Searching the Elusive Bonobo in Congo

Category: bonobo, people | Date: Jun 28 2007 | By: admin

A bonobo in a zoo. (Flickr image) Good photos in the forest are still a rarity. Note the black face…different from a chimpanzee.

When I started to write this post, I knew it would be pretty humiliating !

Ok, so I have worked out here in the DR Congo, in Salonga National Park (see some nice photos of the park from a former colleague), for 18 months before starting on this new project and yes you guessed it I had never seen a Bonobo in the wild. In fact I still have never seen one in captivity as I am not a big fan of zoos. But this week I saw bonobo. And in the wild too! So I manage to save face!

Previously, the closest I had come is branches bobbing wildly and dark blurs about 15 meters over my head, along with the racket of a rapid bonobo retreat. I could pretend that I saw something, but no it was mainly waving leaves. But the sound! Bonobo cries are a forest sound not easy to forget.

My feeble defence was always: For the conservation of Bonobos it is not important to see any of them, it is important to know they are there and also to know what threatens them. In Salonga that I definitely learned. I have seen tens, no hundreds of nests, what they throw to the ground and evidence of their eating. What I really saw a lot of in Salonga, was evidence of hunting: snare traps and shotgun shells. Scary really.

So there you have it. Almost humiliated and just for a blog, but then I saw the prize! But there always is some humiliation: I’m sitting here getting covered with ants just when I risked feeling proud of myself !

–

Read more on the bonobo in Wikipedia. And an interesting blog post about what inventory work is from my former colleague, Kim Gjerstad. I also update my photos once in a while, so check out my Flickr account.

2 responses so far

Category: bonobo, wildlife | Date: Jun 26 2007 | By: admin

Sunrise over the Lomami River.

We are about 100 km south of Opala as the river meanders. Half that much as the crow flies. If you have a satellite image (google earth) and follow the Lomami river south from Opala you will come to the last three tiny villages. They are half hidden by cloud cover. We are in the second one.

And there are monkeys all around. Just cruising around in the morning this is what we saw:

• -Black Mangabey – both banks of the Lomami. See a photo on Flickr and read a good San Diego Zoo article.
• -Red Colubus west bank only so far. See Flickr search results for a variety of races.
• -Red tailed guenon (apparently a hybrid type) both banks. Here’s a good photo of one variety of red-tail on Flickr. Below is a photo of what I saw south of Opala.
• -And I think it was the Blue monkey that we saw on the east bank.

Being watched by a red-tailed guenon.

But here is the BIG news. We saw bonobo on the east side of the Lomami. First we heard them, a real racket. We knew right away it was bonobo and not chimp. Very high pitched. So we pulled the pirogue over as quickly as we could. I was sure that they would have fled as we maneuvered in to shore but a mother with her baby and a young “juvenile” were still visible.

They were obviously bonobo with the distinct dark face. I have a few seconds of video of the mom with her baby.

I was ecstatic when we got back to base camp, in fact I don’t even care that I am covered in a ton of red spots. They don’t itch or anything but very odd. The guys think it was from me swimming in the river last night. Probably right…

Our location is good for a base camp. These are the coordinates S01.19230, E024.84041, in case you want to drop in. Actually, here it is in Google Maps.

It is a really good location but unfortunately there are absolutely millions of bees. So you probably don’t really want to drop in. The bees make it very hard to do anything. A nightmare in fact. So we might have to move on, or it could be just the season. I have to type this in my tent.

And we don’t get good satellite connection here so, to send this, I will have to paddle out to the middle of the Lomami.

Ashley connected from the middle of the Lomami River with a Bgan (behind the laptop).

4 responses so far

Category: Places, Threats, wildlife | Date: Jun 22 2007 | By: admin

Diamond miners inside the Rubi-Tele Reserve

While Ashley was just starting to negotiate the Lomami River to the south of Kisangani, two exploration teams (simlar to Ashley’s teams) finished their two-week inventories in the Rubi Tele Reserve to the north of Kisangani.

We knew there were diamonds north of Kisangani and I was not surprised to find that up the road to Buta there were many small-time miners digging and wading in the forests and rivers searching for the brilliant stones, looking for a brilliant exit from poverty. BUT we have learned two new things:

• North of Kisangani, in the Rubi Tele Reserve, Dino and his teams found that the wildlife has been plundered to feed the miners on the diamond frontier. More about that below.
• South of Kisangani, Ashley has found that there are diamond miners. We don’t yet know how far they have gone into the forest or south of Opala. Ashley will find out and post that later.

