Sengi course run at Mareja by Galen and Peter

Harith (Ecology Tutor at Unilurio, Pemba) wrote in his feedback: initiatives like these are fundamental to the growth of the biology students not only from Cabo Delgado but from Mozambique.  With these 3 days we could live and learn with the kind of people we all want to be like in the future.

Whenever we have visiting specialists at Mareja it is our express wish to involve locals were we can and in particular enable them to share and benefit from their passion, professionalism, skills and knowledge.

It is widely acknowledged that Mozambique needs to build its capacity for research and conservation so it can better manage its great and diverse natural resource.  There are huge holes in its current expertise, so it relies on visiting specialists and a small team based in Maputo at Eduardo Mondlane or the Natural History Museum. 

It is also recognized that the country's biodiversity resource is severely threatened by persistent and increasing factors - farming, development and exploitation for logging, mining and poaching.  As one of the country’s most at risk from climate change, due to its large coastal line, the preservation of its coastal forest is paramount.  Mareja supports 36,000 hectares of this unique habitat, sub tropical coastal miombo forest, an ecosystem that makes it a Global Biodiversity Hotspot.

Early this year we signed an MOU with the newly established local university UNILURIO and Quirimbas National Park (QNP). Unilurio offer two degrees, in IT and Biology - subjects that reflect areas of great economic growth and importance to the country.  However the university has limited resources with no laboratory and only 15 titles in its library.  But it has attracted 120 students who are currently studying Biology and it has aspirations, such as, to employ Tutors with a relevant MSc qualification within 5 years.

Galen and Peter only had three weeks to achieve their objectives but they made time for a 3 day course for four key individuals, two top students and a newly employed Ecology tutor, Harith, and Snr Denga, Head of Research at QNP.  They ran a practical field course offering insight into Sengi and their research.

One of the objectives of the workshop was also to teach the British and American style of discussive learning, creating an informal 'tutorial' atmosphere where questions and debate are encouraged.  (They tend to use a more lecture based style of teaching here in Mozambique.)

It was a hugely successful few days full of hands-on learning, much discussion - fuelled by homemade fare, Peter's contagious interest and Galen's life experience as one, if not the, leading Sengi specialist.

Here 'papa' (sweet maize meal) for breakfast prepared by Antonia and served by Maria

- topped with nuts, banana and Mareja honey

MANN Mission: we mount the ex army truck and head to Nanduli..in search of a goat

Ali: left look out

Without question one of the strangest trips of my life.  Imagine a huge army truck, really huge dating from 1960's built for the Cold War and imported from Germany by Dominik to Durban and driven overland. 

We have two lookouts precariously balanced on the front and a cargo of immensely excitable whooping cutana (bush knife) swinging people, and Peter - who are so enjoying the clanking, hulking dominance of the strada to Nanduli.  Dominik is driving and me and Galen are upfront perched on the unstable detachable seats that are semi covered in kudu skin and smell rather strongly of rotting meat.

Admao: right look out



Forca!  The road ahead

 The cutana wielders have been instructed to cut any overhanging branches.  And in between whenever a stretch of road without huge holes appears everyone cheers Dominik on to pick up speed.  Right at the front, against the metal grill that divides the cabin and large open back, is a mother and child, the child is being rocketed or poked neatly into a hole in the metal grid but like the mother she is smiling and laughing – those in the front decide she is possibly the most resilient child in history.

Usual employment of the Truck

This truck is used for road making and carrying overly large piles of wood, a huge water tank or similar.  However on this occasion it is being employed simply to go to Nanduli to... pick up a goat. 

I kept on wondering if there were other reasons to mount this exuberant voyage – but there really were not.  Well we might collect Maria who could help prepare the beds for the students arrival tomorrow but then again she could walk or bike to Mareja, and Antonio would like some shima.  So the 20km journey was to collect a goat, Maria and shima in priority order.

We have had a run of tyre problems on the Nissan indeed three flats and two innertubes peppered with holes.  Dominik has tried every sort of patch and fixative and many days have been spent pumping, clamping, jemmying, gluing to no avail.  Now  message has been sent for two replacement tubes with or without Mechanic to come to Mareja.  Thus we have to take the MANN truck as the Nissan is wheel-less.

Shima, milled maize

The  most surreal moment of all was on approach to Nanduli, everyone started chanting M-a-reja, M-a-reja, M-a-reja.  Sounding like vagabond war mongers, I was sure all of Nanduli would be in hiding or armed to the teeth.  But in fact not - the whole town surrounded the truck and added to the already highly charged excitable occassion. 

We bought The Goat... 

