Today Paula collected my check for Ksh 60,000 (about $1,000) which was given to me by the AFEW (African Fund for Endangered Wildlife) Giraffe Center in Langata, Nairobi. The funds are to help pay the costs of our community scouts as well as some legal costs.

This post is to thank AFEW for believing in the Garissa Giraffe Sanctuary.

Here are some of the tenants of the Giraffe Center

The newest baby - only one year old already 10 feet tall!

Daisy 2 - at a strange angle

She is massive, 17 years old, her head is always in the sky!

This is one of the few places in Kenya where you can meet the animals close up. Based right on the edge of Nairobi the giraffe are free to come and go as they please! They attract hundreds of thousands of people each year, especially children - school kids go free and have the use of a wonderful education center.

Kenyans love giraffes which are the subject of wooden and metal art works

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Imagine challenging a lion physically: Look at this picture of how a lion has damaged the thigh ( deep cut) of this man. Garissa and Wajir districts in Kenya have become a battle zone in the recent past between marauding lions and helpless pastoralist. Early this year , nine family members have been seriously injured in Biyamadow in Wajir. They attained serious injuries ranging from severe skull damage, deep cuts to skin scratches as shown by the above picture which i took in Garissa general hospital. This particular man  who have been at the hospital for a week  told me that they had to fight the rogue lions for almost four hours in broad day light just to rescue one of their goats.  According to the victims, lion’s attacks have been on the increase mainly due to prolonged droughts, trade on lions cubs and perhaps due to reduced water sources. Other similar incidents have been reported in Liboi, Modogashe, Bananey and Damajalley in the two districts.

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Greeting to all the friends of the giraffe sanctuary. I am glad to inform you that we finally  purchased the computer which we seriously needed for our work. I would like to say thank you for all those who contributed towards this machine that will help save many giraffes in the arids areas of kenya.

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This is just to give Theresia an idea of what kind of crops are grown in our area. The farms are mainly along the Tana River which is the only source of permanent water. NO major large scale farming are carried out here but small irrigation based cultivations( an example is the sweet melons farm shown in the picture above). Many fruits do well here. Some of the major ones include Mangoes, tomatoes, melons, pawpaw,quavas, bananas, orages. Other common crops include maize and canes.

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Ostriches are abundunt in this dry part of kenya, North Eastern province(NEP) with mainly the somali Ostich race. They are present in almost all the districts but little effort has been directed to its commercial exploitation as an alterntive to pastoralism. Local communities here attach alot of Nutritutional and medicinal value to ostrich meat and its products. I have come a cross many isolated ostrich populations in the region which can become perfect ostrich farms.

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Dear freinds.
This post is just to bring to your attention how an introduced ailien species known as prosopis Juliflora is rapidly colonsing the sanctuary and it is environs replacing indiginous acacias and other forage plants for the giraffes and the gerenuks. we have tried a number of measures such as harvesting it for firewood and cleaaring, but this seems still not effective. The plant originally from south america was introduced in kenya in early 80s just to increase green cover in arid and semi arid areas of kenya. It is now becoming a serious problem blocking water corridors and supressing all kind of indiginous vegtations. Your ideas and opinions on control measures of this plants will be of great importance.

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Dear friends. I recently had the chance to visit and sensitise youth groups in the famous Dadab and Hagardera refugee camps in Kenya. I was invited by some official of UNHCR and CARE Kenya to talk to the youths in the area on general environmental issues affecting their life. We had a great moment together as we were entertained by traditioanl groups and school children following my talk . Since the collapse of the Somali republic in 1991 the influxes of refugees in these camps have been constant and now most of the the current youth were born in these camps. Ofcourse direct consequence of this is the impact to the environmnt as this people directly depend on the ever diminishing dryland natural resources available causing serious vegetaion destructions. This is manifested in terms of charcoal burning, firewood harvesting and massive green cuttings for shelter materials especially in the refugee camps areas. it was obvious to me that continuous exploitation of deadwood for the immediate needs of the refugees and the host communities without regards to its sustainability will compromise the natural regenerative capacity of the environment, and thus compromising its ability to meet the needs of the future generation. Dead woods are home to several insects and rodents that play an important role in nutritional cycles, and also serve an important food source for birds, thus contributing significantly to the complex food web. As we all know there is increasing global and local recognition of the inter-dependence between environment and development and often environmental destruction is directly proportional to the level of povety. I therefore urge development agents in the area to sandwitch environmtal programes with other development issues.

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North eastern, the third largest province in Kenya, is mainly characterized by arid climatic conditions with an erratic rainfall of less than 250mm a year. The area is mainly inhabited by Somalis, who rear livestock as their main economic activity.
Garissa district, the headquarters of the region represents one of the most degraded ecosystems threatened by desertification, biodiversity loss, deforestation and fuel wood shortages. the reasons include the prolonged shifta wars, livestock- wildlife conflict and the influxes of refugees and their livestock from the neighboring Somalia.
However, the vast district is historically home for large mammals including elephants, the endangered rhinos, buffaloes and finally the big cats. Older people still vividly remember how they had some rough time with these animals. Other than the big cats (Lions, Leopards, Cheetahs) most of these animals have disappeared, thanks to the illigal trade in trophies (tusks and horns) in the 70s. However, due to recent improvement in security in the province,elephants have reportedly returned to garissa which used to be a migratory corridor connecting the Tsavo and Kora ecosystems to the grater Somalia ecosystem.
Specific sightings have been reported in Bura division of Garissa district in past two years. According to the area Kenya Wildlife Service Honorary Warden Mr. Hassan Sheikh Ali, who recently encountered a breeding herd of 14, with their calves in Jambele area, south of Garissa, the elephants have invaded farms in the area and destroyed mango trees.
The animals have also been seen in Modika, Balambala, Balich and Bananey, in north of the district.The big question is how will these elephants be accommodated by the local pastoralists/ farmers who have not had to deal with any since late 70s, when elephant poaching was at its peak?
Historical corridors and water access points have been blocked in the recent past, and this could be a source of new battle between the destructive beast and the people. Too many people in Garissa view the return of elephants as a disaster in the making and they may not be supportive of the government conservations goals.
Ali A Hussein

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Dear frieinds. This post is just to inform you that Tana river is the only source of water around garissa district in kenya greatly defining population distribution pattern. The 440-mile Tana River is the longest river in Kenya, rising in the Aberdare Mountains to the west of Nyeri. Initially it runs east before turning south round the Mount Kenya massif. The river then turns into the Masinga and Kiambere Reservoirs created by the Kindaruma dams. Below the dam the river turns north and flows the north-south boundary between the Meru and North Kitui and Bisanadi, Kora and Rahole National Reserves providing the much needed water support to all these dryland biodiversity pockets. In the reserves the river turns east, and then south east. It passes through the towns of Garissa, Hola and Garsen before entering the Indian Ocean at Ungwana Bay. The sanctuary is located along the eastern side of the river near garissa and the giraffes acess it through marked watering corridors. However due emerging river bank farming along the flood plains of the River farmers continue to block these ancestral routes for accessing the river by expandings their farmlamds. Nevertheless, in collaboration with government agencies we are trying to reach out to these farmers not to block the access points. Efforts are also underway to sensitise the farmers to tolerate the presence of wildlife around their farmlands.

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