A Day in the Work Life

Sorry about the absence, I kind of knew this would happen! Some general updates: Everything here is going swell, I'm making a lot of progress on the elephant database. I've added Birougou, Malolou, Lopé, Minkébé, Waka, Boumé and a few others to the growing list of individuals. One of my favorites is Iguela, because she has the longest tusks I've ever seen on an elephant (not that I've seen very many tusks in my life aside from the past month) and she always travels with Yenzi, who is missing her left tusk. Yenzi has three little babies and I think Iguela has two, and they're always the easiest to spot on the camera traps because they have such distinguishing features. There's also Vembo, who is a big old male elephant who is all saggy. He is around a lot and has big thick tusks and little tear in his right ear. Definitely my favorite to see on the camera traps are the baby elephants, like a year old or less. They're usually really close to the mother so they can be hard to see BUT OH MY GAWD when you do see them, they are to die for. But I digress. Right now I'm gathering images from the camera traps to put up on the Smithsonian WILD website, so that we can get a little out there about ourselves as a program and about African forest elephants. Here are some images from the camera traps:

This is Iguela, taken last fall. We have thousands of un-entered photos like these that I'm going back to and entering into the database on top of the photos that I get weekly from the camera traps. © Smithsonian.

Iguela and one of her youngest. This is usually the quality of photo at night, sometimes better or worse.                          © Smithsonian.

A couple of baby elephants. The one in the front is scratching it's foot or something on the metal post. Their mother is nearby but out of the frame. It's fairly abnormal to get this many photos during the day because they have been driven to a nocturnal lifestyle by poaching. Mireille (the elephant specialist) says that it's because it's the dry season and food is scares © Smithsonian.

This is Yenzi (notice the missing left tusk) and her three babies, in order from youngest to oldest. Yenzi is about 25-30 years old. © Smithsonian.

This is Vembo, he's about 45 years old. The red and white fence to the left is there because this is actually a bike trail, and that was built to try to keep elephants out. It definitely has absolutely failed, and the elephants still squeeze through. You can see the spot where their sides have polished off the paint on the post to the right. The pipes on the foreground are for oil. The elephants step on them all the time to get across. © Smithsonian.

Sometimes we catch other animals on the camera traps as well. So far we've gotten hippos, civets, sitatungas and an owl. This is a female sitatunga. They're fairly common. The males have magnificent horns that twist upwards and look ridiculously regal. © Smithsonian.

I'm still working on the bios of different people who work here, and I'm also working on cleaning up/organizing the lab. It's sort of an awkward space, and it has to function for our daily office space, eating area, storage, guided tours and practical lab use. It's difficult because I've been here such a short time so I don't really know what we have to keep and what we can get rid of so there is usually a big sheaf of extraneous papers or folders that I'm always asking people about.

More recent news, Axel the intern has returned from his vacation and so he's working here as well which is nice because he's closer to my age and very exuberant, especially on the subject of frogs. Right now he's waiting for his government position since he's done with school at l'Ecole des Eaux et des Fôrets. There are three different types of colleges here. Institutions, which are private, specific and expensive, universities, which are more general, and schools, which have specialities and the government pays for in full but you then have to work in Gabon for ten years with the government after you graduate, unless you go back to school for a PhD or something.

August is coming up and that means that a lot of people are going to be going on break. Independence Day here is August 17 and there is a five day weekend or something like that because there is another holiday on the 15th, so Lisa told me that I should plan to do something fun for it because otherwise I'll probably be pretty bored with little to do. Lisa, Gigi, Perez and Clayth are all leaving within the next few weeks, which is a big bummer. Thom is coming back soon though and maybe new people will move in at the dorms.

On Monday at 11:00 AM Lisa got a call from someone that the Ministre de l'Economie et de l'Emploi et du Développement Durable du Gabon (PHEW long title) felt like swinging by the Smithsonian lab for a tour at 12:00 since he was in the area visiting. And we were like oh wow! That's pretty cool that the Minister of Economy and Labor wants to come see what we're doing. So we busily try to spruce up the lab a little and are expecting probably like five or eight people and then they get here and it's like:

From the left: Landry, Madame Marie-Evelyne Petrus-Barry, the Représentant du Système des Nations-Unies (United Nations) au Gabon, the Ministre Désire Guedon, the head of Shell Gabon (PDG) Godson Njoku, and Axel is the one in the white and black sweater. Landry is showing off our bird specimen collection.

