Wildlife and conservation new, wild travel information and links for booking
Kahuzi-Biega National Park was established in 1937 by the Belgium colonial rulers and then expanded in 1975. It now covers 6000 square km or 2300 square miles. Roughly 13000 Batwa were cleared out of the area to make way for the park (along with other people who had settled more recently).
Continue reading “On the founding of Kahuzi-Biega National Park, locals were pushed out -they now have the right to return, what will happen”
Southern African hosts roughly 227,000 elephants out of 415,000 on the continent (in addition there is around 100,000 forest elephants).
In 2020, the estimate was that 30,000 elephants were being killed each year. While the majority of these were in the west african rainforest, and in east africa (it was estimated that the Selous lost 10s of thousands alone).
It is not even just in recent years, but over the last century, that the elephant population in southern Africa has fallen.
Another bonus, is that scientists are now finding clear proof in study after study, that elephants do better in reserves connected to other reserves, than they do in fortress reserves.
It is of course true, that a single reserve is better than nothing. However, increasingly, countries are recognizing that by building their reserves on the borders of their countries, their neighbours can also have reserves, and between them they can put aside enough land to truly allow elephants to live a more natural life.
From the Limpopo transfrontier park – a transfrontier reserve that includes the Kruger, to the Kalahari Zambezi transfrontier park, the Serengeti mara ecosystem and so many more, this is being shown over and over again.
Careful planning of reserves in west african rainforests, can expand this success at great speed if done carefully.
You will find images of each of these species below, linking to a page about each, similar or closely related species will be grouped together initially, until links require their splitting.Â
It should be noted that there are a few other species, which have been lost over time. These include 3 species of elephant bird from Madagascar and 9 species of Moa, all of which was found in New Zealand and all of which were lost. Thankfully at the current time, the Kiwi has not followed its bigger cousin, but we must not be laid back
Found across much of Africa, the common ostrich is a relatively common site in the right places. Capable of defending itself, it is usually only found in larger reserves. There are a number of subspecies click here to read more and visit our ostrich page
Restricted to the islands of New Zealand, the kiwi is not one species but 5. Having arrived on these islands when there were no land predators, they lost the ability to fly. Unfortunately the arrival of Europeans quickly changed this. Click here for the Kiwi page
The Rhea consists of two species, named the greater and lesser Rhea. They are found on the plains of eastern and southern South America. To visit their page, click here
Finally the Tinamous family, a group of 46 species. It is likely to be a while before I get round to building pages for all these species, but should you work in conservation or tourism with these species, you can help fill in the gaps. Although initially thought to be a sister clade, recent analysis has shown that these birds are part of the Ratite family –Â Tinamou birds can fly
Those I have put in pictures for (29) are here but we will hpe to add the rest over time, as well as building species pages
Birds are defined as warm-blooded vertebrates. They have feathers, toothless beaked jaws, a high metabolic rate, a 4 chamber heart, a strong and lightweight skeleton and the laying of hard-shelled eggs.
Now, within these constraints, the birds vary a great deal.
The smallest bird is the bee hummingbird, which has a wingspan of 6.8cm. The largest bird has a wingspan of 3.5m (40 times large). In terms of weight, the bee hummingbird is also the lightest at just 1.95 grams, the Kori bustard weighs as much as 19kg, which is almost 10000 times heavier (heaviest flying bird). The heaviest bird is the Ostrich, which can weigh over 100kg, though these can not fly.
Looking at it in a different way, there are roughly 10,000 species of birds in the world. Now, while this may change as this website grows (both with other authors, and assistance from readers) at the current time, it would be absurd to think that I could build a page for each of these many species. What this page will try to do, is to build a page for each group of birds. Of course, the other point of this website, is that this is to assist in people travelling to see these species in the wild. As such, while I am fully of the opinion that every bird matters, we will concentrate- to begin with, on birds which are popular and/or are interesting to see.
To start, below you will see the initial 2 clades (it should be noted that there was at one time 7 clades, which include clades like Diosaruia), and each clade has two families.Â
                  Palaeognathae (ratites and Tinamou)                                                        Neognathae
Struthionimorphae
This contains just 1 species the Osterich (alongside many extinct species). The male is black, the female is brown
 As this is all of the Struthionimorphae family, you will be able to visit the Osterich page by clicking on either image.
