Where Baby Storks Come From

Originally distributed September 2009

Do you know where baby storks come from? A human carries them in a white sack and puts the baby storks in their parents’ nests.

 (Ok, that took forever. I'm never uploading a video again.)

If you’re curious about what I’m doing in the field these days, I’ve been busy monitoring Marabou Stork nests. Marabou Storks are not the prettiest birds but they’re still interesting. The population that breeds in Swaziland is rather small and would go extinct if isolated from populations in neighboring countries. This year we’re doing a supplementary feeding experiment to see if it increases the number of fledglings produced. Normally, Marabous have 2-3 eggs per nest and often all 3 hatch. But the 3^rd chick rarely survives to fledging. So we’ll see if additional food makes any difference.

The chicks, by many people’s standards, are just as unattractive as their parents. But when you work with them, you manage to find them cute somehow, at least when they’re small. Unfortunately, they grow really fast so they’re not cute for long.

Their nests are in Umbrella Thorn trees, which only reach 20ft tall or so. Still you need a ladder to get to the nest and take the chicks out so they can be weighed, measured, photographed, and this year fed, every few days.

Working with Marabou Storks is a very stinky job. Some of the food we feed them, cow stomach and intestines, stinks. The parents forage at dump sites for the chicks’ food, so that stinks. Sometimes when we handle the chicks they vomit from the stress, and that really stinks! Even better, we have to examine what they throw up, if it hasn’t been too digested yet, to identify what they ate. Sometimes there are maggots crawling in the food that was in their stomachs. So yes, that means the birds had live maggots crawling around in their stomachs. Yummy! And of course they regularly relieve themselves on us so that’s quite messy.

Now there’s a chick that appears to be abandoned by its parents so it’s getting really dehydrated. We gave it some water the other day, which required holding its bill open for a while. We saw maggots crawling in the corners of its bill inside its mouth. Delicious! Anybody want to come help with this project?

BBC News

Originally distributed December 2009

Well, the BBC ruined my 15 minutes of fame opportunity. I was supposed to appear in the black mamba documentary. I hadn’t actually seen it myself before it aired on tv in the US, even though a dvd of it was floating around Swaziland. So I didn’t say “and by the way I’m in it,” and I’m glad I didn’t because all you see of me is the back of my head while riding in a vehicle, and my back as we walked to release one of the snakes, depending on which version you saw. Such is reality in the film and tv business. So all the mamba tracking that they talked about in the program was the same mamba tracking that I did in Jan-Mar.

To fully fill you in, the BBC was there in January when my coworker, Mduduzi, and I went to the park to start the black mamba tracking project that he and I (solely) did for two months. We watched them film the surgeries in which the transmitters were implanted as well as re-enactments of some of the mamba captures they did. I think some of them were real-time captures but some of them had happened before and they were re-enacted for the program. I wonder if that’s why one of those snakes was so ornery. It was probably taken from a terrarium (handling #1), transported across the country, put in a room somewhere (handling #2), captured again (handling #3), transported back, and put back in the terrarium (handling #4).

November was my last month in the field. Very sad. I’m optimistic that I’ll be back to Hlane though. We had our staff Christmas party on the 30^th because several people are off for Dec, including me :)  We did the gift exchange/stealing game and it went on for ages. Here is one of the great treasures someone walked away with.

We’ve had lots of storms lately, mostly thunderstorms with heavy rain and sometimes wind. But we’ve also had a few hail storms and a tornado hit Ezulwini Valley. Here are a couple of funny lines from the Swazi Times about the weather.

Man spends whole night in tree

“There is at least one man who will not be crossing any flooded rivers in the country for the rest of his life. … For hours, he hanged in there for dear life. … The police are said to have taken him across the river and directly to his homestead, where he was instructed to keep warm and was left sitting in front of a fire.”

The sun comes out

“Temperatures as high as 28*C (82*F) are expected for Mbabane by Wednesday, which should be a relief to many members of the public who had been getting worried about their accumulating laundry.”

The Speeding Donkey

Originally distributed August 2009

Swazi newspapers are hilarious. They’re like a 3-way cross between The Washington Post, The Onion, and the Inquirer. Some articles are informative and newsworthy. Others are like tabloid gossip, but still somehow entertaining, and some pieces are so crazy they seem unreal.

