Ah, that sounds realistic - unfortunately

carsten,

in view to hotels and lodges and camps outside the reserve considering the wildlife corridor problem:
whenever privat business or so called "entrepeneurs" are involved they have to be watched very closely in order to not allow them to create misleading proposals!

for example:
when i met calvin cottar he was complaining that the kenyan government did not listen to him years ago when he suggested to the gov that managing wildlife would be done best if a legislation is going to be introduced which allows landowners the possess of wildlife!
taking into consideration that calvin is a hunter himself you can imagine which aim was behind this glorious suggestion!

generally speaking i considers it very dangerously to listen to armees of people because it's not always cristal clear what is behind their suggestion and what motivates them!

regarding the massai and their income:
it should be monitored how the millions of dollars from visitor fees are shared in the community. to me it makes no sense if the income is exlusively invested into even more cattle which are going to die as soon as the next drought hits the country.

here it comes down to the key factor: EDUCATION - means getting the masai aware that it makes sense to in invest into education of their children instead of letting the children take care of the goats!
as a result they don't need as much land and therefore can provide this land for wildlife corridors!

pippa

Pippa:

I agree with you that education is the answer. However, I think it is going to take years to change people's thinking. My guide at Amboseli, a Maasai himself, has been trying for at least five years to convince his tribemates to sell half their cattle and use the money derived from it for clothing, food, education for his kids and slowly building up his herd again. It just doesn't sink in! They still think total number of cattle makes them wealthy, though as you state, half may starve because there isn't enough food.

While waiting for the cattle to cross the road in front of us at Ambo we noticed herds of females first and then herds full of just bulls. One or two bulls could service most of the females, so one wonders what the heck they are keeping all these bulls for. Why not sell a lot of them?

I heard from Amboseli yesterday. All the wild herd animals have left the park because they are finally getting rain, though not enough. Since the wild herd animals are gone, the lions are now taking the cattle and are even following the cattle back to the bomas!!
I can't imagine raising small children in a boma knowing the lions are nearby Must be quite scarey at night there also.