After finishing the inventory of the Rubi Tele Reserve, Dino sent the following news from the one and only Cyber Café in Buta with its second hand antique Dells:

We will work up our data during the next week but already we can tell you that the animals in Rubi Tele Reserve are under threat, particularly on the west side of the road. The good news is that deep in the forest on the east side of the road we still found signs of forest elephant, okapi, forest hogs and chimpanzees. On some of our transects there were even 11-12 chimpanzee nest groups!

Unfortunately, other monkeys are very threatened everywhere and shotgun shells litter the forest floor. The hunting is heaviest around each of the camps at diamond mining operations. Bows and arrows, spears and various guns including AKs from the rebellion are used. Hunters even go out with lamps and shotguns at night to paralyze their game in the bright light, then shoot them.

Rubi-Tele pangolin caught and killed in snare trap

Now we are looking for gasoline so that the little hotel where we are staying in Buta will be able to run the generator and we can work on our computers to enter data. We will be in touch again very soon.

The next update from Dino’s teams will be in one to two weeks.
Bon courage, Dino, Kahindo, Crispin and Paka. Good work!

Shotgun shells being sold in Rubi-Tele diamond mining camp

Terese

3 responses so far

Category: Threats | Date: Jun 20 2007 | By: admin

Wads of Congolese Francs (500FC is approximately a dollar). Green dollar bills might be required depending on your problem.

This is the one area of this work that I am just not very good at.

You need to have patience in abundance, and then some. Out here it is a world away from Europe or America. Totally different rules apply. However an obvious defense which does not improve my patience: immense poverty, no education, and complete isolation do change the rules. I am talking about dealing with the officials , and the multitude levels of bureaucracy.

For example, I have official documents from the government in the capital, Kinshasa, but in Kisangani (still DR Congo of course) they said they are for Kinshasa not here! Then I get documents in Kisangani for the whole Province Orientale and the people here in Opala (still Province Orientale of course) say they are for Kisangani, not here!

Then there are the incredibly numerous departments that have to be dealt with everywhere. For example here in Opala (see it in Google Maps), a small village basically in the middle of nowhere, there is an immigration dept and they asked for my passport and to see my visa. How on earth do they think I got here. As if there was an international airport in Opala, flying daily to London direct! See, already I lost my patience and I’m just typing about it…

Finally for me there is the problem of dealing with people I would rather not know. I refer to people like the Colonel who held us up for 4 days. I’m not sure he is even a real Colonel but he seems to think he is and all the people here fear him immensely. All I know about him is that he is a former Mai Mai rebel leader who understandably has been integrated into the army, at least I think he has.

What else do you do with people like that? He bullies, intimidates, procrastinates, talks an incredible amount of rubbish and in the end we have to slip him something so we get a smooth passage. His former rebels still here in the forest, apparently. He gave us a signed letter saying we are basically ok and not here to exploit the DR Congo.

In defence of the average Congolese, they do not necessarily like this either but when you have people who work in government departments and do not get paid what else are they to do? They know that the rare white persons that turns up will have money. The problem is no legitimate businesses are ever going to bother here big time with so much corruption.

I feel this is like one of those Catch 22 situations. You starve if you don’t accept bribes because you don’t get paid, but if you do accept bribes then you give the DR Congo a bad name and hold it back from progressing. Hmmm…

Mai mai in Opala, holding court

4 responses so far

Category: About the project, people | Date: Jun 19 2007 | By: admin

Monumental trips need team work. The exploration up the Lomami River, through the heart of the Congo, is monumental. Ashley is in a giant dugout and with a well-seasoned Congolese team, but none have been up the Lomami.

Ashley, himself, has been seasoned by the spicey, somewhat dicey, wilds of the Salonga National Park, where he did his first forest/bonobo inventory – enough to teach him that team work is essential. In fact there are three basic parts to this TL2 (Tshuapa-Lomami-Lualaba) exploration team:

1. Field – for now that is only Ashley and his crew
2. Congolese logistics and support – that’s me and an irreplaceably good-spirited young Congolese woman (also secretary and gofer)
3. Financial and administrative backbone - this is essential - up to the present we rely on three foundations that hold us up like a three-legged stool.
   • Alexander Abraham Foundation
   • Arcus Foundation
   • Lukuru Wildlife Foundation

A trip into unknown wilderness where there are no villages, almost no written history, and no trade requires preparation. There is the obvious like taking a truly comprehensive first aid kit and all the fuel you need to get the 35 horsepower motor all the way upstream and enough to assure your rapid return.