Nanduli by night

a poor goat for the Mareja community party on the Scientists last night.  Galen had bought it as a thank you to the community, providing a great treat and feast, so my feelings about goats had to be suppressed.  (I find them exteremly endearing, with their wonderful coloration and willful ways.)  Ours was trussed up in the back of this most uncomfortable of transport methods.  We also bought an immense about of shima (12kgs) but Maria surprisingly didn't want to come back with us...oh  how wise

...no more than 100m outside Nanduli we heard the regular low thud of a flat tyre - but not any flat tyre a huge hulking tyre flattened.  Suddenly the jubilant arrival in Nauduli ebbed away and the dark and cold set in.   Adamo forgot the jack - how was he to know this trusty stead would get a flat tyre too?  Four hours later the tyre has been replaced for one of the extras on the back.  Many free riders had headed back to Nanduli and others had lit a fire.  At this time of year the nights are freezing.

In all it was an eight hour round trip to Nanduli and back, and a rollercoaster of emotions.  Now the goat is tethered awaiting the party (thankfully unaware)

Learning to prepare a study skin

By night or twilight (depending on the days progress) Galen and Peter prepared their specimens for transport and more importantly for preservation as scientific museum specimens. (They have a collecting permit for 8 of each Sengi species.) They were neatly and expertly skinned and then stuffed, turned into ‘study skins’.  It is something I have always wanted to know how to do. 

Having worked at the National History Museum in London, as part of my job I have investigated most corners and storerooms to examine their extraordinary collections and stood eye to eye with preserved large animals, all but alive... for the glass eyes and elements of slight curl or fading that set in over time.  Images are etched deep, such as the baby elephant prepared by the great Taxodermist Rowland Ward, so life like it is turning as if it has just spotted you or the Black Maned Lion now extinct from the Cape in South Africa.  Or the large collection of Giraffes in the storeroom in Wandsworth were necks are separated from bodies for economies of space and placed carefully next to their matching body - the slender necks form a wonderful dappled grove with the heads as a low-lying canopy you could almost touch.  Or the small Victorian cabinet on display in the museum, crammed full of hummingbirds that glitter prepared with their habitat and scattered amongst the trees like Christmas decorations.

Peter was taught the skill and quickly picked it up, being very dexterous and careful.  For some reason I would always alight on the stuffing scene, which was sharply illuminated by their head torches, just as Peter had finished neatly putting a kebab stick with twissled cotton wool into the tail and was embarking on brushing or stroking the specimen with a toothbrush.

Towards the end of their trip Galen very kindly taught me to prepare a specimen.  I so enjoyed my lesson, once I had detached myself from the living creature that was still warm in my hands and imagined its great value as a sample of its morphological and genetic evolution - I had the opportunity to examine it closely and did.

I have always wanted to try this art, there is a difference between preparing study skins which preserve the features as much as possible and a taxidermy specimen that preserves the pose of life.  Mareja Sengi are being prepared flat with feet neatly and directly forward and back, not the most comfortable pose but they can be stored and studied to best advantage.

In haste...Termite mound makes feeble telephone station

Momentarily back in Pemba to collect food and deliver two Rangers to a guide course.  Set off rather late and two flat tyres later arrived!  However, this all feels like a holiday after the intense but (almost) comical patch we have just had in the bush.  ...All to do with me needing to send a vital funding bid with only a whisker of connection from one termite mound...and then my computer battery failing again and again until we wired it up to the car. 

A summary of events in pictures.


1. At the moment mobile connection is particularly bad on the reserve so we plan to drive to Pemba so I can send my funding application by the deadline at 12pm on 20th June.   Just before leaving Dominik unexpectedly goes on a drive to check some road work.  I wait and wait, until I recieve news that he is in a large hole....

2.  The Nissan is completely lodged and has to be pulled out with the huge German army MANN truck.  Now it is too late to drive to Pemba, we decide to try the Termite mound and  just hope it works...



3.  A shot of the communications hub

4. And here is the termite mound, the few feet of elevation makes a small but significant difference.  After a long, painful hour of trying eventually the document went, well it registered 'sent'...

Bush living is not without its stresses, in fact on such occasions they crescendo to a fever pitch rather like cicadas at Christmas.  I hardly slept wondering if 'sent' actually meant 'received'...?

Trapping SUCCESS and we eat cake

Only day two of field work but Galen really wants to catch a Rynchocyon and Peter says he will be on valium if they don’t within a week.  They are particularly hard to trap. But trapping them is their entire focus, only then can they begin the process of seeing if they are a new sub species or even species. 

As they appear up the forest path, they are clutching a bag (old pillow case) that contains something, it seems large.  Yes, they are smiling, they have caught one, the mysterious Giant Elephant Shrew.  It is an amazing creature, dark rusty brown with darker lines and spots along the back and a deep orange bottom.  The nose is elongated to a point and very mobile, with its twitching and effective end.  It has dark currant eyes.  It is placed in the loo with natural vegetation, logs, much foliage, for some photographs –( and the loo looks like the corner of a hotel lobby where the brief is ‘natural’ or a perhaps a local museum diorama.) 

Rynchocyon sp.