30 people or something like that. Usually our tours are about five people, so having 30 people was pretty overwhelming and I'm just standing there in my Keens and jeans shaking hands with these fancy suits and shiny shoes. It is pretty exciting, though, that he wanted to come by and see what we're doing since the interest level in biodiversity research here varies greatly depending on a person's priorities.

Landry showing the Minister a small sample of our insect collection.

Also, apologies for the lousy photo quality. If I would have known that a Minister and his crew were coming I would have brought the nicer camera.

Then there was this little guy, just chilling outside while all the hubbub went on inside the lab. Actually "little" is totally false, he was probably about as long as an iPhone and about as thick as an average-sized carrot.

The sun set last night was brilliant, but as it is the dry season right now there is often a thick cloud cover, which made it look like a big fiery ball.

Taken in the backyard at the dorm. The big tree on the left is a mango tree in bloom. No fruit til September.

And this is Beka, the main chef at the dorms. I think his eye sight isn't so good because he looks really serious and worried until I get to be a few yards away and then he always breaks into this big grin. At dinner they always serve you buffet style, so you have to tell them what you want. Beka always thinks it's hilarious when I pronounce the different words like le riz and le poulet and le pâte. He also gives out huge portions and so I always tell him "un peu" to which he giggles and scrunches up his face and says "oooh petite petite." He always chops up the chicken and beef for dinner outside and throws the scraps to the chickens in the backyard which makes me feel weird but they don't seem to mind it.

Beka striking a pose. The dorms are serviced by Sodexo, Gabonese style.

When I first got here and I was the only girl, Gigi started joking that I am the princesse du foyer stagiaire and that name kind of stuck because compared to everyone else here I need help a lot. Luckily everyone au foyer is super nice and willing to deal with my French incompetence, and always making sure that I'm doing well. I'll be putting up more photos of people in my daily life, stay tuned!

A New Partnership: Smithsonian Institution's Gabon Biodiversity Program and CABAlliance

By Anna V. Smith

The Central African Biodiversity Alliance is the most recent collaboration with the Smithsonian Institution’s Gabon Biodiversity Program. The CABAlliance is a combination of students, Postdoctoral researchers, policy makers, and scientists from Gabon, the United States, Europe, Equatorial Guinea and Cameroon intended to promote research collaboration within Central Africa and to better understand species adaptability to climate change.

The initiative for the CABAlliance was first sparked from a conference that took place in May 2011 at the Université des Sciences et Techniques de Masuku in Franceville, Gabon, which brought together U.S., African, European, and Japanese scientists to discuss biological diversity in the Congo basin, as well as the relationship between evolutionary research and conservation. While the program focuses on conservation prioritization, there is also a strong emphasis on partnership, and connecting African and U.S. students involved with the research.

“People were already working in the region and wanted to collaborate on conservation of biodiversity, and that produced this global collaborative program instead of working individually,” says co-principal investigator Dr. Nicola Anthony of the University of New Orleans.

The program is set up into different stages of research and progression, “We were talking about a way that we could make this project comprehensible to a large audience,” says Dr. Anthony. “So we collectively decided to break it down into parts that people can understand, because it is very multidisciplinary.”

A student assists Dr. Nicola Anthony in measuring the ear of a Stella wood mouse.

From May to August 2013, Dr. Anthony and a team of 11 have travelled around Gabon, working in the field to gather samples of Stella wood mice, African puddle frogs, and blue duiker dung for the project. Overall the CABAlliance will be studying nine different taxa, chosen for their widespread distribution and variety of habitats.

During their weeklong stay in the Gamba area during the month of July, the Smithsonian Institution lent their field research camp in Mouloundo to the team. The Smithsonian Institution is currently studying the area as the site of a road that will be built in the next two years.

