June 17, 2010

Damiano recently demonstrated how elephants need and will utilize safe corridors. In Kasane, a wildlife corridor is designated from the forest reserve to the river. This corridor crosses the tar road and is situated between 2 large fruit and vegetable fields. Elephant herds walk past the fields to get to the water and to attain nutrient rich soils along the river’s bank. Here is a map of Damiano’s movements this week and how he avoided conflict with people and used the corridor:

Damiano utilized the Kasane corridor early June

June 10, 2010

Damiano was found amongst a large breeding herd

First day back in the field, we tracked and found “Damiano” from Zimbabwe, now wandering in the Chobe/Kasane area amongst a huge breeding herd. He is another “released” elephant after spending 10 years in captivity at a sanctuary. Glad to see he is doing so well!  Read: www.elephantswithoutborders.org/collaborations

June 8, 2010

Dr. Mike Chase is presenting our latest project, “Elephant Conservation & Community Outreach Farming Project” at a human-elephant conflict workshop being sponsored by Conservation International in Maun, Botswana. Attendees are expected from Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and South Africa.  To read more about this project see: www.elephantswithoutborders.org/living_with_elephants.php

June 3, 2010

Exciting news from Zimbabwe… Mary, the matriarch of the released Hwange elephant herd has a new calf.

Mary and her month old calf

Roger Parry, our partner in monitoring this herd, was out on a routine visual check of the herd when Mary came out from the grass, and just below her belly appeared her calf! However, the grass was too tall to determine the calf’s gender. He reported that the herd, mother and calf all looked like they were doing well. There was  another elephant, not part of the original herd, that is with them and may also be a new addition.

May 29, 2010

The results are out… EWB was rated as one of the top 125 organizations in the Green Choice Campaign! Great Non-profits lists 1.2 million nonprofits. Thank you to all those that wrote reviews and comments! http://greatnonprofits.org/reviews/profile2/ewb-inc-dba-elephants-without-borders

May 25-29, 2010

We are pleased to be spending the week in San Diego, meeting with our collaborative partners from the San Diego Zoo, Wild Animal Park and SDZ’s Institute for Conservation Research and their various department members. Thank you to all of our wonderful hosts and those that attended Dr. Chase’s presentations at both San Diego Zoo’ s Institute for Conservation Research and the Zoo… it was wonderful to see so many familiar faces of continued support!

April 14, 2010

Another Congratulations! goes out to our colleagues and their herd at San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park, for their new “trunkful of joy”… it’s a bull! (the second in 2 months!) http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=3851177&id=28896772146

April 13, 2010

Beyond Borders April 2010

New EWB reports and maps are now available! The Chitabe aerial survey report, Elephant movement maps for Jan-Mar and “Beyond Borders Progress Report April 2010″ and a link to new published scientific publication on mapping corridors and barriers. http://www.elephantswithoutborders.org/downloads.php

April 7, 2010

bull at EWB office fence

Kasane/Kazangula are the epitomy representation of the elephant issues we face, right now, here in Botswana. It is wonderful to sit in our offices and watch a full breeding herd pass, but them having to use a 3m corridor next to the fences and face traffic to get to the river is a reality, but on the flip, yesterday a… woman was killed by eles just down the road from here.

March 30, 2010

A summary of the 15th Convention of the International Trade of Endangered Species of wild fauna and flora is now available, see: http://www.iisd.ca/download/pdf/enb2167e.pdf

March 29, 2010

lemons and corn in elephant dung

This is the time of year that elephants frequent our homebase village of Kazangula and township of Kasane, every night they walk past our gates to drink at the rising Chobe river, every eve we hear drums to keep them away from homes, every morn we hear the horns honking, as they are crossing the road to head back into …the forest reserve. Today’s dung check on our driveway revealed lemons and corn.

March 20, 2010

EWB’s Elephant Conservation & Community Outreach Farming Project update: 2,000 chillie plants planted at the field site this week! They need alot of water, so fingers crossed for more rain

Wildlife conflict reality: Hundreds of vultures were killed this week nearby, in the vicinity of a vulture nesting ground, a grim consequence of someone poisoning a cattle carcass very likely to target lions in the area… it’s a stark realization of a human persepective, attitude and outlook that conservationists work with here.

March 13, 2010

The Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) begin their week long meetings today, in Dohar (Qatar) 1,500 delegates will attend the world conference and debate on 42 proposals slated, including the fate of the elephant ivory trade. To read more:

http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID=617&ArticleID=6495&l=en

The listing proposals can be viewed at http://www.cites.org/eng/cop/15/prop/index.shtml

March 11, 2010

In today’s news: from the IUCN (the International Union for Conservation of Nature) “Red List Status of the African Elephant Corrected” http://iucn.org/about/work/programmes/species/red_list/?4895/RedListStatusoftheAfricanElephantCorrected

elephants spook as gunshots rang from across the river

The Chobe river is rising and the elephants are loving it. However, this afternoon as I was observing their water antics, gunshots rang out from across the river, sending the herds into a panic. Fishermen, over a kilometer away were shooting to scare them to not cross into Namibia. The villagers likely are concerned ab…out crop-raiding. It is a complex dilemma… borders come in many forms.

