Kat: Maybe I should leave retirement and try to find a job huh? Actually with the economy as bad as it is, I've been considering it but never thought of a newspaper reporter

Jan your our own Roving Reporter.
We will always hold the front page for you!

Kipper: In a small way I hope to do that. I've been in touch with KWS to see if I might see the ivory room and get some pictures, and I've been told I could do it when in Nairobi. I suspect the ivory held is from smaller and younger elephants and females as most of the big guys were killed long ago. Thus hopefully when I get back home I'll be able to post pictures and put a small story with it.

Amboseli Awash!

www.amboselitrust.org
Thu, 2010-01-07 17:56
By H. Croze

When the drought breaks in Africa, it doesn't mess around: we've had 69mm (just under 3 inches) since the New Year.

The first image is looking south to Kili with Cynthia's tent to the right seen from my tent yesterday afternoon. The second image is the Elephant Research Camp from the air this morning. looking NNW. Note the all the pools surrounding the camp and the huge lake that's formed where there was a dust bowl three weeks ago.

Three inches may sound pitiful for those getting inundated with rain and snow in other parts of the world, but in Amboseli, that represents almost 20% of the average annual rainfall. In one week!

The terribly distributed rainfall is one of our ecosystem's curses: too much, too quick, so there is huge runoff with not always enough soaking into the soil.

But, on the bright side, the glut of water brings about transformations that are magical. Where we have been inhaling alkaline dust for months and months, we are now slithering in the mud from tent to tent (Cristina and I flew a tent-maker down to finish up some of the refurbishment work that started last year).

And, although the elephants and wildebeeste are still not back, other creatures are beginning to celebrate the return of the rains.

Some are beautiful, others, not so.
On the beautiful side, we have the Great Egret and the Crowned Cranes (first bird image) and the Saddle-billed Stork who have homed into the temporary pools to feast on the myriad of little frogs that have emerged from who knows where (aestivation?). Dragonflies are cruising for less agile insects right in front of our tent.

On the less glorious end, we bumped into a rather handsome black slug that I've never seen before, and have watched uneasily as the ticks have started to scuttle up the walls of our tents, entranced, no doubt, by the wafts of our body odour.

There are, in fact, about 50-60 elephants in the park, and -- good news -- flying out we saw perhaps a hundred or so wildebeest and zebra some 20 miles to the north.

The ecosystem seems to be shrugging its shoulders and coming back to life. Let's hope we can now hold off the poachers!

Article with photos at: http://www.elephanttrust.org/node/613

With the feeling you have for the bush and wildlife - Jan you are a natural reporter!

Cody: Thanks. As you know - that is how Africa effects most of us. We go the first time thinking it will be a once in a life time trip. However, once there, Africa grabs our heart and we return again and again. There are many countries that have far more beautiful landscapes than Africa, yet it is the African wildlife that has such a powerful effect on us all. When we all share what we have learned, such as through bushdrums,
it helps bring attention to conditions, good and bad, to those that may not be aware of them.