In 2016, the Smithsonian Institution’s Gabon Biodiversity Program will be hosting the field-research aspect for the undergraduate training program. “Field visits to Gamba will expose students to how the private sector, government, and NGOs can work together to promote and protect biodiversity in the context of resource development,” says Dr. Lisa Korte, Director of the Gabon Biodiversity Program.  “Students will gain an appreciation for Gabon’s national parks as well as the beauty of the coastal forests, where the rainforest meets the sea and hippos, elephants, and buffalo walk the beach.”

Part of the team at the Mouloundo camp before going into the field.

Katy Morgan, from the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology, is one of the Postdoctoral researchers involved with Dr. Anthony’s team. “I’ll be doing the genomic analysis and sequencing to look for certain markers that are associated with different environments, to look for signals of adaptive evolution,” Morgan says. “We’re looking at identifying signals of adaptive potential to model how species will be able to respond to future climate change and to identify areas that will be important for conserving evolutionary potential.” Morgan will be working with the Stella wood mouse and duiker samples at the University of New Orleans after the team returns from Gabon.

In addition to exploring the genetic potential of adaptation, the CABAlliance will be prioritizing hot spot areas in Central Africa. The ranking will take into account the data from their study, as well as informed criteria such as human population density, cultural and social value, and opportunity costs of preserving the land instead of leaving it open to logging or mining.

“Papers will be published to relay the findings, but that is not going to be our main goal,” says senior scientist Dr. Eric Fokam from the University of Buea in Cameroon. Dr. Fokam works with the amphibian team to conduct plasticity studies, which will examine how much an organism evolves to better cope with environmental changes due to climate change. “The question is going to be, at the end of five years, how has this work contributed in making the lives of communities better in guaranteeing that several plant and animal taxa will have a better chance of surviving the activities of humans.”

Gamba Life

Some little photos of my life in Gamba:

My room! I put up some Smithsonian posters of the insects and amphibians here. My growing collection of shells is to the left on my mini-fridge.

My little collection of things from home in the corner, plus a little cup that I got here.

My room is just to the left. I hang out with these two the most: Gildas, on the right, teaches me French and I teach him English every day after work. I call him Gigi. Clayth is on the left. They're both Gabonese and interning with Shell. 

This is the gateaux that I mentioned in a previous post. The little white bags are called lait caillé, a frozen sweet milk. It's pretty close to ice cream. You tear a hole in the corner with your teeth and then squeeze it all out like an Otter Pop. I think this was all 500 CFA, which is about $1.00. They're perfect for a snack between lunch and dinner.

Gigi in the front and Perez in the back. This was at a local soccer competition between five or so teams in the community. It was held at a community center in Gamba, which was pretty big and nice. The games were played on a basketball court though, so it was really small for soccer.

Our team from the dorm! In the back from the left, Dede, Dmitri, Hervé, and Mamadou. In the front from the left is Sylvester, Gigi, Perez, and Armand. They lost the first game and won the second.

Gigi just being his happy self.

A day trip that I took last week into the fôret with a small team to look for elephant dung for genetic sampling. We actually walked right into an elephant, but I didn't see it because I was the third person in the line. We turned right around and walked back a ways rather hurriedly, and then kept going. We also think we were quite close to a gorilla because we found fresh gorilla dung and heard it nearby. It's funny how quickly you feel unprotected and meek when you're thinking you're about to face a gorilla. Really puts the whole "survival of the fittest" thing into perspective.

A pretty typical forest shot. This was from an expedition that I went on with Mireille, the elephant specialist here at the Smithsonian, Lisa, the director here, and two guides to collect fresh elephant dung. Mireille is beginning a project of collecting elephant dung to get DNA samples so that we can start getting genetic information on the elephant population in the area, as well as the elephants who are raiding plantations.

Mireille, in the blue, sampling elephant dung, and Martin on the right getting GPS coordinates.

A break in the forest, and also where elephant ticks like to hang out. A lot of this hike was into the fôret marécageuse which is basically really swampy areas with trees and water.

Also, here is a link to an article that Lisa sent me about the partnership going on between Gabon and the University of Oregon.