March 8, 2010

This morning, we gave a talk on EWB and elephant conservation to the SIT Study Abroad/World Learning students visiting from the USA. We extend to them, a warm wish of an enjoyable and educational experience here, while in Botswana!

March 5, 2010

Elephant research colleagues in Kenya were devasted as floods washed away their research camp. Luckily no one was hurt. Our sympathy goes out to Iain Douglas-Hamilton and his team at Save the Elephants.  To read more about the floods, see: http://www.nation.co.ke/News/-/1056/873512/-/vr6ga0/-/

February 26, 2010

Recent elephant movements in relation to some of Botswana’s veterinary fences and the Okavango Delta (red is the vet fences, the other colors and points are particular elephants and their paths)

Elephant movements relating to Botswana vet fence

February 22, 2010

Farmers and elephants having conflict in the Tuli area of Botswana, read about it in the Sunday Standard http://sundaystandard.info/news/news_item.php?NewsID=7056&GroupID=1

Elephants Without Borders is trying to address this issue, read about it on our web page at http://www.elephantswithoutborders.org/living_with_elephants.php and the projects progress is posted on our latest blog EWB Field Research Site Update

February 18, 2010

Two men accused of smuggling ivory out of Botswana, read about it in the Botswana Gazette http://www.gazettebw.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5532:chinese-men-alleged-to-have-tried-to-smuggle-ivory-&catid=18:headlines&Itemid=2

February 13, 2010

Naledi, one of our tracked elephants, is “up to it, again” and has suddenly made a bee-line walk northeast 40+ miles across the southern periphery of the Okavango Delta, another named Kwebe, darted almost 6o miles south towards the once-dry but now filled, Lake Ngami!

January 25, 2010

Dr. Mike Chase and Kelly Landen are en route to attend the International Elephant Conservation & Research Symposium being held this week in South Africa. The conference schedule includes various presentations, meetings, panel discussions and posters from elephant researchers and conservationists from around the World, including the USA, UK, India, Denmark, Japan, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Austria and countries throughout Africa.  Topics to be covered vary from emerging diseases, reproduction, new technologies in elephant conservation, veterinary care, management of elephants, and living with elephants. We will keep you posted!

January 23, 2010

EWB volunteered to help support and assist Birds Life Botswana on their bi-annual wetlands bird species count. In addition to the traditional ground count, we agreed to do an aerial count w/photos to supplement and compare to the ground count. We took to the air in mid-morning and the flight took only a few hours. Landing, we drove into the park to assist the ground teams. We are happy to report, the bird count went well.  However, on a personal observation seemed that there may be a decline in fish eating species.  Now we are anxious to see the final analysis and comparison results. The Birds Life teams were led by Pete Laver and Mark Vandewalle. We’d like to acknowledge Gavin Blair for the use of his plane and expertise.

January 20, 2010

Beyond Borders 2009

Now Available: “Beyond Borders: Year in Review, Research & Conservation with Elephants Without Borders, 2009″ Download it now on EWB’s Downloads page, under Reports (click here)

January 12, 2010

Bull attending to a zebra foal's wounds

Another interesting observation sent to us by David Dugmore (thank you!) “This foal come to the waterhole having survived a lion attack. It is believed that the mother was killed and the foal escaped with scratches.This bull was throwing sand onto the wounds! When the elephant stopped, he continued to drink. Sadly, however, the foal eventually died. But the body was protected from hyenas and jackals by the elephant bulls for most of the night!”

January 10, 2010

Elephants Without Borders surpassed 1000 fans that have signed up to follow us on Facebook! If you have not already… log on and join our herd! www.facebook.com/pages/Elephants-Without-Borders/220139555561

January 8, 2010

Just in, San Diego Zoo’s new promotion to help raise funds for their collaboration with Elephants Without Borders, to help support our work: You’ve probably heard the expression “the elephant in the room,” but how about the elephant in the iPhone? Now you can carry elephants with you, courtesy of our brand-new iPhone app. Created especially for us by The Blimp Pilots, creators of Koi Pond, the number one downloaded app of 2008, our animated, interactive app brings you a herd of elephants. You can direct them with a touch, provide food for them, get them to swim, hear them trumpet, and choose three different environments. The Elephant Odyssey iPhone app sells for 99 cents, but the best part is that 60 cents of each download benefits the San Diego Zoo’s elephant conservation work in Africa. Look for it in the iPhone app store!

Get it here: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/elephant-odyssey/id346258636?mt=8