Zimbabwe Wild Dogs

Category: Education, Random, Uncategorized, zimbabwe | Date: Feb 24 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

Chishakwe Ranch (where I live) is involved in an environmental education program in some of the schools around the conservancy.  I went along with the managers today to have a look at one of the schools and help out with one of their activities (painting chairs with wild animal pictures and information). 

The chairs before being painted

It was a very interesting day.  Despite it being almost the end of February, the school was not yet officially open, because the teachers are still on strike demanding pay in foreign currency.  They have been on strike since last year, and 94% of rural schools have failed to open this year. 

However, the dedicated headmaster of this school, despite not being paid and having no guidance from the education ministry managed to gather together the children involved in the activity and we turned up to a group of 30 or so very poorly dressed but well behaved and keen students.  All of them participated with enthusiasm in the activity, despite the fact that many had never painted anything before, and the result was a colourful array of chairs for their classroom, all illustrating different wildlife species.

Nonethless it was shocking to see how basic and bare the classrooms were - not a single picture or poster or teaching aid anywhere on the peeling and crumbling walls.  And the level of English was appalling too, which is very sad because the exams are set in English, and there will be little hope of any of them passing (even if they do ever manage to pay markers to mark last year’s exam scripts).  This is not helped by the fact that the vast majority of trained teachers have left the country and untrained and inexperienced people stand in as teachers.

It worries me this, because I believe that Zimbabwe is the wonderful country that it is, and has survived so long despite the worst, in large part due to the excellent education of its people.  Zimbabweans at school prior to 1990 grew up with an excellent education system which provided them with sound morals and an honest and hard-working attitude, hence the resourcefulness of people today.  With the lack of even basic education (schools were open for a total of only 23 days last year in many places), the prospects for the future of the country are worrying.  Where will the next generation of leaders come from?

We at the Wild Dog Project are keen to do something about this, and are currently working on ways of supplementing teachers salaries so that they are able to stay in their jobs, providing scholarships to the poorest and brightest children (from primary school up to university level), and providing resources to the schools.  We’ll tie this in with enhanced efforts in the environmental education program, but really we just want to keep children in school and keep decent teachers so that the children in the area can grow up with a decent chance in life. I’ll keep you posted with our progress.

I’ll add some pictures of the chair-painting experience to this post in a couple of days,

Back soon,

Rosemary

Tags: environmental education, schools, wildlife education, zimbabwe

3 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Feb 19 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

I just got back from the wildlife capture course which I did to enable me to get my license to dart the wild dogs.  It was an incredible week, with a great deal to learn and lots of practical work too.  Between all the teams, we had to immobilise a lion, an elephant, a giraffe and 2 white rhino (for management purposes), got to practice darting out of a helicopter and learnt how to do boma captures of impala and zebra. 

Elephant immobilisation and recovery

There was also a lot of theory; understanding physiology, all the different wildlife drugs, how the drugs work in the body, the doses to use, the antidotes to use, what to do if something goes wrong, safety and first aid etc.  We also got to practice with several of the different dart guns available on the market and learnt which types are best to use for which animals. 

Giraffe immobilisation and Rhino Immobilisation

Fortunately I passed the exams at the end of the course and am now able to apply for my license.  Not only will this allow me to immobilise wild dogs for de-snaring, treating injuries and collaring purposes, but also to help rescue animals caught in snares etc. 

It was also nice to meet so many people working in Zimbabwe (and surrounding countries) who are doing their best to conserve wildlife, despite the difficulties in the country.

Back soon,

Rosemary   

4 responses so far

Category: Wild Dogs, zimbabwe | Date: Feb 19 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

Thanks very much for all your great suggestions for names.  I listed all the names suggested and then looked at the photos of all the pups to see if any names jumped out as particularly suitable.  And indeed they did!  I’ve gone for Dudu, Loopy, Biscuit and Milo for the four that I posted photos of in the last blog.  For the others I’ve gone for Twinspot (like Spotty but he has a very distinctive double spot pattern on his back right leg), Roxy, Simba (a very plain, lion coloured one), Trinity (3 distinct white marks on back right thigh), Macbeth and Mishmash (the only one with a full array of splodges of all colours!).

I’ve got about 20 more to name still, so I’m sure I’ll use some of the other names too.  I’ll let you know.  Thanks again for all your input – it’s great to have such a varied lot of names.

Rosemary

Tags: names, puppies, Wild Dogs

One response so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Feb 07 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi guys,

I’ve recently put together a set of photos of the pups from the Mapari pack.  I’ve done this for all the packs, for the pups that are still alive now that the litters are are over 6 months old. I   But I’ve really run out of inspiration now!!! 

I’ve posted some pictures of the Mapari pack pups below: any suggestions for names would be great….  None of them have especially distinctive markings and no names seem particularly fitting, so the choice is limitless!  There are 10 pups in total in the pack: perhaps a theme would be a good plan…?  The only thing that really strikes me is that they are fairly plain dogs in general, with one small white mark on each of their back right thighs…  I’ve posted 4 pics below: lets see if we can get these named and maybe a theme going…?  Additional names for the rest of the litter (6 more pups) are welcome  (my internet connection is too slow to put up more than these 4 photos).

 Pup 1

Pup 2

Pup 3

Pup 4

I’ll be out of touch for a while now as I’m going on a course to get my license to dart and immobilise wild dogs.  I’ll be back about the 18th and will look forward to some truly inspirational names!

Rosemary

13 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Feb 06 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Just a very quick thank you to Ludovic who very generously donated U$55 to the project.  Thank you so much Ludovic - we appreciate your support enormously.  And a second thank you to all those who donated in November and December to help our snared pup.  It’s good to know people care. 

Rosemary  

Tags: conservation, donations, Wild Dogs, zimbabwe

No responses yet

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Feb 02 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

Sorry I haven’t posted for so long: our internet system here in the bush finally died, as did the other system I have occasional access to, so I’ve not been able to get online for a while.  We eventually got the technicians down and it appears to be fixed now, so let’s hope it stays that way.  It’s a fairly quiet fieldwork time at the moment – both the project scouts are away because they have sick family members, and the wild dogs only need basic monitoring at this time anyway.  As of last count – they were all present and correct! 

I am spending most of my time doing paperwork: endless fundraising applications, reports, data entry, reading literature and planning the expansion of the project into Gonarezhou National Park and other areas of the Zimbabwean lowveld for this coming year.

I just came back from a few days in Harare where – on the surface – things seem to be functioning fairly well.  They have now officially “dollarized” the economy and everything from the newspapers on the street to new television sets are being sold in US$.  This means that for those that have access to US$, life is a little bit easier, albeit considerably more expensive, because at least you can actually get things.  For the majority of the population though, life remains a constant struggle and US$ notes are much sought after.  No-one really bothers with the Zim dollars anymore – they are utterly worthless.  The cholera epidemic remains at catastrophic levels and we just had our first case on the ranch I live on.  It really is a horrific disease, and the epidemic is classic evidence of the current state of desperation in the country.  The only consolation, when it strikes so close to home, is that at least people here in the conservancy will be looked after properly and driven to hospital, and provided with the necessary rehydration drips etc to pull through.  It’s hard not being able to do more for people, but at least we can help in this small way.

Rosemary

6 responses so far