The story I’d like to highlight for you is unfortunately a tragedy, but the way it was written I couldn’t help but laugh. A donkey was being led by a 9 yr old girl to get water. The girl was going to fill some water jugs at a nearby stream and transport them back to her homestead using the donkey. For some reason the donkey was not in the mood so it decided to run off. Unfortunately, the young girl had tied the rope that was attached to the donkey around her neck. So you cam imagine what happened when the donkey took off.

Here are a few quotes from the article:

“…donkey outruns residents and motorists for a kilometre.”

 “The speeding donkey dragged the girl into the thick bush and into rocky surfaces and injuring her in the process.”

“They ordered that a doctor be called to inspect what might have caused the animal to behave in such a manner.”

Losing Streak

Originally distributed July 2009

I’ve been quiet for a while because I’ve been traveling and losing stuff and trying to reconstruct my life. It began with a pair of field pants that I couldn’t find. I thought I had brought them to Swaziland in January but I couldn’t find them anywhere. Maybe I left them in the US after all? Well, I visited home for a very brief period at the end of June and they weren’t there. So they disappeared. I also had a neat little solar radio that I was planning to bring that also vanished into thin air.

But it got better on my way back to Swaziland. So much better! I’m pretty sure it was the baggage handlers in Johannesburg, South Africa who broke the lock off my luggage and stole a ton of stuff. I just realized tonight one more thing they stole! That’s how much stuff it was. They stole my tennis shoes, shorts, battery charger, camera cable, field pants and much more. Those are just the things that hurt the most to lose.

Fleece and first pair of field pants lost

But that wasn’t the end of it. My first day back in the field here in Swaziland I somehow lost my fleece. It vanished into thin air. That was quite bothersome. Then I was helping a friend with her field work and she needs power from car batteries to run black lights in sugarcane to attract insects. She’s collecting them for her master’s research. While carrying a car battery, battery acid leaked onto my pants, my one and only pair of field pants for cold weather at this point. The next day they ripped wide open from my hip to my knee. Great…..

I also managed to lose one of two keys to my bike lock, so I’m now down to one. And, when I washed my sleeping bag in the washing machine, which it’s supposed to withstand, it came out with 6 rips. Awesome…. At least I was able to stitch that up. I don’t know what kind of curse I have on me at the moment, but I can’t wait ‘til it’s over! This is insane!

Everybody's Doing It!

The breeding season gets under way here much earlier than it does up north. Some birds begin molting into their breeding plumage and even building nests in what would be considered late winter in the northern hemisphere. But of course here the average winter temperatures are higher so things heat up sooner.

That said, the White-fronted Bee-eaters have already fledged their first offspring for the season. You’d think after spending your whole life in a cavity excavated from a bank of red clay that the last thing you’d want to do is roll around in it some more. But that’s exactly what they did… vigorously, in the dozens. No fewer than 27 of these little birds, fledglings and adults, formed a vibrating mass of green feathers with a red dust cloud above them. Occasionally one left and others joined. But this went on for a good 15 minutes. They were having a ball! They were too far away for me to get a video, but someone else in the world did! Check it out.

What happened in Saint Lucia?

First of all, can I tell you how confusing it is to have a St Lucia in the Caribbean and a St Lucia in eastern South Africa? When I first moved here and spoke to travelers about their itineraries and they’d say, “I’m headed to St Lucia from here.” I’d think, “Wow! That’s quite a leap!” until I learned about St Lucia, South Africa.

Once adjusted to the idea of St Lucia, South Africa, I met a guy from St Lucia who was doing some contract work as an engineer for the sugar cane industry in Swaziland. No, of course he’s not from St Lucia, South Africa. He’s from the Caribbean. So once again I was initially confused. But that explained his unusual accent and lack of knowledge on the region and cultures.

Originally distributed October 2009

I visited St Lucia, SA in May. I won’t go over all the details of the trip, but I will tell you this. While staying at the backpackers there I came back to my room one afternoon to find it had been raided. Stuff had been taken out of my bag and strewn about. Clearly, someone had been in there. Trying to contain my angst I went to the front desk to report the matter. They asked which room I was staying in, “the one in the back corner, near the pool.” Were my windows open, “yes.” Oh it was the vervet monkeys. They’ve gone in that room before when the windows have been left open.

Monkeys! Whew! What a relief. I went back to my room and took stock of the situation with new perspective. Suddenly I was able to laugh about it. My inventory survey showed that nothing was missing. They had pulled out some clothes and my glasses. Come to find out later when I looked through the photos in my camera, they had put my glasses on and taken pictures of themselves! Hilarious! Monkeys with a sense of humor, I love it!



Oh, yeah. That last part was just a joke. But they did break into my room and take out my glasses.

