We are very pleased to announce that the Lion Guardians project has now officially expanded into Olgulului Group Ranch! The Group Ranch which surrounds the world famous Amboseli National Park is a huge area of communal land which also borders Eselenkei Group Ranch to the North, and Mbirikani to the East, where we already have…
Expert tracking skills
Steven from the Laikipia Predator Project came down to Mbirikani last week with expert tracker, Morani. Steven and Morani spent a week with the Lion Guardians developing their tracking skills even further for a new part of their work – spoor counting. Although the Lion Guardians are all expert trackers, Steven and Morani helped them…
Reuters visit Lion Guardians!
Yesterday the Lion Guardians were visited by Reuters, the world news agency. The crew visited Lion Guardian Mokoi’s boma where they were treated to tea and some songs from the mamas at the boma. Here are the Guardians swapping their news at Mokoi’s boma, while being filmed by Reuters. The film crew talked to Guardians…
Kenyan lions face extinction in 20 years?
A report in the Telegraph on Tuesday suggested that within 20 years lions may become extinct in Kenya. This follows a press release from KWS (Kenya Wildlife Service) which says that Kenya is losing an average of 100 of its 2,000 lions every year due to growing human settlements, increasing farming, climate change and disease.…
New Lion Guardians chosen!
The one month voluntary period by the new Lion Guardians on Eselenkei Group Ranch is now over. During this period the volunteering Lion Guardians have helped reinforce more than ten community bomas (livestock enclosures) to predator proof levels, found lost livestock herds in the bush and been tracking lions across the length & breadth of the…
Dead lion mystery is solved
You will probably remember the story of our collared female lion Nemasi and her 3 male cubs. Here is Nemasi and her cubs in March 2008. In February we were very sad to come across a dead sub-adult lion on the side of a hill called Olasera. A herder had found the carcass while looking…
Little lion cubs and a wandering lioness!
As we told you last week, we finally found our collared female lion Selenkay in Amboseli National Park. She had been wandering far and wide, around Amboseli and the surrounding communally owned Maasai land with 2 other females. On Saturday we received a call from Lion Guardian Mokoi to tell us he had been following…
More tests for new Lion Guardians
The Lion Guardians team recently conducted three workshops for our thirteen new Guardians who are hoping for employment. We trained and tested them on their tracking skills and reading and writing abilities, as well as carrying out some human-wildlife conflict role-play scenarios with them. The Maasai warriors were eager to learn as well as demonstrate…
1st lion collared on new ranch!
We are sorry the blog has been quiet for a while. We’ve been having some problems with our internet but I hope you will be pleased that we are now back and reporting on the work of the Lion Guardians here in Maasailand! Kamuna, one of the promising volunteer Lion Guardians in our new area…
New Lion Guardians! The selection process continues.
After months of waiting, we have finally been able to conduct interviews for three positions as Lion Guardians on Eselenkei Group Ranch. With the drought really affecting the area, the Maasai murrans (warriors) have been travelling huge distances throughout southern Kenya in search of better pastures for their famished cattle herds. Now after a little rain,…