GIS training in Samburu
Category: FoASF staff, General | Date: Jan 30 2009 | By: davidngala
GIS Training in Samburu.
Geographical Information System (GIS) is a conservation tool that is slowly gaining momentum in today’s conservation world. Recently the Ecological Society of Eastern Africa also know as ESEA organized for a GIS training that was held at the Earth Watch Institute in Samburu - Kenya.
Participants at the GIS training.
The training targeted users of GIS in the field in conservation work, its aim was to help users become familiar with the use of GIS as a conservation tool and how to use it in mapping issues of importance in conservation.
Participants are shown how to use a GPS.
Elepehants at Sambur Nature Reserve, where we carried out our field work.
The training drew participants from Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. This training gave the participants insight on the of GIS and the use of a GPS as a data entry tool. The FoASF manager, Caroline Lumosi was among the participants who benefited from the training. The new skill gained will be of a valuable resource for FoASF in mapping the illegal activities in the forest.
GIS training participants.
For more information concerning training opportunities with ESEA kindly visit www.ecsea.org
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Final day of Darwin Film editing course
Category: FoASF staff, General | Date: Nov 25 2008 | By: davidngala
Final day of Darwin film editing course.
What has a beginning has an end, the final day of the five day editing course finally came. It was hard to believe that within a short time we were able to edit 9 different film all targeted to various audience. The beginning looked almost impossible, however the impossible became possible. We produced 4 - 5minute films and 5 - 9 minute films all on various aspects of the environment, wetlands, waste, forests, rivers and fish.
We will be soon uploading the videos.
The whole editing crew.
Caroline Lumosi.
Day two of Film training
Category: FoASF staff, General | Date: Nov 19 2008 | By: davidngala
Day two of film training
Day two of film training started rather on a frustrating note, we were to edit our previous films geared towards a different audience, the trick was locating our capture scratch, the raw material, most of the files were offline and we could not locate the source of the disk to reconnect them on line. It was a bit frustrating as we did not have enough time to work on our films yet we were taken quite a back, by the time we located our files we had almost lost a half day and we had to burn the midnight light to keep on track.
during the training
Busy at work
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FoASF benefits from Darwin Community Based Conservation Film Training
Category: FoASF staff, General | Date: Nov 18 2008 | By: davidngala
This week I will be in Naivasha for a one week training on making community based conservation films with support from Dr. david Harper of the University of Leicester in the UK and the Darwin Intiative.
The course is am enhancement of a pervious course we did in July, I was among a group of trainees from Kenya, Tanzania and Ethiopia who participated in the first training where we made community films on various components of the environment, basically this week will be a further editing course to use the same material to make a different film targeting different audiences. at the end of the day these films will be used as an educative tool to community members, policy markers, school children… name it, they will be distrubuted to various organizations and institutions to achieve this purpose.
I left Gede on Friday evening for Naivasha, I had a quick stop over in Nairobi then proceeded to Naivasha together with the Darwin - Leicester team. We arrived at our rendezvous at United Kenya club and left from Naivasha just after 3 pm. The trip to Naivasha was great although I have been to Naivasha many times, I never stop loving it, and its scenery, the great rift valley being one of them, it stretches all the way from Ethiopia all the way down to Tanzania, it is said to be an aftermath of the great tectonic movement when the earth was being formed and what was left was a huge trench that has become a great valley with undulating hills and very beautiful scenery, the look out point stood at about 800ft above sea level, overlooking this great cliff was this massive deep trench with beauty scenery no words can explain this.
The hills at the escarpments.
The weather here was cool and then slightly moved to cold, the sun was quickly disappearing beyond the clouds and as we continued on at the rift valley the surrounding vegetation was a vast of green carpet, all around was green, green and more green, wow, now I may sound like a tourist yet am not but at this point am proud to be living in such a beauty country like Kenya. The roads were great, smooth and I left like we should just continue driving forever, the traffic was not as bad although Naivasha highway is well know to be a transit point to western part of Kenya hence huge truck filled the road, from oil transporters to flowers exporters name it all sorts of truck could be seen on the highway.
One of the vehicle we used passing the rift valley.
As we proceeds on among the vast greenness I saw dots of white, at first I did not know what they represented but as we drove close by I actually identified that those dots of white were actually IDP camps (internal displaced people), one of the outcome of the post election violence, it was not a pretty sight as I somehow felt sad that in the midst of all this beauty was these people who have no home and no where to go, that was really sad.
view from the rift valley.