Shout Outs

I just re-discovered this list that I made when I was on the plane from Chicago to Frankfurt. It's a little bit late but still very valid. In general, I'm thanking each person for far, far more than what I've listed below. These are just the most tangible.

Mom & Dad, naturally, for your mental, emotional and financial support. I’ll do my best to communicate frequently.

Willie, for driving me to the airport, and doing your bestest always at being a brother.

Minh Khoa, for your love. And dropping me off at the airport and letting me borrow your sunglasses. I will bring you back a shirt.

Zander, for the name of this blog.

Ben, for the golden mix CD and the kendama, which will provide hours of entertainment. Also for 

taking care of lil’ Oaty. BIG UP.

Natalie B., for your letter of recommendation and French support through the years, and encouraging me to stick with it.

The Smithsonian Institution, for accepting me as an intern!

Anne & Brianne, for your pepper spray. I hope I don’t need it.

Shelby, for showing me the internship in the first place all those months ago and for being my golden girl.

Will, for being Will.

Kyle, for hanging out with me during last two days in Eugene.

Gleen, for being so incredibly helpful and finding me a place in Libreville. Eternally grateful.

Emily, for giving me so much advice about what to expect, and for being endlessly reassuring.

Maria, for giving me the job that allowed me to pay for my plane ticket etc. in the first place, and writing me a letter of recommendation, and just being so cute. Lil’ nugent.

Oaty, for being so fuzzy.

Moulondo Camp for 3 Days

Found my memory card! I'm going to let photos (and I guess some captions) speak for themselves about my time at the Smithsonian Moulondo camp with the CABalliance and Smithsonian teams.

The Macro Invertebrate Team crossing the Boumé

This was an eerie place. The river is the Boumé Boumé, and the bridge that is in the  background was (obviously) never finished. A small collection of shanties that can be seen in the background were built for the people working on the bridge. It's all deserted now, though. An unfortunate example of the many projects in Gabon that run out of money or interest. If/when the new road is built and a bridge is made, they will have to pull out the partially-existing bridge. The red thing in the foreground is a hand-pulled ferry that you can drive your car onto. There have been problems with people driving over the edge, or sinking it because they put too much weight on it.

The "road" on the other side leads to Panga and the coast.

Our driver in the front, Jean Noel, and our guide Kassa in the back.

Panga

This may or may not be a good picture but I love it because just a sliver of the coast can be seen, and the ocean meets the sky.

This mangrove swamp has been invaded with salt water, so all the trees are dying.

Jean Michel, the driver for the macro invertebrate team, standing on a mangrove branch.

The macro team at work.

The students from CABalliance and their guides. Nikki Anthony is the woman on the left with the fanny pack.

Gabe and Katy in the field.

Cute friends, Timmy and John.

Patrick, one of the senior scientists, looking for African puddle frogs.

The Stella wood mouse team. Unfortunately the red glare from the tent made my camera go haywire so it had to be in black and white. But you can sort of see the mouse that Nikki is holding. It actually wasn't the species they were looking for but they kept it for a little to identify it and then released it back where it was caught.

John and I. Camera faces and then what we actually look like.

Timmy and I. Timmy worked on the l'equipe des petites mammifiers.

Elephant tracks and hippo tracks in the sand.

Ça veut dire quoi?

To re-cap the past few days, Lisa and I went out the Smithsonian camp that is set up to study the area around the proposed new road. It’s about a two and half hour boat/car ride and lordy do they need a road. In order to get in or out, including all goods, they have to cross two rivers (which means they have to put their cars on a ferry, one of which is hand-powered via ropes and pulleys) and a good amount of land that is pure sand and water. Imagine if you attached roller skates to each wheel and then tried to drive. I don’t know if that makes any sense but it’s the closest analogy I can think of. Since the road is so intense, the Smithsonian etc. hires drivers who are really good at driving on it.

Anyways, the Smithsonian was graciously sharing their camp with a group of students and researchers with the Central African Biodiversity Alliance who were getting samples for their study. It’s actually quite amazing what they’re doing. I’ll post about it later (and there are a lot of different aspects to what they’re doing) but the part that I was most interested in was their focus on determining the evolutionary possibilities of organisms to adapt to climate change. This way, after the results and such, governments will be able to focus on minimizing the damage to these ecosystems and species.