But most striking in almost every letter Ashley sends back from the field are the unforeseen costs: the rent for the temporary base in Kisangani, the gifts to the village elders in Opala, the high prices caused by the “underground” wealth from the diamond mines, etc etc.

Two foundations have given us the possibility to push ahead. Friends at the Abraham Foundation introduced us to the Arcus Foundation and suggested we write a proposal. Nancy Abraham said that she would supply matching funds if Arcus would provide the basic funding for the proposal.

What better inspiration could there be? I spent a month researching and writing a complete proposal with enthusiastic support from the would-be field team.

Arcus Foundation fully funded the part of the proposal we hoped they would fund. They committed to 300,000 USD over three years. And Abraham provided the match, another 100,000 dollars. Altogether, and in one step, we had half of the entire funding we needed for the first two years. A single year — at full activity – costs between 350,000 and 400,000 USD.

A small NGO (Lukuru) stepped forward and offered us an administrative home from which to launch the project. Lukuru is dedicated to conservation in the south-western part of bonobo range and provides much more of a home than the word “administrative” conjures up. These are our colleagues, field mates, and among the un-dauntable.

So field work could begin… and obviously has.

Terese

5 responses so far

Category: people | Date: Jun 18 2007 | By: admin

Terese was in Salonga National Park earlier this year. Salonga is the only national park in the world with bonobo. Terese is dancing with wives of park guards.

After more than thirty years in DR Congo, I am now coordinator of the TL2 project (Tshuapa-Lomami-Lualaba project). I work closely with Ashley, who is now paddling up the Lomami and keeping us updated in this blog. But you will read me here, too, working to the north and west of TL2 and putting nature conservation in the local context — as I understand it.

I came to the Ituri Forest in 1974 as a Peace Corps volunteer. Those two years I taught high school Biology, lived in a Swahili-speaking family and collected dragonflies. John Hart, a friend from college, also in Congo, and I decided to get married. This idea came one night on a two-month bicycle trip we took along the Albertine Rift.

In 1980 we returned to DR Congo together, with a 2 year old daughter, to do our PhD research, John on rain forest antelope and myself, the trees. After two and a half years in the Ituri Forest we returned to the States, now with two daughters.

The first project John and I shared was a study of rainforest giraffe, the Okapi. Based in Congo’s Ituri Forest we captured okapi, put on radio collars and then followed the released animals with hand-held antenna over a 50 sq km checkerboard trail system. During that four-year project our third (and last) daughter was born. New York Zoological Society continued to support us as we diversified our animal and forest work. We also built a Research and Training Center (CEFRECOF) and I was first director. We worked with our colleagues to assure that part of the Ituri Forest was protected as the Okapi Reserve.

During the years of Congo’s Civil Wars 1996 – 2002, I moved to a more national approach to conservation. From the capital, Kinshasa, I served briefly as national director for an international conservation NGO. Now, still from a Kinshasa base, I work independently with conservation of Congo’s little-known natural richness as first priority. And top of the list is exploration of the Tshuapa-Lomami-Lualaba basins (TL2). As coordinator of the TL2 project, I am convinced we will find out what must be protected and help make conservation a reality.

Terese

3 responses so far

Category: Places | Date: Jun 16 2007 | By: admin

On the way to Opala, the forest reclaims old colonial buildings. The roof is partly gone but people still live here.

–
Ashley is on his last big stop before his research work starts. In Opala, he meets chiefs and others, gets extra groceries. After this, it’s the unknown. Do diamond diggers meet chimps, bonobos and okapis south of the Opala? We’ll find out in the next coming weeks. See where Opala is on Google Maps.

To our knowledge, very few videos and images exists of wild bonobos. But here’s an amateur video from San Diego zoo on youtube to give you an idea. Also, see the strange okapi in this video on youtube, also taken in a zoo.
–

This is a strange village.

Being the last major village on the river you would think it might have a frontier feel about it, but it does not. It has a feel of desperation about it.

There is no work and things are difficult for the local people. Although there is some business here the village does not seem to profit from it, or maybe it is just not enough. Apparently there are diamonds in the surrounding forest and they are being exploited. There is also a lot of upland rice grown around the village.

