(Posted 21st November 2024)
Misty mountain: MKT works to turn degraded landscapes such as these on Mt Kenya back into forests through community agroforestry projects, in partnership with Kenya Forest Service. We monitor every tree that we plant to maintain high survival rates of 85-90%.
MOUNTAIN DISPATCHES
July to September 2024
Welcome to this month’s edition of the MOUNTAIN DISPATCHES newsletter! We’re excited to share our latest updates from the past quarter.
We appreciate you all and are incredibly humbled by your participation in all of the ranger events, such as the World Ranger Day celebrations and the annual Wildlife Ranger Challenge, completed by our Elephant Corridor team.
Our tree planting season will be soon be with us in October, and we’ve detailed here the work undertaken throughout the year, from monitoring to seed collection and more to ensure we plant healthy seedlings with the best chance of survival on the mountain. We aim to grow forests, not just seedlings, and we can 100% guarantee we watch out every single seedling (because we know the amount of work and effort that is required to grow a seed into a mature tree).
Our work comes with so much impact, opportunity and challenges and we hope you enjoy reading about a few of our highlights over the past few months.
Your contributions, whether through donations, spreading awareness, or participating in our events, directly impact our conservation efforts. Together, we can ensure a future where wildlife thrives and conservation remains a shared responsibility.
Taking the office to the field for restoration monitoring training!
QUARTERLY IMPACTS
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WILDLIFE RANGER CHALLENGE (WRC) 2024
MKT’s Elephant Corridor team participated in this year’s WRC, an annual event that is now in its fifth year raising frontline funds for conservation ranger teams.
The campaign involves a rigorous series of fitness and mental challenges undertaken by rangers from across Africa, including a ranger quiz, sit-up, and push-up competitions leading up to a 21-kilometer (half-marathon) run at Lewa Wildlife Conservancy.
A huge thank you to Anne Tissier who arranged two fundraising events on behalf of MKT – the Ranger Olympics and car boot sale (held at One Stop, Nanyuki) and the Mount Kenya Forest 5km and 10km walks, held in Marania forest.
The Olympics were a lot of fun with multiple games such as Tug of War, an egg and spoon race, situps, a waiter run, a sack race, memory game, and quizzes. An auction was also a huge success with many kind donations, including Safarilink flight tickets and a painting from Susannah Mortensen.
Participants, old & young, enjoyed a refreshing walk with rangers in the moorlands, under the cedar canopies in the indigenous forest section with tall, old Hagenia trees and catching a glimpse of the MKT Restoration site at Marania, as the farmers tilled the distributed plots in preparation for tree planting season.
The finale on September 21st brought together rangers from across 18 African countries for the final WRC Challenge. The rangers ran in a coordinated 21km team race, with each member carrying over 20 kgs of weight in rucksacks.
We are happy to announce that we smashed our fundraising target, raising over $6,000 USD. As we celebrate this achievement, we thank everyone involved and all of our supporters, for your vital role in enabling the preservation of Africa’s biodiversity through ranger support.
MKT is a proud participant in the African Wildlife Ranger Challenge! Check out the highlights from 2024 here.
WORLD RANGER DAY 2024
World Ranger Day is celebrated in honour of the great sacrifices rangers worldwide make to protect and care for wildlife and ecosystems.
The MKT rangers celebrated by holding a Mental Health Awareness Discussion session and capacity-building event at our Horse Patrol Team base.
The session prioritised the rangers well-being, acknowledging their selfless dedication to safeguarding our natural treasures, while also honouring those we have lost in the line of duty.
In addition, at Nanyuki Stadium, a second event was held, where rangers from the Laikipia and Mount Kenya landscapes gathered in honour of the day. It was a colourfully vibrant and memorable day, marked by insightful presentations, including a musical performance by one of our rangers, who played a homemade traditional instrument to the amusement of the crowds!
There was traditional Maasai dancing, and rangers showcased their patrol techniques, including their four legged K9 Patrol Units.
In attendance were KWS Senior County staff, and our Executive Director, Susie Weeks, who gave a speech. MKT demonstrated their elite fire fighting technique and displayed some of the brutal snares that are recovered in the forest.
We are thrilled to announce that among the rangers honoured on that day, MKT’s Julius Karomga, received an award for his exemplary service as a ranger. The event provided an excellent platform to connect with others dedicated to protecting ecosystems in the Mount Kenya and Laikipia landscape.
Our projects do not come without challenges and sharing these as part of the process of undertaking conservation work in the region:
- Stock outs of oral contraceptives were faced, and disruptions were caused by healthcare worker strikes, particularly in Tharaka Nithi and Meru. CHPs allocated buffer budgets to procure essential supplies to maintain service delivery.
- Our carbon and biodiversity credits feasibility study is now complete with a commercially viable project ready to go. We are now approval pending at the national level.
- The Imenti tree planting site remains closed due to a national imposed ban on the site leading to huge losses in planted trees and community efforts.
- At the demo plot, the beehive fence continues to deter elephants, although some damage was noted when elephants were pushed into the community fields. The bee hive fence has since been repaired, and we continue to make efforts to ensure the remaining hives are occupied and promote Human-Wildlife Coexistence in the plot. Stay connected for updates.
- We unfortunately hosted some crop-raiding elephants a few days after completing harvesting at the Mugumo Regenerative Demonstration Plot. The staff reported eight elephants got into the farm at 3am to raid the remaining crop. Fortunately, we had already begun harvesting, and most crops were out of the field. Among the crops raided included cabbage, maize, beans, kale and sweet potatoes. The elephants did not eat the spinach but rather trampled on them.
- In the Marania tree planting site, the monitoring team marked 41 permanent sample plots with a Ficus in the centre for identification, each with a 20m diameter for monitoring. These plots cover 8% of the area. The analysis found tree survival rates at the site to be 85%, but challenges such as tree damage during bush clearing by CFA members were noted. KFS was notified to prevent future damage, and a recommendation for trees planted after cultivation was tabled with KFS.
