Kenya Bird of Prey TrustRaptor Report January 2023 |
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Dear Supporters, The new year has started and we hope it brings great things for you and for raptor conservation in Kenya and beyond. The last quarter of 2022 has been a busy one for the Kenya Bird of Prey Trust and in this newsletter we share some of the major events and highlights. With all the challenges facing birds of prey we need to value all positive outcomes and keep faith that continuing our work and implementing our new plans will make real difference. Your financial support is more needed than ever as costs of caring for over 40 birds continues to rise. Donations can be made via Mpesa - Paybill# 4041103, Account# your name. We're grateful for your support on this journey. Nick Trent, Executive Director |
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Building our new strategic plan Early December 2022 our team of directors came together at Soysambu Raptor Centre for three days to work on a new strategic plan. We had already done a lot of work reviewing our mission, vision and core values and defining our strengths and challenges and now it was time to meet in person and develop measurable goals and objectives to guide our way towards achieving our mission. Armed with easel pads, coloured sticky notes and a lot of enthusiasm we set to work. The discussions, brainstorming and sharing of stories all worked to strengthen the working relations within the team and we’re both happy with and proud of the results of our meeting. There is still a lot of work to be done but we hope to be able to publish our strategic plan in April of this year. |
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Left: Simon sharing his ideas with the team. Right: Many memorable events were shared |
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Bateleur and White-backed Vultures released In our previous newsletter we mentioned the rescue of a poisoned white-backed vulture and a Bateleur. We’re happy to report that both raptors were treated and fully recovered. Early november they, together with another rescued White-backed Vulture, were flown back to the Mara to be released. All birds were fitted with a gps transmitter so we can track their movements and make sure they are doing fine. After being released, both the adult and juvenile white-backed vultures settled in the Mara. The Bateleur initially flew to Tanzania to explore the Mara Region before returning to Kenya where it is now firmly settled in Mara Ripoi Conservancy close to the location it was found. |
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A new lease on life for the electrocuted Tawny Eagle Mid October an electrocuted Tawny eagle was brought in. The wing received a "double tap" electrocution, meaning that both the biceps and hand got hit by the electrical current. The wing was amputated halfway up the forearm and titanium implants were put into the radius and ulna in the hope that this can be successfully used to help balance the eagle. It took many weeks for the wing to heal but Simon could keep a close eye on it without removing the bandage by using a thermal camera. This has helped enormously as we didn’t have to remove and redo the bandage every few days and could just leave the wound alone to recover. When we could finally remove the bandage we were pleased with the result. |
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The thermal camera, a relatively cheap phone device, was bought from the budget we raised for Simon’s clinical equipment and has proved useful for monitoring other birds as well. Not only to ‘see’ through bandages but also to check if limbs are alive or not. |
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Of course this Tawny eagle can never return to the wild, but with a foot prosthesis and the ability to balance itself, he can have a good quality of life and be of value to raptor populations by educating people about the horrendous effects of electrocution by poorly-designed power poles. Watch the video to see how he gets around and protects his food. |
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Update on Kwenia Vulture Sanctuary Last August saw the start of phase 2 of the development of Kwenia Vulture Sanctuary and Robert Kaai, who has worked with the projects since its inception, is now officially appointed as Sanctuary manager. Robert has been working in wildlife conservation for 11 years and has extensive knowledge of both the local area geography and community structures and we're very pleased with his appointment. Soon after the start of the project we were able to employ 5 Raptor Guardians to patrol the area surrounding the Kwenia cliffs making sure the vultures weren’t disturbed and to raise awareness about raptors in the community. We have been able to grow the number of Raptor Guardians to 14, all recruited from the local community. Their role now includes the monitoring of raptors and the general implementation and enforcement of the conservancy rules and regulations. To help improve their knowledge of raptors in general and Rüppell's vultures in particular they visited the Naivasha Raptor Centre. Here they received training on how to handle poisoned birds, and how to identify different raptors. It was a unique experience for the guardians since this was their first exposure to raptors at very close range. Being this close offered the opportunity to observe the vultures and discover details not seen when observing them from a distance. The team was very excited and asked endless questions and we plan to organise follow-up training on effective methods for nest monitoring and practise the handling and basic care of poisoned raptors. |
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The team of raptor guardians watching vultures at close range, asking many questions. |
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Eleonora’s falcon rescue Early December an Eleonora’s falcon was rescued in Tinderet, after it was attacked by a Black Sparrowhawk. Close inspection showed that almost 50% of its surface area was gone due to feather wear and tear and stress. This migratory raptor was on its way from Spain to Madagascar but the feather condition inhibited a quick rehab and release and it needs to stay in our care until it moults into fresh feathers. Hopefully we can release it in April or May when she can join the return migration of her species from Madagascar to Spain. Read the full story in Simon's newest blog post "An Eleonora’s Falcon saga". |
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We especially thank the following people for their crucial role in the rescue of this Eleonora’s falcon: Crispin Ngeza for alerting us of the bird in need, Alfred Koech for helping to get the bird to safe place and informing the KWS warden, Grace Wendot, KWS warden for Nandi, who played a crucial role to save the bird and Gilbert Yego who kept the bird safe overnight and delivered it to the airport to be picked up by Nick Trent and Simon Thomsett. |
