The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust Wilderness Journal

Posted by nsheldrick on 28-Feb-2013, 4:23 pm UTC

Wings Over Tsavo

A hotbed of volcanic activity in the past, Kenya’s remote Tsavo ecosystem offers some of the most dramatic landscapes in the world. The impact of this landscape can be appreciated by simply driving down the Nairobi-Mombasa Highway, which bisects Tsavo and forms the boundary between Tsavo East and West National Parks. However, one cannot fully comprehend the magnitude of this remarkable place until taking...

Posted by nsheldrick on 13-Dec-2012, 5:36 am UTC

Lamu Cultural Festival 2012

Since being named a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2001, Lamu Old Town has held an annual cultural festival, intended to showcase the rich Swahili culture of the Lamu Archipelago and to help preserve the unique art and handicraft of Kenya’s oldest living town. Events are designed to encourage traditional skills such as henna painting, Swahili poetry, dhow sailing and dance. The donkey race is also...

Posted by nsheldrick on 22-Sep-2012, 12:57 pm UTC

Turning back the Clock on World Rhino Day by Dame Daphne Sheldrick

On a sunny morning towards the end of 1949, the Founder Warden of Tsavo East National Park, David Sheldrick anxiously awaited the very first visitors to the new Park he had been responsible for creating from the virgin bush of what formerly had been known only as the Taru desert. A few arterial tracks were now open, carved by hand with sweat and toil out of dense near impenetrable thorny thickets of...

Posted by stella.deane on 22-Jul-2012, 10:00 pm UTC

Orphans in Blankets

The colourful array of blankets hanging on the trees, fences and stockades of the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust Nairobi Nursery are now a familiar symbol of the elephant orphanage. When washed and dried these comforting blankets are an elephant’s best friend. In the wild, baby elephants are sheltered from the the wind, rain and sun by their loving and attentive elephant herd, from the cold of the night...

Posted by nsheldrick on 20-Jul-2012, 11:53 am UTC

Water is life — how nature provides by Daphne Sheldrick

Water is, indeed, life; for without it, there would be no life. Water is what makes our planet unique within our solar system. Evaporation from the land is sucked into the clouds of the sky, which float around the earth depositing it in the form of rain far and wide at certain times of the year into natural depressions and rocky fissures in wild places, over forests that act as sponges so that life...

Posted by nsheldrick on 7-Jul-2012, 4:33 pm UTC

Lamu’s Age-old Craft

Owing mainly to its location, Lamu has been an important port for hundreds of years. With African, Chinese, Portuguese, Arab, Indian and British influences, it has always been a melting pot. Many families can trace their lineage back to Omani forefathers and are still in contact with relatives in Oman. DNA analysis has also shown traces of Chinese heritage thought to have arrived when shipwrecked Chinese...

Posted by nsheldrick on 8-Jun-2012, 9:35 am UTC

Lessons with Ali: food and drugs in the wild

Something that the Lamu Conservation Trust is hoping to do on Amu is to begin work documenting the knowledge of local tribes like the Boni. Inspiration comes from the ranch’s tracker, Ali, whom I have met on several occasions. Nicknamed GPS for his uncanny ability to navigate in the bush, he has lived and learned the ways of this wilderness his entire life. Finding food and medicine in the wild, and...

Posted by nsheldrick on 8-Apr-2012, 6:01 am UTC

Wings over Amu

To effectively patrol its wilderness, project Amu employs a full-time pilot to patrol the skies above the ranch. The plane is kept on Manda Island, across a narrow channel from Lamu Island, where Nick Trent resides. He sets off by boat early in the morning to Manda and then sets off on the short commute to Amu from there. Despite the relatively flat nature of terrain along the Kenya coast, there is no lack...