On the first day I started getting sick which was sort of phooey. But in general it was incredible to be around so many intelligent and passionate people. It was also really wonderful to talk to the “eco-guides” that were accompanying us. Essentially the researchers hire guides who are Agence Nationale des parcs nationaux, and they go out with the researcher teams. They’re there to basically look out for the team: keep an eye out for elephants and gorillas, tell the team what to do if things go badly, etc. etc. They also looked really cool with their camouflage and machetes. One of them, John Moussavou, seemed to like me a lot and would quiz me on my wildlife knowledge (what do you do when confronted with a gorilla, or hey what kind of animal left this poop? Etc. etc.). But I liked talking to them because they took a lot of pride in their work, in knowing the plants and animals of the area, and generally being helpful.

Side note: The top bun is not an appropriate hairstyle for the Gabonese forest.

So camp was amazing, and I wish we could have stayed longer because I essentially met everyone and then had to leave. It felt a little like I was leaving summer camp or something because people gave me contact information. Later on I’ll be posting an article about the CABalliance and Smithsonian collaboration.

Unfortunately I can’t find the memory card with all the photos from that trip. I’m quite confused because I remember taking it out and setting it down and now it’s simply not there… BUT ANYWAYS my room is only so big and so I’m sure I’ll find it soon.

The view from my door, into my backyard. There are a few trees to the left.

I have some time now so I think I’ll describe what my weekdays are usually like:

6:00 AM: Wake up, get ready for the day.

6:30 or 6:40: Eat breakfast with either Clayth or Romel in the “salon.” Say “bonjour” or “bien dormi?” to literally every single person I see.

7:00ish: Get picked up by Gabriel and Michel. Say “bonjour” and “ça va” etc. etc.

7:30 – 12:00: Work! Who knows what it may be! So far I’ve checked elephant camera traps, done data entry, worked on my own, seen a chopped up manatee, and so on.

12:00: Lunch! I make my lunch in the mornings from the same thing I ate for breakfast, usually an egg-sausage-baguette sandwich. Eat out on the covered patio, which is very pleasant. View of the lake and there’s a black and white cat that I’ve recently named Ferdinand who always sits with me. I feed her pieces of my sandwich (only the egg and sausage. Ferdinand disdains any sort of bread product). Say “bonjour” and “bon appétit” to every person who walks by on their way to lunch.

12:30-3:30: Lord knows. However I usually get off work fairly consistently at 3:30. Then someone drives me home and I get there around 4:00.

4:00-7:00: I’m still figuring this part out, but I can never just stay in my room. I like it (I recently redecorated) but I pretty much always leave or at least sit outside with the chickens. I like going on walks a lot, seeing little parts of the town at a time. Sometimes I’m not up for it though, because it can take a lot of energy to be stared at. But like I’ve said before, it’s never staring that is uncomfortable. Sometimes I’ll do little errands like adding minutes to my phone or buying a notebook. Gildas (I call him Gigi) and I went and got gateau yesterday, which was wonderful. The gateau is little fried balls of dough and slightly sweet. The lady sells them with an ice-cream type milk, and I forget what it’s called. Then I usually hang out with Gigi, Clayth and Perez until dinner. Don’t forget to say “bonsoir” to everyone walking by.

7:00: Dinner! This is consistently rice, squishy legumes, and three different types of meat; fish, chicken, or beef (sometimes rabbit. And yes I’ve already explained Otis to everyone so they know I don’t eat rabbit). Usually I eat with the same three, Gigi, Clayth and Perez. I guess not really Perez because he doesn't eat dinner. The TV is always on and it’s either French news or sports in French. The table conversation is actually frequently partial English, which is nice of them. Clayth is fluent in English and Gigi has been learning a lot from speaking with me. Perez doesn’t know as much English as the other two but he tries and is definitely improving. All three help me a lot with my French on the daily.

8:30- 10:00: Usually I read or try and write. Sometimes I’ll watch a movie or sometimes we’ll go get a beer after/before dinner. Generally I’m super sleepy, and since we all wake up at the same time (Clayth wakes up at 5:30 for some reason) 8:30 is usually go-back-to-your-room time unless someone can think of something to do. End the day with “bon soirée,” "bon nuit," and “à demain.”

