Elephant Voices

Category: 2. Field News Kenya | Date: Dec 30 2007 | By: admin

Hi all,

After a few days with very few elephants coming into Amboseli National Park due to the recent rainfall outside, larger numbers are back. This is good news for our playback experiments, since our methodology requires that we have to wait for quite a few days before we can expose the same elephants to new sounds.

During the morning we met the EB family, the group that we have studied for many years, and that has been made famous through 3 BBC productions. We always enjoy seeing our study elephants, but must admit we felt that the 65-year-old matriarch, Echo, looked thin and gaunt. Is the long drought taking its toll, or are her teeth so worn down that she cannot feed herself effectively? Or, perhaps, she has other health challenges that affect her condition? Her lack of energy was evident when Iris, matriarch of the IAIC family, tusked Echo’s calf, Esprit, knocking her off her feet and rolling her over, so that her legs were up in the air. She screamed loudly and Aunt Eliot ran over to the rescue, even seeing off the decades older, Iris. But, Echo, didn’t so much as lift her head – highly unusual for a mother elephant.

In between playbacks we encountered a rare interaction between a baby elephant and a young male – and felt privileged to see how patiently the big boy let the baby study his activities.

We probably won’t be online tomorrow, and so we take the opportunity to wish all you and the elephants of Amboseli a peaceful 2008!

Greetings, Joyce and Petter

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Category: 2. Field News Kenya | Date: Dec 29 2007 | By: admin

Hi All,

After a few relaxing days on the Kenya coast we arrived back in Amboseli on the evening of 27^th. We were able to drive through Tsavo West on the way to the coast and through Tsavo East on the return journey. The two Tsavos amount to 22,000 sq km of national park – one of the biggest protected areas in the world. It was great to see how calm the Tsavo elephants are now. Back in the late 1980s, when the poaching of elephants for ivory was really high, Joyce did a survey of Tsavo’s elephants. Then they ran from approaching vehicles, but now they are almost as relaxed as Amboseli’s elephants. We watched three males engaged in relaxed sparring in the ankle-deep Galana River and many other groups, too.

The 27^th was election day in Kenya. Now, the 29^th, we are still waiting as some delayed results trickle in!

Meanwhile, we are back to work with several more playbacks accomplished. There has been a bit of rain outside the park and most of the elephants have been away for a few days to enjoy pasture further afield. There were only a couple of families in the park yesterday.

Early this morning we found the AA family on the eastern side of Ol Tukai Orok – an area they don’t usually enter, but may have felt emboldened to visit since the usual occupants were away! Anghared’s 2007 male calf was thrilled to meet a gaggle of egrets around the feet of its family members and had an elephant-of-a-time chasing them about! Notice the tone of his trumpet when you play the video clip!

We were fortunate to watch several groups as they returned to the park and arrived at the swamp edge. After a couple of days without water they were extremely thirsty and there was much excitement and jostling for best position.

Cheers, Petter and Joyce

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Category: 2. Field News Kenya | Date: Dec 21 2007 | By: admin

Back in the tent last night we heard rain – and we fell asleep hoping for plenty. When Petter drove to the ATE office in Ol Tukai this morning to check on e-mail and upload news pieces to WildlifeDirect he learned we received – 4 mm. “Better than nothing”, was Josephat’s dry comment. With rain the elephant movement patterns often change, fewer may go into the Park to access the water in the swamps. But, 4 mm does not make much of a difference after almost a year of drought, so we continue to cross our fingers for a few days of real downpour.

Early in the morning Joyce had a meeting in camp while Petter sat online. Then we spent a couple of hours out with Ulla’s and Philomena’s families. After a typical Elephant Camp lunch of cabbage and carrot salad and bread it was time to download and organize photos and deal with other “office” tasks. If we don’t have elephants, buffaloes, lions or monkeys around camp the sounds of numerous birds and insects always fill the air. Some of the individual birds have been with us for years, and are tame enough that they land on the table while we are eating and fly into our tent to beg for bread crumbs and other goodies. Elephants are an important symbol for all wildlife, but there are millions of other wonderful creatures all around us.

This is written just before we start packing our bags for a few days at the Kenyan coast, where we are going to celebrate Christmas with close friends. We will drive through the huge Tsavo ecosystem, to experience two of Kenya’s many amazing National Parks. We’re back in Amboseli on the 27^th of December.

We wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Petter and Joyce

Tags: africa, behavior, behaviour, elephant, elephants, elephantvoices, kenya

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Category: 2. Field News Kenya | Date: Dec 21 2007 | By: admin

Today we drove west, looking for elephant families for our roar playbacks while on our way to Tortilis Camp where we had arranged to have new shock absorbers fit and some annoying car rattles spot-welded. The western side of the Park is extremely dry and the elephants quite listless. The Tortilis mechanic Julius did an excellent job and we have the unexpected bonus of being invited to stay for lunch. With new shock absorbers our KAM853D gave us a smooth ride back to camp, and later we once again headed out for elephant families.

Our field vehicle got a visitor while we were busy preparing for some more playbacks. You can see yourself what attracted a neighbour of ours to jump into the car without being invited.

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Category: 2. Field News Kenya | Date: Dec 21 2007 | By: admin

This morning colleagues Cynthia Moss, Director of the Amboseli Trust for Elephants, and Betsy Swart, head of the US office of the Trust, arrived and we held a meeting in camp. In the evening Petter, Selengei and Joyce drove east toward Njiri and Olodare and were able to carry out another three playbacks before a beautiful Amboseli sunset. Our ten rather noisy lion friends waited for us just outside the camp.