Weddings and Funerals

Originally distributed June 2009

Within a month’s time I’ve experienced a Swazi wedding and a Swazi funeral. In mid-April one of my coworkers got married. It was a Christian wedding in a church but it had several different elements that I haven’t seen in America. First when the kids in the wedding party walk down the aisle, one of them carries a basket of candy and she throws it out to the congregation. The little girl at this wedding was actually chucking it at us, so you had to pay attention or you might get hit in the face by a piece of hard candy. The rest of the members of the wedding party dance down the aisle! I loved this part! It really added to the celebratory atmosphere. If I ever get married and end up getting married in a church, whoever’s in the wedding will be dancing down the aisle.

During the wedding there were times where the congregation would get up and go to the front of the church and dance with the bride, groom and wedding party. It wasn’t paired dancing, everybody was just dancing together in one big crowd. Also there was a choir that would perform songs periodically and they danced while they were singing as well. The bride, who is my coworker, actually sings in that choir so once all the usual marriage rituals were finished she joined the choir to sing with them. It was cool to see her standing in the middle in her wedding dress (a western style white wedding dress).

As the wedding went on….and on and on, I realized why they handed out candy in the beginning. Because it’s really long and you get really hungry! So it’s handy to have something to keep you going. The bride’s uncle was the videographer and after about 2hrs he came to some ladies sitting next to me and asked for a “provision of sweets.” Altogether, the wedding started about an hour late and lasted for 3 hours! Plus, we all got there almost an hour early. So we were there forever. But it was really fun. And we all ate after the ceremony was over. The wedding party took pictures outside after eating and then people left. So there’s no long reception or party afterwards because the party essentially takes place during the ceremony. Oh! And when I go to another Swazi wedding I’ll know to bring earplugs because the music and preaching are really, really loud.

Sorry I always put the sad stuff last but I’m covering these topics in chronological order. Another of my coworkers died tragically in a head-on collision on May 24^th. He was at the wedding in April and I took a picture of him outside dancing with a girl’s scarf tied around his head. That sort of captures his laid-back, fun-loving spirit. He was always happy and playful, and it’s such a shock to us all that we’re still trying to accept. His funeral was a week after his death and it took place at his mother’s homestead in the far south of the country in a very rural area. There are a lot of preparations that need to be done for a funeral in Swaziland because they’re not all taken care of by a company like they usually are in the States. All of us at All Out pitched in to help with things throughout the week.

The funeral was a typical 12hr overnight affair starting on Saturday night. First, the night vigil began around 10PM. Then the funeral service and burial took place at dawn on Sunday. Several staff went down on Saturday morning to build a tent where the vigil and service would be held, and string extension cords and light bulbs from a place with electricity to the homestead. One of the Swazi ladies on our staff helped cook food for the people who were there all day Saturday, making and serving lunch and dinner, and cooking food for the masses of people who would come later for the funeral.

I went Saturday evening with a few other coworkers and we helped prepare the food that would be served at dawn. Then we went into the tent where the night vigil had already begun. There were several pastors there taking turns preaching. The services alternated between sermons, which are delivered with much energy and volume, and songs that all the attendees participate in. Somehow, without having hymnals, everybody seems to know all the words and the tunes, because there are also no instruments. We non-Swazis, and non siSwati speakers, stayed until about 2AM at which point we were too cold and tired, so we took naps in the car.

Around 3:30AM I was too cold to sleep. It was about 45*F outside and windy, so it was really cold. I sat at one of the fires where the women were cooking and the guys were warming themselves. I talked with a Swazi guy for a while who was my late coworker’s brother-in-law. We talked about funerals in our countries and other aspects of our cultures and political systems, since they’re ruled by a king here. I also learned that he along with several of my coworkers and other guys took turns throughout the night digging the grave at the burial site nearby.

At 5AM they started the viewing and that’s when women started wailing and sobbing. The funeral service was held in the tent. As the sun rose, a group carried the casket and we all walked to the burial site about ¼ mile away. It was a huge procession and people were singing all the way there. At the burial site the pastors talked some more and people sang. Then we all took turns throwing dirt into the grave before the guys again took turns burying the casket. A group of women went to collect rocks which were placed over the grave. Everyone stayed until the burial was completely finished. Then we all walked back to the homestead and ate. After saying our goodbyes to his family we headed back home.