To explain how difficult life is here: a person who is willing to take a pirogue from here to Kisangani with 5 people and merchandise, that is a person who will use an oar and slowly pull the pirogue all the way, will get paid 20,000FC. That is equivalent to about $40. It will take him a month!! This is 12 hours per day of very hard physical labor in rain or burning sunshine. Hmmm, makes me wonder how many people in the UK or USA would be willing to do that if (or when) temperate prosperity lessened.

Every chief of village or group of villages has got word that we are here. They are all arriving hoping for a little something, and to say hello and see who these new people are. However they seem very disappointed when we tell them that we are only going farther into the forest and a very long way away. Only one chief here is important for us. The chief is a she which is a first for me. She arrives today apparently which will be interesting. The more females in charge in DRC the better, I believe.

In fact I believe that all around the world.

There are many old buildings built when the Belgium’s were here. Now, nearly all these buildings are in disrepair. Some are used for administrative offices, but they really need an injection of TLC — or just plain cash for upkeep. They were once wonderful and still be could be again. Hope springs eternal!

Opala, the final stop before commencing the real voyage…

No responses yet

Category: Places | Date: Jun 15 2007 | By: admin

The Lomami river is huge. We have gone over 250km along it already and it is still over 300m wide. We have another 600km to go!

It is a dark river full of detritus. I swim in it and cannot see more than couple of feet in front. No crocs yet! It also has a strong flow. You cannot tread water and stay in one place. You quickly float down the river. It is also remarkably warm for such a huge river.

There are many villages along its bank over the first 200km. They are mainly small villages with just a few mud huts but some are much larger containing hundreds of mud huts. Although they all look similar they do, in fact, all have slightly different characteristics. Some will have a church or seem to have some sort of organization.

It will take us three days traveling down the Lomami before we get to the final large village, Opala.

Some villages come across as friendly with everybody waving and smiling whilst other villages seem to glower; people stare at me and demand things (food etc). Not sure why the villages are different but it might have to do with the prosperity of the village.

With all the villages along the edge, at first the forest was quite degraded but now it has changed and I’m getting a real buzz out of what might be in those trees….

–

Terese Hart, my colleague (boss) in the city, wrote an earlier article on why we are here.

One response so far

Category: bonobo, wildlife | Date: Jun 13 2007 | By: admin

A view from our pirogue. This is a load of stools made from forest rattan on its way to be sold in Kisangani. See more photos on Ashley’s Flickr account.

We have been in Opala, south of Kisangani, for one day now. Arrived yesterday evening.

Have gone through all the formalities and all seems ok. I’ll be here for two more days before heading off. Stocking up on food and getting the rest of people needed for the teams.

So far I have found out some interesting things about the area around here.

1. There is diamond mining going on.
2. The Mai Mai (armed group) are here in the forest.
3. Some people have said there are Bonobo and chimpanzee in the same forest.
4. When questioned about how he new the difference he described the 2 species very accurately and the difference between them.
5. Okapi are here in the forest.
6. The river is navigable but there are some rapids.

The first two are probably true, but oddly the village is very poor so no money from the diamonds is arriving here in the village.

I don’t believe there are bonobo and chimps in the same forest but there might be chimps and bonobos here but either side of the river. Nobody seems to differentiate between either side of the river as different forest. Still very interesting.

Excellent news that Okapi are here.

Not sure I believe anything people say about the river as it changes all the time.

A person bought a monkey killed by a hunter today. It was ascanius. But interestingly it was the same ascanius as in Epulu (village in the Okapi Wildlife Reserve, a World Heritage Site in DR Congo) and according to the French book* on monkeys that should not be here! So already we have an unusual situation. Unfortunately as I have already said no one could confirm exactly where the monkey was killed. Which side of the river. Going to talk to more hunters tomorrow and try to get as much info as possible.

The real adventure is about to begin. The info we get here is going to be amazing I think.

There is woman here to do with immigration and she knows Terese and John Hart from Epulu! She mentioned Jojo and Bekah and Sarah [their daughters]. How odd. Her name is Utulo Charlotte I believe. A tall slender woman. Seems plesent enough.

All the way along the river so far the forest has been terra firm, no swamp! If the river continues like that then it is going to be amazing here.

See more photos of the last few days on my Flickr account.

–
* Gauthier-Hion, A., Colyn, M, & Gauthier, J-P.  1999.  Histoire naturelle des primates d’Afrique centrale. ECOFAC, Libreville.