Notice the mobile tip to its nose

We go in to see the setting and the Sengi is released and immediately runs up Dominik's back behind his shirt and hides under his arm, pocking his long nose out of the short sleeve.  It is so endearing and Dominik feels protective of this wild creature that has found good refuge. His currant eyes are now matched by D’s doe eyes, and it is clear that he is wondering about it as a pet.  Galen stiffens the mood and pops it back it the bag.  We remind ourselves that this beautiful creature could be an ambassador for its species and hopefully enhance the spotlight on conservation at Mareja.

In no time it is prepared and stuffed, pinned on cardboard and drying in the sun. 

(The chickens have to be watched, they have discovered the centre of Operation Shrew and the scraps left by the dissecting process under the table.  Destroying the final carefully prepared specimen would be a disaster on a global, biodiversity hotspot, scale.)

Throughout this I am working hard preparing a fund-raising bid with Oxford University, the deadline is approaching and we have much hope pinned on this bid. It will support research and the development of a Biological Field Station at Mareja for the local university, Unilurio in partnership with Quirimbas National Park.

Also I decide it is a cake baking day, so the furnace is lit.  Dominik is making a drainage channel around the loo involving the new tiles and music.  We rarely have music playing, in fact never during the day.  But it has created a happy non speaking environment for everyone.  In the later afternoon, at the table by the swing, Peter and Galen are preparing their Sengi, dissecting, dusting with maze meal and stuffing with cotton wool. 

After the cake mixture is carefully divided between tins, Antonio prepares the furnace as only he can, removing the larger coals which narrowly miss his feet.  I go to help Galen cut his nets in half, to double his capturing capacity, with a tin mug of tea for us both.  I have a view of D with trowel in hand to my left with Peter beyond with many small tools and a pinned out Sengi in front of him.  I reflect on the scene as we stretch the nets the length of the main domestic area of Mareja, then The Killers sing us into the sunset. 

One of those moments to hold onto - surreal and wonderful.

First full day in the field and a WELCOME ceremony

There are two trapping methods for the species that is of greatest interest Rynchocyon, low nets and Tomahawk traps.  It is intensive work, nets are opened early and checked twice, then closed at night and traps are checked three times, left open at night and checked at first light.

Success, four smaller elephant shrews caught, Petrodromus tetradactylus (Four-toed Elephant Shrew).  They are beautiful things, with cream rims to their eyes and large rounded ears, with slightly comical pointed noses and elegant thin legs, the back ones elongated for jumping. 

At dusk there is a ceremony to welcome our scientists – Untamar and the new young Queen have visited to clean the graves.  We gather at the main grave site where the three Barons are buried including the first.  (Untamar is the fifth Baron of Mareja).  Muslim chants lead into animalist thanks and request for guidance.  We are all crouched and listen intently to the Machua, then Portuguese then English translation.  A waft of incense floats from the shovel of hot coals outside the first baron’s grave marked out with head and foot stones and covered in a small grass roof.  Thanks for the harmony between black and white people here at Mareja, that no troubles have come with the white people, that the scientists may leave with all they hoped for, and that a willingness for good remains.

ELEPHANT SHREWS...Ranger induction and I learn more about this fascinating creature



A world map and distances travelled by Peter and Galen
to Mareja to research...see drawing

The first day of field exploration for Galen and Peter and it began with an introduction to the Rangers.  The shrew mission was explained with maps and images, drawn with battery charcoal on the terrace floor.  They recognise the long nosed creature, and know of two ‘types’ locally Mpili larger and russet-brown, this is the exciting one a Rynchocyon sp. and another known as Rete smaller and later identified as Petrodromus tetradactylus (Four-toed Elephant Shrew). 

Four Rangers troupe off to show Galen and Peter some Mpilii and Rete habitat. An hour or so later and they return having seen two elephants but no shrew.  The name Elephant Shrew is somewhat misleading as it is not related at all to the Shrew however it is an ancient relative of the Elephant belonging to an order of mammals that emanate only from Africa the Afrotheria. 

Afrotheria include a wonderful  and diverse mix of other relatives, dugongs (seacow), aardvark, hyrax, golden moles and elephants.  There are 17 known species of Elephant Shrew (also called Sengi the Swahili name), very few and they are only found in East and North Africa and devoid from the Sahara and West.  They are best described as a cross between a miniature antelope and anteater.  I also learn from Galen they are monogamous, territorial and nurture their young by the ‘female absentee system’ which means the mother only feeds them once a day.  But her one or two young are born fully formed and ready to run and defend themselves.  Galen is one of only a handful of specialists who study Elephant Shrews, surprising considering their unique and fascinating ways.

After the first foray into the bush our scientists are full of renewed vigour, I think heartened by the signs of life and potential Sengi habitat.

We also see some wildlife....D and I go on a small drive to the damn and then beyond.  On returning guinea fowl and baboon are making a din.  We stop and there is a Serval about 50 m ahead with its long spotted and striped tail flicking as it saunters off along the track.  D manages to fix its face in the binoculars.  A clear view of a red data species