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The Mara Raptor Project 2022 proved to be another successful year for our nest monitoring programme in the Greater Mara Ecosystem. Lemein Par leads our nest monitoring work and in total he monitored 269 nests of which 157 were active. Bateleurs had an incredibly successful breeding year with all 9 monitored nests successfully fledging a chick. Secretarybirds appeared to have a tough year with only 5 active nests found. In 2021, we monitored 13 active Secretarybird nests in the same area. We are in the process of finalising our 2022 nest monitoring report and will share that with you all shortly. |
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Bateleur nest sequence 2022 - from incubation in early April to fledging mid August 2022. |
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15th Pan African Ornithological Conference In November, Stratton Hatfield travelled to the 15th Pan African Ornithological Conference (PAOC) in Zimbabwe to present one of the chapters of his ongoing PhD research on Martial Eagles. At the conference Stratton represented both the Kenya Bird of Prey Trust and Wageningen University. It was a fantastic event with lots of productive networking opportunities. Stratton received the runner-up award for the best student presentation. Watch this space in the future for some exciting collaborative work that was initiated at PAOC. |
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The soft release of a Black Sparrowhawk When it is time to release a bird that has had no hunting experience or has gone through a long recovery process after suffering a major trauma the release needs quite some preparation. First of all the birds need to be fit and able to fly and hunt. Secondly it must be offered a back-up plan in case it turns out to be not fully independent yet. This is why one of our raptor centres is located at Soysambu. It’s a quiet place with different habitats and is very suitable for the soft release of raptors, also known as “hack”. So when the juvenile Black Sparrowhawk that was found injured in Nairobi last year recovered from a broken wrist it was time to start the hacking process. The bird was very fit, having spent much time in a large shed with a female, and Simon started to train him to fly to a lure and this progressed to the bird flying free, instinctively returning for food. Although he was brought in as a juvenile, he did have some experience in the wild as a hunting bird. By the end of October it was time to cut his jesses and let him go. At that time the wild doves had returned to Soysambu in their thousands making it the best possible time of the year to be hacked. And because there was so much prey he didn’t even bother coming home! |
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Raptor technicians Mwanzia Sr and Mwanzia Jr releasing the Black Sparrowhawk |
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New solar freezer We are truly grateful to Governors Camp Collection for their long-term support that allows us, among other things, to buy quality meat for our resident and rehab vultures every month and to distribute anti-poison kits. Recently they went out of their way to provide a solar freezer for Soysambu Raptor Centre, which is completely off grid. Regular freezers drain electricity like crazy so you can imagine how useful a solar-optimised freezer is for us. And we’re not making this up, the day we got it up and running, just before Christmas, the other freezer broke down! |
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Left: Governors Conservation manager Alisa Karstad with Horace the Lappet-faced vulture, by Fernando Faciole. Right: Mwanzia Jr presenting the new solar freezer. |
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If this story inspires you and you want to support Kenya Bird of Prey Trust as part of your Corporate Social Responsibility programme, please get in touch. |
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Update on Simon’s clinic To celebrate Simon receiving the Partners for Raptors Lifetime Achievement Award last year we started a fundraiser to support his clinic with more professional equipment. So far we have been able to buy a thermal camera phone (see article about the electrocuted Tawny Eagle) and two second-hand X-ray plates. Sourcing the X-ray machine itself was more complicated than we had anticipated with some options falling through. After consultation with the Nakuru vet we have decided on the type of machine we want and are keeping an eye on ebay for an offer that fits our budget and we’re sure this will come soon. We’d like to extend our gratitude to RaptorAid, Governors Camp Collection and all individual donors for helping make this dream come true. |
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Martial Eagle 3E resurfaces in Grumeti In early 2018, the Mara Raptor Project banded several free flying juvenile Martial Eagles that fledged from known nests within the Maasai Mara National Reserve. These birds were fitted with alphanumeric leg bands so that they could be identified and monitored as they dispersed and spread throughout the ecosystem. One of these birds was a juvenile female Martial Eagle that we leg banded with code 3E. She fledged from a nest we monitor in the Esero Sopia area of the Maasai Mara National Reserve. |
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The chick that was later leg banded with code 3E on the nest monitored by the Mara Raptor Project. |
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For the last 5 years 3E was not photographed or reported. We feared the worst and thought she had died as most juvenile birds do during their first few years of life, but to our surprise on the 29 th of December 2022 Grant Tefler photographed her in adult plumage at Singita Grumeti – Serengeti. It is possible that she has set up a breeding territory in the Grumeti and we hope that over the next few months guides and guests will continue to report her. This band resighting is incredibly valuable as it teaches us about Martial Eagle juvenile survival, dispersal, and territory establishment. If you happen to ever see a leg-banded Martial Eagle - please don’t hesitate to contact us. |
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Martial Eagle 3E as a fledgling on 30 March 2018 in Maasai Mara National Reserve and the same bird, now fully grown on 29 December 2022 in Grumeti Game Reserve, Tanzania. |
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Thank you for your support |
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Learn more about the several ways to financially support our mission to create awareness on raptor conservation and to protect and restore raptor populations in Kenya. Together we are making a difference! | | |
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