The Horrifying Part of Biking

Originally distributed April 2009 as “Cute, exciting, horrifying”

One morning I was biking to the nearby town of Simunye while Mduduzi was driving the volunteers there. It was so delightful cruising along and seeing vultures flying overhead, catching thermals and rising higher and higher, then cruising along in a string across the sky. Farther along several impalas were running parallel to me in the grass about 50yd in from the road. Beautiful!

As I made my way to Simunye there was an unexpected explosion. Flesh and car parts were suddenly flying in my direction. An impala had run out into the road at the wrong time. An SUV was coming toward me and the impala just darted out, giving the driver no chance to avoid it. I saw the impala run out and knew it would be hit. Within a split second the impala and the car merged. The majority of the impala’s body disappeared as soon as the impact happened, probably having been hurled into the bush in the direction from whence it came. But its intestinal contents burst all over the road. I slowed and swerved away from the road, flinching as the debris flew in my direction. The car pulled over several hundred yards past me. I stopped near the scene of the accident to take it all in. I must’ve been in shock because in hindsight, why would I want to see the remains of an animal hit by a car? What was I going to do? What if it was still alive? What if it was disturbingly mangled? Luckily, I didn’t see the body. And the smell from the intestinal contents was putrid and strong. So I continued on my way, trying not to vomit from the smell, which lingered for a while because the breeze was blowing in my direction.

Several minutes later, still on my way to Simunye, I cried. It was so sad and so shocking I was momentarily overcome. I still ride my bike on that road though as often as possible and just hope I don’t witness that same scene again. Sadly, it’s very common, and impalas are the most frequent victims because they’re the most numerous.

Biking with the Bulls

Originally distributed April 2009 as “Cute, exciting, horrifying”

In Hlane Royal National Park, where I live most of the time, I stay in a tent on the ground—no platform, nothing fancy, just your run-of-the-mill tent. I’ve been at Hlane for 6 weeks now so my tent hasn’t moved in all that time.  One morning when I was getting up I kneeled on the floor and I heard something move under the tent. My first thoughts were “lizard or scorpion” because they’re around and scorpions like to live under the tents. There was a crease in the floor of the tent so I pushed on it gently and I heard the critter move again. I kept doing this until I effectively chased the mystery animal out from under the tent. It turned out to be a cute little toad. It lived with me in that little space for about two weeks. Then it decided to move on. It was fun knowing I had a little neighbor there, even if I rarely saw it.

I recently bought a bike here in Swaziland and increased my happiness level by several orders of magnitude. Now I can get more exercise and move around more freely. My bike fits inside the kombi, so I brought it to Hlane right after buying it so that I can ride it out there during the week.

My first day riding it, I decided to leave the park and ride it on the tar road because there’s no place to ride it inside the park. Between the campsite and the road is a big game area, with hippos, rhinos, elephants, giraffes, etc, but no lions or big predators. You have to go through there to get to the road. Before I headed out, my field assistant Mduduzi told me he had seen elephants near the gates so I should be careful. Will do! As I pedaled out I looked carefully all around until I was again in safe territory at the other end. I rode along the road and had frequent adrenaline rushes as cars whizzed by at high speed. Mental note: next time ride against traffic so you can see them coming and see how much space they’re giving you.

On my way back into camp I remembered “elephants” so I was on the lookout. I went through the reception area and was cruising toward the gateway to the big game area. Screech!!! I grabbed the brakes and skidded to a stop on the dirt road. About 50yd to my left was a huge bull elephant. I got his attention by stopping so abruptly. Uh oh! I jumped off the bike and quickly turned it around to head the other way. He started coming after me. I ran, pushing the bike along next to me. There were two buildings near the gateway in the area I was in, Reception and a building across from it. I ran around the building opposite reception hoping that if the elephant couldn’t see me he’d stop his pursuit and move on.

Meanwhile a lady at reception was yelling to someone in siSwati. Then I saw the head ranger strolling down the drive, radio in hand, toward the elephant. I peaked around the building and saw the elephant standing in the gateway swaying back and forth as if he were thinking, “Should I chase that stupid girl or go back to browsing?” As the ranger approached, the elephant raised his trunk, appearing to sniff the air. There was chatter on the radio, which I’m sure the elephant could hear as well. He appeared to size up the situation and decide it would be in his best interest to stay inside the big game area and just continue on his way. After several seconds that’s exactly what he did. Thank goodness! I watched the elephant mosey along until he was a good distance away. But I stayed in my hiding place until the ranger gestured for me to go on through. Before I left though the receptionist cautioned me, “Be very, very careful or else you will become bulls@&$.” Thanks.