Conservation
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Students from Marungu Secondary School take a walk on the wildlife side
Part of Wildlife Works’ community enrichment strategy includes ensuring that underprivileged students get a chance to view their beautiful ecosystems and see wildlife in their natural habitat. Students in rural areas do not enjoy the comforts and opportunities that the more privileged students in urban areas regularly experience. The schools surrounding Rukinga, including the Marungu Secondary School, are located almost two hours inland from Mombasa, deep in the Kenyan bush. Students at Marungu are boarded for four years, and many of them never get the opportunity to travel or visit the most picturesque parts of Kenya. Last month, the Wildlife Works’ Human Resources Department organized a group of 30 Form…
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Not a drop to drink: Building water tanks in arid lands
For the people of the Kasigau area where our Rukinga Wildlife Sanctuary is located, a normal day involves walking many miles to collect or purchase clean water. With urbanization and changes in lifestyles, water consumption is increasing at a tremendous rate. Kasigau is considered an ASAL (arid and semi-arid land), where water shortages are the norm. The lack of clean water leads to unhealthy living situations, forcing humans and wildlife to drink contaminated water, which can lead to water-born diseases. Our conservation strategy that falls under the REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation) carbon offset marketplace includes the implementation of community improvement projects that aim to ameliorate these…
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Growing Responsibly Through the Use of Sustainable Material and Means
The battle between development and environmental conservation can often be a fierce one. With the natural progression towards growth, the environment is often left tattered in the wake. Wildlife Works at our Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project has certainly grown in the last few years, and will hopefully continue to do so. We’ve increased the number of jobs in the local area twofold from a year ago. We are very aware of the effects of development on the environment, which is why we’ve opted to use simple, eco-friendly architecture wherever we can. The newest sector in the company requires a base from which they can run their field operations. The concept…
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Beehive Fences Help Protect Farmers’ Crops
As human development continues to expand and encroach on wildlife, there has been an increase in human-wildlife interaction and conflict over the years, particularly in areas within Kenya where humans and animals directly share the local land and resources. This phenomenon is further magnified by climate change, which causes the wildlife to change their migratory patterns in search of food. One such area is Kileva, a small sub-area within the Taita-Taveta County, situated a few kilometers from Rukinga. Here, the dwellers are prone to conflicts with elephants, which frequently destroy farmers’ crops during the dry seasons. As many of these farmers rely on their crop yield to survive, this has…
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Wildlife Works Embraces New Biogas Project
Here at Wildlife Works Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project, we are constantly looking for opportunities to coordinate with the next generation of young Kenyans who devote their time and intellect to developing environmentally sustainable innovations. Meet 21 year-olds Daniel Njuguna, a recent secondary school graduate, and Edward Mwakisima, a Sociology student at Catholic University. They are currently developing a system to promote alternative energy use for everyday activities, in an effort to reduce the harmful effects of charcoal production in the area. The project began when Edward informed Daniel of the water shortage problem that was being experienced in his hometown of Maungu, a small village located within Wildlife Works’ Kasigau…
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Update on Ijema, Our Injured Ranger
Thank you to all who donated to the families of Ijema, our injured ranger, and Abdi, our ranger who suffered a fatal gunshot wound. We received an outpouring of heartfelt messages from all over the world as well as generous donations that totaled $6781, which has been passed on to both families on your behalf. Abdi’s family will also benefit from Wildlife Works hiring one of their family members, Ali Adoww, who is currently being trained as a ranger. Wildlife Works has put Ijema up in a comfortable home in town and is supporting him through his recovery, including the surgeries to repair his shoulder. The titanium shoulder was donated…
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Elephant Poachers Kill Wildlife Works Conservation Ranger and Critically Injure Another
As vigilant as we are when it comes to protecting our community and the wildlife surrounding us, tragedy still finds us at times. On Friday, January 13th, elephant poachers opened fired on our unarmed conservation rangers who were patrolling the Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project area in Kenya. One of our rangers, Abdullahi Mohammed, was fatally shot and another ranger, Ijema Funan, was injured by the gunfire. At the time, our rangers, along with members of the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), were tracking the poachers after discovering a wounded elephant in the protected project area. “This is the first time in 15 years that any of our rangers have been killed…
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Restoring Rukinga
Rukinga, the home of Wildlife Works in Kenya, has seen many human-influenced changes to its landscape. Once a pristine wilderness with a small hunter-gatherer population, the last century or so has been witness to a depletion of natural resources due to an increase in population and the transformation into a cattle ranch. Now, Wildlife Works is working with the people of Rukinga to restore the land to its former glory as a paradise for a huge range of fauna and flora. The end of the 19th century saw the construction of the Mombasa-Uganda railway, which runs within a kilometre of the north-eastern boundary of the wildlife sanctuary. Throughout the construction,…
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Traditional Roofing in Kenya
By: Scolastica Fundi – Eco-factory assistant – 18th October 2011 Our pilot REDD project area at Rukinga, Kenya, Wildlife Works’ growth has been tremendous within this last year. We are erecting seven new building all using traditional materials and techniques. Here we show traditional roofing called Makuti in the building of our new dining room. Makuti are bunches weaved leaves from a coconut plant caked Mnazi in Swahili. They are mostly found in coastal region of Kenya. Kenyan coastal people like the Mijikenda tribe mostly do Makuti production. PROCESS OF MAKING MAKUTI: STEP 1: The coconut plant leaves are harvested when they turn brown STEP 2: The leaves are soaked…
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Indigenous Tree Seedling Purchase – November 2010 Report
By Silvester Mkamaganga, Forester at Wildlife Works Carbon 13 November 2010 TREE SEEDLINGS PURCHASE INTRODUCTION The Kasigau Corridor REDD project has now created an economic incentive for the landowners and communities within the corridor to protect their forest. Wildlife Works will be working with the landowners and local communities to implement forest management plans that exclude the destructive use of forest resources. In that local communities are encouraged to raise indigenous tree seedlings in their own home made nursery in different containers and will be purchased by Wildlife Works for nurturing them to the right size then they will be taken back to the communities to be planted to the…