Notopalaeognathae
This contains Rheas, Cassowaries, Emus, Kiwis and Tinamous (as well as the extinct Moas and Elephant bird)
This family includes a number of species so as we build pages, they will be linked to images below (the pictures for these species in directly below here)
Pangalloanserae
There are two subgroups in this group, though Asterionis is extinct. The only other group is Galloanserae or fowl – containingÂ
180Â Â water-fowl (Anseriformes) species
 
290 Land-fowl (Galliformes) Species.
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Neoaves
This contains the rest of the birds not already included in another group. This is roughly 95% of birds.
Now, Understandably, this group covering 95% of birds, we will not be listing every species. However, we will endeavour to list groups of interest down to a lower level- I know that there is a great deal of interest in birds, and I will rely on this website taking off to a greater degree in order to push this further
This family is large and varied. We are going to start with currently agreed “magnificent seven” supraordinal clades, as well as the three orphaned orders.Â
Notopalaeognathae
Neoaves
In Zimbabwe, elephants started dropping dead, no-one knew why. This has now been solved, but were not any nearer to ending the problem, and now its spreading.
It is unfortunately a fact, that in the majority of instances, sudden deaths from an unknown illness are impossible to prevent until we know more.
In total, 300 died in Botswana with another 35 dying in Zimbabwe just 2 months later. 50 more elephants have died since in Botswana.
It turns out that these animals have fallen as a result of an obscure bacteria, and scientists are concerned that it could spread to other species.
Should something similar happen amongst, say the lions of an area, we could quickly see all the lions die.
It took 3 years but a wildlife veterinarian at the Victoria Falls wildlife trust has worked out what happened. Although initially thinking it was anthrax, it was spreading in a strange way, and killing to many animals.
It turns out that a bacteria called Pasteurella Bisgaard taxon 45 was responsible. It is relatively rare, and had not been known to kill elephants. Unfortunately, in previous heatwaves, similar issues have been known to jump the species barrier and kill large numbers of antelope – particular during a heat wave. This bacteria caused blood poisoning, and mostly killed recently weaned young, which are generally weaker anyway.
It is unfortunate that outbreaks like this are so easily linked to high temperatures, as our behaviour means that these high temperatures occur more often – so deaths like this may become a way of life. Given the slow rate of reproduction in elephants, this could threaten populations if not dealt with rapidly.
The same bacteria is thought to have been responsible for 200,000 saiga antelope dying on the steppe of Kazakhstan in 2015.
Oddly, this bacteria is thought to live happily in the mouths of a variety of animals from elephants and antelope, to lions tigers and even chipmunks. If all it takes for this bacteria to become deadly is an increase in temperature, we have a hard task ahead of us.
Currently, there are 350,000 savannah elephants in Africa, but this number is already declining by around 8% a year (around 26,000 animals each year, or the equivalent of twice the total elephant population of the Kruger national park – one of the largest in the world. While it is possible to turn this around it is not easy.
There are three species of elephant, the African savanna elephant, African forest elephant and the Asian elephant.
With the African species, Forest elephants have declined 86% between 1986 and 2015, African Bush elephants declined 60% 1965 and 2015 leaving just over 400,000. African forest elephants are thought to number between 100,000 and 150,000.
Perhaps the most scary fact is that the African forest elephant was only declared as a separate species in 2021 only 2 years ago. These species are not particularly similar – indeed the Asian elephant is more genetically similar to the mammoth, than the African savannah elephant is to the African forest elephant!
The African forest elephants population has declined precipitably in the last few years. Given the recognition that the forest elephant is a separate species only came 2 years ago, it is hard to get accurate historic figures. Never-the-less, the combined african elephant species population was thought to be around 26 million in 1800, and 1.34 million in 1976. The estimate is currently around 100-200,000 forest elephants. One of the problems, is that the African forest elephant is an essential part of the ecosystem. There are many trees, which rely on forest elephants to carry their seeds through the forest, so that they germinate a good distance from the original plant (more than a few of the same plant in the same area, causes the pest that feeds on the tree to multiply to the point where it can kill the tree. While it is true that other animals like gorillas and chimpanzees can do this, they do it far less. Should the forest elephant be lost, the African rainforest is likely to be far less capable of of handling the various changes, like climate change that is coming.
