Congo: Conkouati Lagoon I’ve been at Conkouati National Park for 2 weeks now and have boated around most of the southern end of the large lagoon. One of the first days we went out to where the lagoon drains into the Atlantic Ocean. The lagoon is formed from many rivers that meander down from mountains west of here and drain into lakes and then rivers […]
Uncategorized
Mayumba, Gabon to Conkouati, Congo After finishing my surveys in southern Banio Lagoon, I returned to Mayumba for several days to interview fishermen and survey several rivers at the north end of the lagoon. I also worked with Jean Nestor and Chardene, the WCS outreach team, on manatee presentations for villages. Mayumba has a much higher human population so manatees are rarely seen (the last
First day with Sea to Shore Alliance! I’m very excited to announce that as of today I am be joining the staff at Sea to Shore Alliance, a non-profit wildlife research organization based in Florida. Sea to Shore’s Director is Dr. James “Buddy” Powell, who has been my manatee mentor since 1998, and my African manatee work follows in the footsteps of Buddy’s ten years
Gabon: camping on the haute Banio After spending time with Victor, it was then time to continue my surveys for wild manatees. As I mentioned in my previous post, I haven’t been to this lagoon since 2006. At that time I only spent 2 days doing surveys because during my first season I traveled to many different parts of Gabon to get an overview of
Gabon: Return to Mayumba I’ve wanted to post long before this, but I’ve had a series of computer nightmares recently and am only typing now thanks to the generosity of my friends Hilde & Tim, who’ve lent me a laptop. In early June, once I’d sorted out all my logistics and research permit applications in Libreville, my friend Rich Parnell and I flew to Tchibanga,
Thank you Jonathan!! Jonathan Perez-Rivera left Gabon last night after spending the past 4 months working with orphan calf Victor and training his Gabonese caretakers. Victor is now steadily gaining weight and we’re learning valuable new information about the growth of West African manatees through the data Jonathan carefully collected. We hope he can return to Gabon to continue working with Victor once he finishes
News for the week of May 23, 2011 A new online article about my manatee work in Senegal was posted yesterday and they used some of my photos… click here to read it! I arrived back in Libreville, Gabon late last night after a 42 hour journey from Florida. All 190 lbs of my gear made it with me and it’s wonderful to be back