Liddle birds in my yard. Perez feeds them rice.

What I Will Be Doing for Three Months

6/27/13

DEFINITIONS TO BETTER YOUR COMPREHENSION:

Yenzi Camp: This is where the management staff lives with their families. These are all long-term employees, both ex-pats and Gabonese. The longest time here is four years. It has a school and a clubhouse and some other nice amenities.

Vembo: There are dorms and an eating area here for very short time fieldwork employees, who don’t bring their family. Here they work for about a month, take a month off, and so on. Their days are from 6 AM – 6 PM every day. We also have our lab here, in a separate building. I like it, there’s a nice patio to eat lunch and a lake right nearby. Watch out for the crocodiles.

Gamba: This is the actual town, also called Plaine because it's pretty flat, and it’s where I live! It’s not very big, pop. 9,000, but compared to what it used to be (a tiny fishing village) it’s huge. I live on the main street in the dormitory, which is one of the few nicely paved roads and has lots of open-air shops and such. Apparently there’s a nightclub somewhere too. I have yet to see any police.

Anyways:

Today is my fourth day at work! Yesterday Lisa and I figured out a solid set of projects for me to work on. The first one I’m starting on today is doing short biographies of main researchers that are working in the Gabon Biodiversity Program, as well as some short articles of what the different teams are doing. Today I’m going out with Lisa, Michel, and Gabriel to a research camp until Sunday. Like I mentioned in the “Bienvenue à Gabon” post, Gamba is seeking to develop its infrastructure, especially when it comes to accessibility for cargo and people. So they already have the big boat, and they’ve been trying to build a road that will connect a highway near Loumbodo to Moungangara, from which people/cargo/cars would be shipped to Mayonami and then Gamba.

I say trying because apparently there have been a lot of issues with money, time, bureaucracy, basically everything it sounds like. Anyways the Smithsonian team is doing studies to figure out the best way to build the road, and also so that they can study the area after it is built to see the impact it had.

I’ll be going out there to interview people for their bios, as well as doing short pieces on their work. Lisa also just wants me to get a better grasp on what it is that they’re doing out there. I'll be trying to write them up in French first, and then English.

Secondly, I’ll be working on the ongoing elephant camera traps. Mereille, the elephant specialist here, and Lisa along with some others have been trying to identify individual forest elephants who commonly walk through the Yenzi camp here. It can be a serious problem because there are bike trails, a golf course, and a lot human activity that are in close quarters with these elephants. From my short time here, one thing that I’ve learned is that elephants are not to be trifled with. They are ridiculously strong, very intelligent, and don’t react well to human contact. Usually in a situation when they feel threatened, they will charge. 

This elephant-human relationship is very present, and yet we don’t really know anything about the elephants coming through here. We don’t know how many different families there are, what they’re social behavior is, how many babies there are, males or females, or how many individual elephants there are. So using a set protocol for distinguishing different features (with these camera traps, Mereille has identified 50 individual elephants. But nobody has been keeping up to date with the data on the camera traps and now my job is to look through 90,000 files and memorize the previous 50 elephants, and categorize new ones.

Thom is working on developing a program that will hopefully make this process much easier, so that I can actually compare new photos to the profiles of the individuals. But he’s leaving this Saturday and so I’m really hoping that he’ll finish it in time.

Speaking of Thom, I went fishing of the beach on Tuesday with him, his father, two Dutch contractors, and another lady. We didn’t catch anything but it was nice to see the beach again. The shells here are absolutely incredible. They’re all huge and intact for the most part.

And I forgot to mention the third project, helping with the mini-jungle! Apparently it has been very neglected, and there’s not much going on with it so Lisa asked if I could help out, as in finding a gardener, finding plants, identifying the ones inside, etc. This is one of the projects that has a little less urgency, so I’ll probably work on that intermittently.

Here are some photos from fishing on Tuesday:

Thom fishing in the ocean.

We didn't catch anything so we all went out to a restaurant afterwards. And we found giant escargot!