The last strongholds are in Gabon (a survey last year suggested Gabon has 95,000 forest elephants, rather than the 60,000 that was originally thought) and the Republic of the Congo and Democratic republic of the Cong, with smaller populations remaining in other African countries (Cameroon, Central African Republic, Equatorial Guinea) and Cote d’Ivoire, Liberia and Ghana in west Africa. There is much space for forest elephants to greatly recover, if the poaching is able to stop.
Below this, you will see a video on this species, and below this is a list of any times that the african forest elephant has been mentioned within this blog.
Below this, at the bottom of the page, we hope to list places where you can go to see this species in the wild – if you work in conservation or tourism around this species, do get in touch. we would love to list you, and it costs nothing to be listed, we merely work on commission.
One of the problems with cutting down rainforest, it often what is left is so fragmented that it is useless for conservation. Remaining blocks of forest must allow a viable population of the rarest creatures, in order for the animals not to need to travel outside protected areas.
In Borneo, like in Sumatra, there has been a rapid loss of rainforest over the last few decades. Often it is claimed that enough is left behind in order to conserve the animals that live there.
In Borneo, while there is still a large quantity of wilderness, this is increasingly fragmented.
Continue reading “Positive news from Borneo – reconnecting wilderness”
Established back in 1927, initially as a hunting reserve, it has been purely with a camera since 1964. Relatively small, only covering 62 square miles, it is sandwiched between the Kruger and the Sabi sands game reserve. As such, the game is incredibly dense.
There most luxury suites in each camp is 10, across all three camps so if every single one is inhabited, a large so called traffic jam would not stop you seeing the wildlife. Unlike in the Kruger itself, you are not restricted to roads, which means often very close encounters., it also make 62 square miles an enormous area to explore with your guide.
The skeleton coast in Namibia, is one of the few people where the desert runs right down to the sea. This desert area in Namibia is quite strange, as many species that do not usually live in desert region, but here they do.
Here freshwater springs permeate the barren sands to create life-sustaining oases for small pockets of wildlife in the middle of the desert. Hartmann’s mountain zebra, gemsbok, desert-adapted elephant, brown hyena, giraffe and – occasionally – cheetah may all be found in this wild and rugged landscape. This part of the coast hosts a several large cape fur seals colonies, which leads to fascinating moments like the above with lions hunting on the beach.
Below is a video, of a hyena deep in the desert, something not likely to be seen elsewhere.
This huge area of wilderness is actually made up of 4 reserves: Skeleton Coast national park, Dorob National Park (which contains Cape cross seal reserve -this is the largest of the 24 cape fur seals breeding colonies, with 80,000 to 100,000Â on site at its height. Fur seals are more closely related to sea lions than to seals), Namib-Naukluft national park and Tsau Khaeb national park. Any links will appear below as this site grows.
One of natures greatest spectacles, the Victoria falls lie within the national park that takes its name, and in turn is part of the vast Kalahari Zambezi Transfrontier park. The area around the falls contains a wealth of wildlife, Covering a total area of 56 000 hectares, both parks lie on the southern bank of the Zambezi River which forms the border between Zimbabwe and Zambia. There are a number of picnic and fishing sites available. Activities include guided tours, walks, day and sunset cruises, game drives and adventure activities.
The Rainforest – Here visitors can see unique flora and fauna. Bird species and small mammals may be spotted beneath the forest canopy whilst following the paths through the groves of Date Palm, Fig and Mahogany.
The Game Park – Elephant, Lion, Buffalo, Leopard and White Rhino (the Big Five) can be seen in the park as well as herds of Eland, Sable Antelope, Zebra, Giraffe, Waterbuck and Kudu amongst other smaller species. The Zambezi River is known for its Bream and Tiger Fishing. There are two game drive routes, one accessed through the main gate and the other from just outside town on the Bulawayo road.