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Category: 2. Field News Kenya | Date: Dec 21 2007 | By: admin

Most of the day was used to put together and test all our equipment. As usual Petter had to use his creative technical skills to find viable solutions to rigging the playback equipment in our field vehicle. In the late afternoon we were able to carry out 3 playbacks – all successfully, and without car problems!

Amboseli is a great place to experience wildlife at close range. At night ten lions tried to disturb us with load roaring, but tired from the heat and sun they didn’t manage to keep us awake. Noise from lions, elephants, hyenas and other animals occupying our surroundings is part of the background music of camp!

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Category: 2. Field News Kenya | Date: Dec 21 2007 | By: admin

Karen departed on the early morning flight and Joyce spent the morning out with Graeme and Katito Sayialel (field assistant of the Amboseli Elephant Research Project), doing playbacks, while Petter and Selengei went out to test our new Canon EOS 5D camera. Joyce had a wonderful morning watching the elephants’ response to a variety of playback stimuli, while Petter and Selengei, sat for almost four hours, in the hot sun in a a car that wouldn’t start. Not a very auspicious start!

Surrounded by buffalos, Petter decided not to walk back to the camp… This time it seemed that the problem was the battery. Luckily we were able to borrow a battery from another car. So with rear shock absorbers and a new battery on our list we called Nairobi and arranged for spares to be purchased and sent down.

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Category: 2. Field News Kenya | Date: Dec 21 2007 | By: admin

We departed for Amboseli at midday arriving at camp just after 17:00. The dirt road into the Park from the border town of Namanga was really corrugated, and we quickly realized how badly we needed new rear shock absorbers. The back of the car was wallowing back and forth, at times almost sliding off the road. Both Petter and Joyce are used to corrugations, but this was frightening.

The park looked extremely dry and barren. Last year we were in Amboseli during a period of tremendously high rainfall, but there has been very little rain since then. The long rains of March/April failed and it seems that the short rains of November/December have failed, too. One can’t help wondering if the extremes are a consequence of global warming.

It was wonderful to drive into the Elephant Camp – an oasis surrounded by palm trees in the middle of the park – and to meet our old friends, Josephat and Saruni, who are among its caretakers. Karen McComb and Graeme Shannon, with whom we are collaborating on a study of elephant social knowledge, came out to greet us, too.

We had an entertaining evening catching up on elephants and playbacks before Karen left the following morning to return to Sussex University.

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Category: 2. Field News Kenya | Date: Dec 21 2007 | By: admin

Today was spent making arrangements for our trip to Amboseli and meeting up with Mark Mwongela from Intrepid Data Systems who is building a searchable Elephant ID database for the Amboseli Elephant Research Project. Petter and Joyce have taken the lead in organizing the building of the database, defining the protocols and discussing these with the Intrepid team. We arranged for Mark to be driven in our car to meet us: the car broke down and Mark was stuck waiting while mechanics tried to repair it for almost five hours!

Eventually the car was (at least partially) repaired and Mark arrived. We are so pleased with the work that they have done, thus far. The database needs a bit of tweaking here and there, but we expect to have it available to field test in a few days! You have no idea how exciting this is for all of us. For years we have relied on an enormous stack of ID cards that we have to search through one by one to identify elephants (for those of us who don’t recognize all of them).

Having just started on the long list of essential repairs of our Land Cruiser, we were a little concerned about next day’s trip to Amboseli, well aware that the condition of the road would leave us both shaken AND stirred.

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Category: 1. General News, 2. Field News Kenya, Support Appeals | Date: Dec 13 2007 | By: admin

Joyce and Petter here,

While we frantically prepare for our field trip to Kenya (we depart tomorrow December 14th) we receive a message that our field vehicle, a rugged 1993 model Toyota Landcruiser, desperately needs repair. As you can see from the pictures, it meets some tough challenges in Amboseli. During the last couple of weeks another researcher has been using it, but because of starting problems it is currently “out of business”. The long list written by a mechanic in Amboseli makes us despair:

• Fuse box, which needs replaced due to a short, which results in overheating and the fuses melting
• Replace rear shock absorbers (x2) as they are very worn and leaking. (TZ reccomends the gas type)
• The universal joint on the prop shaft needs replacing as it is worn and there is a lot of play.
• Replace the top link bushes, which are both worn and cracked.
• The rear silencer is very old and worn and in need of replacement.
• The stabiliser bushes at the front of the car are exhibiting a lot of play and need to be looked at.
• The oil seal on the transfer box is leaking oil.
• Both tire rod ends are very worn and must be replaced as a matter of urgency.
• The hub oil seals are leaking on both thr front right and left wheels.
• Both rear stabiliser bushes need replaced.
• Finally, the front arm bushes are worn, especially on the left hand side.

We are arranging to have the immediate problems dealt with as a matter of urgency, but will have to assess the rest of the long list when we are in Kenya. Being an old bush-car we may have to accept some peculiarities… We are extremely grateful for any contribution towards meeting the substantial costs we will have to face - our dear old Landcruiser is vital for our work and the elephants are totally relaxed around it.

And now the final packing before our AM departure tomorrow… You’ll hear more about our field vehicle and other issues later!

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