I slowly drifted away reading the newspaper as the rest of the team was first asleep I guess from the exhaustion of traveling from far one of them was from Tanzania and the other from Ethiopia and our trainer is from UK, the newspaper somehow seemed interesting , well that is you are crazy about Obama as I am or do I say all Kenyans are or is it all Africans, the world.. whatever call it what you may but am sure glad Obama won, for me it represents a beacon of hope that I can make it in life if am determined to and focus on it, it was great reading about him and I guess for the next few months the pare will be just Obama this and Obama that and Michelle this and first family and first dog… ok sometimes it gets crazy so drifting from the Obama maniac from the papers my eyes focus on yet something interesting to me just as we were approaching Naivasha, mount Longonot which is one of Kenya crater mountain could be seen from a distance, again the view was great, as the sun set in the horizon the beautiful shadow it cast made the mountain look more beautiful than I have even seen it. A few meters from that was this small wood lot of eucalyptus trees that ere farmed form timber, I think this is a great idea and reduces pressure on indigenous trees for timber, just farther on the magnificent view of the lake could be seen, Lake Naivasha a fresh water lake in Kenya is well know for its biodiversity from the fish eagle, the hippos and others found in the lake, and before long as I was enjoying the view of the lake, we had arrived to the flower town, Naivasha can be referred to as the flower farm of Kenya as it has the highest number of flower farms, we headed down at south lake where we were to set camp at Kijabe farm in tented camps. We will be here for the next one week and already am liking it, it’s a good feeling begin away from the ocean and forest and enjoying the different weather, as I got to bed I cover myself with two blankest and have two jumpers a very contrast of what I have in the coast, we star the training tomorrow as I decide to hit the sack early to be fresh tomorrow morning.
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Introducing FoASF’s New Manager
Category: FoASF staff | Date: Aug 13 2008 | By: davidngala
Hi,
My name is Caroline Lumosi, am glad to be joining Friends of Arabuko Sokoke Forest (FoASF) in the capacity of manager, my background is a degree in Environmental Science from Kenyatta University with emphasis on Natural resources management, I am eager to experience the wonders of Arabuko Sokoke Forest and what it has in store for me, am excited to be working with such a wonderful team and I must say it has been a real joy that I have been given such good reception even before I join the team.
I was previously volunteering at Kakamega forest another beautiful forest in the Western part of Kenya, am excited to bring with me the knowledge and experience I gained while working with the community members helping them to enhance their capacity in environmental matters as well as embracing ICT skills. I seem to be falling in love with Forests, I guess I will with Arabuko Sokoke Forest.
I am also excited as I have just completed a field training course on how to make community based conservation films- I just made a 15 minutes film on Eburru forest another great forest that is a fragment of Mau Complex, and I believe these skills will be used to help the community at Arabuko have a better perception of the forest and other natural resources that encompass the forest, this I believe is also a great tool towards conservation.
It will be a great honour to work along side with David Ngala, I have heard so much about him and am ready to learn under his guidance about Arabuko Sokoke Forest and I hope he will transfer the passion he has about the forest to me. I have met with Colin Jackson in Nairobi and he was able to brief me on FoASF and what FoASF has been doing so far, A Rocha staff have also been great! trying to help me feel more welcome and are kind enough to offer me temporary accommodation at Mwamba before I locate my own crib!
I am grateful to the generous donations made through this blog that has enabled me to come on board and help out steer FoASF. I am taking up the challenge to steer FoASF to foster environmental conservation at Arabuko Sokoke through community awareness and education, I need all the support possible as I turn this challenge into a great opportunity. I anticipate that this blog will be active and you are welcome to give your suggestions and views. Watch this space!!!
Friends of Arabuko-Sokoke expanding
Category: FoASF staff | Date: Jul 17 2008 | By: davidngala
Friends of Arabuko-Sokoke Forest (FoASF) has, since it began in 1999, been pretty much run by volunteers other than having a Visitor Centre Assistant at the forest station to welcome visitors and explain what they can do in the forest - birding, walking, camping etc. Just a year ago we employed David Ngala who is the “main man” for this blog and who is passionate about the conservation of Arabuko-Sokoke. His job is ‘Conservation Officer’ but our struggle has been to really be able to channel his passion and fieldwork into something more structured and effective - simply for lack of time and resources amongst the FoASF Committee who have otherwise been doing the volunteering.
We are really thrilled, therefore, to have Caroline Lumosi joining us in August as the Manager for FoASF. The very generous donation from Nancy in April is what is allowing us to take Caroline on. It is a crucial position she will be filling as her job is to make all the wheels go round in the organisation and for things to really happen - to date they’ve been happening in fits and starts when we’ve had the time and space to do it.
I met Caroline in Nairobi on Sunday and had a long meeting with her explaining all about the ins and outs of the organisation. She’s currently finishing up some voluntary work in Kakamega forest in western Kenya and will go down to Watamu in the first week of August. She will be taking DAvid’s data he collects on illegal activity, mapping it and producing reports to circulate to stakeholders. She’ll also revive the ‘Friends’ scheme and help Mary at the Visitor Centre in her work. She’ll also be taking over the main updating of the blog - so watch this space!
A cut stump photographed by David using his new camera
Tags: Arabuko-Sokoke forest
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