropological and environmental culture of water begins to reveal itself. We experience it in late afternoon salt-water runs, thick humidity, dynamic rain storms, and most notably, the Indian Ocean.

Each day brings hard work, but also terrific amounts of beauty. Typically, we spend eight hours on the water in our research boat a traditional wooden dhow. The day is long and hot. Aided by Shafii the captain, we carry out turtle transects and dolphin surveys. We have spotted rays, reef sharks, hawksbill and green turtles, barracuda, and bottlenose and humpback dolphins. Often, the dhow startles schools of small, flying fish, which travel out ahead of the boat. One of our most interesting sightings this week involved a mother bottlenose dolphin and her calf. Using a dead parrot fish, the mother appeared to teach her calf to feed. The mother would approach, take the fish in her mouth, and then release it. The calf then tried. Significant amounts of time on the water allow us to witness many different dolphin behaviours.

Last night, the rains came. After a week in the hot sun and salty showers, we welcomed the fresh water. I look forward to more time in our small corner of the Kenyan coast. With little electricity, a vast range of native species, our proximity to the friendly Mkwiro villagers, and vast amounts of water on our doorstep, working with GVI provides you with a unique opportunity to push yourself physically, mentally and emotionally.

On the remote island community of Mkwiro where GVI are based, it is has rarely been easy to access healthcare. The community themselves raised money to build a dispensary and for a few years enjoyed medical assistance on their doorstep with a government nurse. However by the time GVI arrived the dispensary had been effectively closed for a couple of years, the nurse having been transferred and never replaced.  

In April 2006 our friend and member of the Mkwiro dispensary committee, Fadhili, appealed to us for help – without a nurse, the provision of drugs and medical resources was to be cancelled – this would mean that there would no longer be vaccines and basic medications available for a visiting public health officer from the mainland in Shimoni to administer. All healthcare needs, including child vaccinations, would depend on crossing to the mainland. Having already been called upon twice in just a few months to provide emergency night time medical evacuations in our boat for advanced cases of malaria – Juma, a boy from the orphanage and Shafii, our own boat captain – we were acutely aware of the risks of delaying medical assistance because of the expense and inconvenience.

Thumbs up from Fadhili for support for Mkwiro dispensary 

With the agreement of Mkwiro orphanage we allocated some of their funds from GVI’s Charitable Trust to pay a nurse’s salary, get the dispensary re-opened and ensure medical care was available once more for the orphans and wider community. Generous donations, including from one of our volunteers, Mirka Meyer, ensured the nurse’s salary for two years, but we were aware all along that this was not a sustainable solution and sooner or later the donations would dry up… which is what happened last year. 

Jane volunteering in the classroom 

Fortunately another former team member, Jane Hainsworth-Birt was on the case with her employer, Timberland. Raising over £4000 for Mkwiro, they managed to fund new furniture for Mkwiro primary school, send students on to secondary school with scholarships and allocate the biggest slice for a sustainable business initiative that would allow Mkwiro dispensary to earn the money to pay for their own nurse and improve facilities. It has taken a long time to find the right initiative but in an exceptionally generous gesture to help his community, Pandu, the owner of the dhow boat ‘Bardan’ that we hire as a research vessel agreed to sell it to the dispensary at less than market value.  

Pandu whose sale of the boat to assist his community was as generous a gesture as anyone else 

And so last month, the money we paid to hire our marine research vessel went directly to the dispensary committee to employ a public health officer. And when GVI don’t need the boat, Kisite Marine Park will continue to draw tourists in search of dolphins aboard a traditional dhow. With enormous thanks to Jane, Timberland and Pandu, it looks as though we have found the perfect, sustainable solution for Mkwiro and look forward to a happier, healthier future for the community!

Dolphin research… it’s good for your health!

Corti

Jon “JR” Olson is a U.S Naval Attache based in Helsinki.  He has come to the south coast of kenya for two weeks to join GVI in its marine research project in the Kisite-Mpunguti Marine Protected Area.  He has kindly written this blog about his first day as part of the research team.

The 0530 alarm went off next to my head and, at first, I forgot where I was.  Then, the heat and humidity of the early Kenyan coastal morning kicked in as I peeled off the sheet from my sweating body.  While some would be put off by this rather uncomfortable fact, I, personally, felt exhilarated as this was to be my first official day working as a member of the dolphin research project in the Kisite Mpunguti Marine Protected Area.

By 0600 I was showered, had organized by personal snorkel gear, camera, sunscreen, some additional clothes, etc, and was in the kitchen eating a quick breakfast.  I was the new guy and had to prove to the GVI veterans I could contribute to this project.  Contribution started with me helping to fix breakfast, cleaning up the kitchen area afterwards, packing the equipment for the day, etc.  By 0630 our group of nine people was hauling the gear down to the water and loading up SQUIRREL, our shuttle boat.  A few minutes later we were motoring our way across the Wasini Channel bound for Shimoni Village and our moored research boat known as BARDAN.  After transferring our gear to BARDAN, we got underway on our search for dolphins and other marine life.

Within minutes of starting out, we spotted our first pod of bottlenose dolphins, right in the middle of the Wasini Channel.  We spent 45 minutes following a pod of seven dolphins as they transited west down the channel.  We took dozens of photographs, logged the entire event, and ended the sighting around 0745.  BARDAN then turned east and we headed out into deeper water destined for Kisite Island by way of Funzi Bay.  We motored slowly under cloudy skies, which, on this particular morning, considering my still pasty white flesh, was OK with me.  The conditions were absolutely perfect for searching the seas for pods of dolphin and other marine species.  And, as luck would have it, while transiting south from Funzi Bay, we spooked a large surfacing turtle which promptly inhaled deeply and rapidly dove back into the deep.

Photograph showing a bottlenose dolphin feeding on a turtle

Some two hours after we departed Shimoni, we arrived in the channel area of the Kisite Mpunguti islands.   It was not long before we spotted a small group of tourist dive boats and we set course for those boats as it was likely they would be accompanied by some type of marine life.  Once again, we were lucky and as we arrived in the vicinity of the tourist boats, we spotted a number of pairs of bottlenose dolphins, all of them engaged in socializing behaviors, and possibly some feeding.  We tracked these pairs of dolphins using cameras, the event and sighting logs, and maintained contact for approximately 30 minutes.  The dolphins then disappeared and we began making our way toward our snorkeling destination near Kisite Island where we would snorkel a defined path, known as a transect, in search of more turtles.
Once in the water, which, to me, feels like bath water because it is so warm, we started our transect and were not disappointed after sighting three turtles, two of which we were able to specifically classify as Green Turtles. 

A bottlenose dolphin with scars that are believed to be the result of a shark attack

Once back in the boat at the end of our snorkel phase, we logged the information on the turtles in the Mega Fauna log and then proceeded back to the northeast, heading back to base for lunch and afternoon of data entry into the computers and some time spent correlating dolphin photos with individual dolphins.  It was amazing to me to see the truly distinctive dorsal fin marks on each of the local, or resident, bottlenose dolphins listed in the photographic data base.  After expert tutelage by GVI intern Karen, I was able to quickly identify a number of dolphins in the data base with photos taken by other research teams, providing much needed data for GVI to inform the Kenya Wildlife Service about key aspects of dolphin behavior.  This information will allow KWS to develop better policies for protecting the Marine Protected Area, which will, in turn, protect the bottlenose dolphins habitat.

As I finish this blog, I realize it is almost 10PM and I have to get up again shortly after 0500 tomorrow morning.  I get to do it all over again!  I can’t wait!