6 responses so far

Category: Threats | Date: Jun 03 2007 | By: admin

While Ashley searched for the perfect pirogue in Kisangani – I headed NORTH into diamond country.

When fully outfitted Ashley will paddle SOUTH (with a 35 horsepower outboard on his dugout) into the unknown and uninhabited forests of the Lomami River. The North is better known country, but full of secrets. Diamond secrets.

North of Kisangani, the road to Buta that was once tiled and drained is now deeply eroded right down the middle. A multi-agency project (Pro-Routes) is planning to rehabilitate it in the near future.

A consortium of major donors is helping develop the whole north-east sector of DR Congo by widening roads that have eroded into incredible disrepair. One of these roads, now little more than a well-worn foot trail, goes through the Rubi Tele Reserve.

As a consultant, I was asked to find out the condition of the Reserve before road-work begins. What animals are there? Are they really protected? And if exploited, how and by whom?

We went in a caravan of six motorbikes, sturdy little yamaha 100-sport. On each motorbike the driver, the passenger, and a small mountain of provisions were squished together tight as bacon, lettuce and tomato. Four of the motorbikes carried the team-leaders for the forest inventory. They will be in the forest until the third week of June. We will post their report when they get back.

Each motorbike carried a passenger as well as a big cargo of food and camping gear.

My mission was to accompany the team leaders to Sukisa, park headquarters in the center of the Rubi Tele Reserve, three days by motorbike from Kisangani and two days return. Sukisa which is little more than a clutter of crumbling mud and leaf thatch buildings is where we did the final organization and launch of the inventory.
This Reserve covers approximately 11,500 km2 or about 4,400 sq miles of equatorial forest, much of it golden, high-biomass mbau forest. This type of forest is a specialty of DR Congo although it narrowly follows some river valleys north into Congo Brazzaville and even Cameroon. But here in DR Congo it not only lines river verges but rolls over the hills in between with trunks so close, that the heavy leaves hang like a tarp slung from thick poles.

This is the canopy over the Okapi, DR Congo’s own forest giraffe, a regal slow-stepping animal known to be particularly at home in the Rubi Tele Reserve, along with forest elephant, forest buffalo, chimpanzees, other primates and forest antelope. At least the Rubi Tele Reserve was a peaceful home until diamonds were discovered north of Kisangani.

The warden and I are on the Tele bridge, about to enter the Reserve. It is hot. I am in long sleeves and scarf because of the motorbike’s mud and dust.

At Sukisa the “régisseur” or warden who is the person who “controls” the Reserve for the Parks Institute gave me the names of the diamond mines he knows about inside the Reserve. There are 35!! With names like “god’s gift” , “Brussels”, “United States”, “talk well”, “white heart”, “promised land”. Most were apparently small with usually about 20 to 30 people. But several were used by hundreds of panners. The régisseur smiled hopelessly “they all eat bushmeat” he said. He has four park guards and one gun with which he is supposed to control the whole Reserve.

Okapi in the Ituri Forest Okapi Reserve. It is as big as a small horse, but really most closely related to the giraffe with whom it shares a leaf diet, stripping the rain forest leaves from the forest understory with a long prehensile tongue. Photo by Kim Gjerstad.

The really big mines though are south of the Reserve. When we crossed the Aruimi (dugout ferry :three motorbikes to one dugout) the helmsman pointed up river. At 20 km upriver are rapids, more than 5000 people are there looking for diamonds… they too are all eating bushmeat. There are divers, dredgers and panners. All are amateur, semi-legal, and distribute pay-offs to local chiefs, regional officials, and military. They work in groups of four to twenty.

My motorbike driver said that once we were back in Kisangani he could find me Evariste, the little brother of Pastor Maseko, who has first rights to the entire rapids and has built a huge local church in celebration of god’s goodness.
Evariste was short, wearing flipflops and riding one of the larger brands of motorbikes. “Yeah” he smiled sizing me up — “do you want to buy??” So far they sold only to the local Lebanese buyers. They had found stones of 15 to 20 karats and better. He paused to measure my reaction. “There is no reason why more buyers should not enter the market.“

Afterwards my motorbike driver told me that it was a good thing I was leaving Kisangani. It would not be good if people started to think I wanted to buy diamonds. That could be dangerous.

See maps of my trip there on a Google Map I created.

Terese Hart

9 responses so far