Field Update:Nest Climbing in Bateke

A new field update from the Batéké Plateau in Gabon where Bradley "Bo" Larson and Ivonne Kienast  have been working as temporary research site (TRS) managers for the MPI-EVA Pan African Programme: The Cultured Chimpanzee's collaborative research site with the Aspinall Foundation and l'Agence Nationale Des Parcs Nationaux Du Gabon.

Ascending a tree with a chimp nest

Usually our site managers have a super tough time getting hairs and samples from chimpanzee nests, but Bo is an experienced tree climber which made getting samples from Bateke, just a little bit easier than at our other sites.

Bo writes:

Nest Climbing

As scientists we take our jobs very seriously. We believe in the scientific process, and the steps we take to ensure good results. This often requires long days, in temperamental weather, just to pick up some poop, catch a few termites, or collect a few animal hairs. It may sound odd to you, but we absolutely live for it. In fact, life is incomplete without it. When we find a fresh nest, or get a strong whiff of what is “left behind” after a chimp's fruit binge, uh, there's nothing better in the world! We jump up and down, we do happy-dances, and the rest of the day is that much better for it. That being said, there is no lie in saying that certain methodologies of sample collection can range from odd to down-rite gross to back-breaking-ly difficult. While finding a sample site overwhelms us with joy, the actual collecting of certain sample types can pose a challenge. Nests are a good example of a challenging collection site. When fresh, they they can be a gold mine for hair, urine, or fecal samples, so we do anything we can to reach them. At the Batéké National Park TRS, we use technical climbing equipment to reach the nests that chimpanzees build in the canopy at night.

Chimpanzee nests can range from a mere 5 meters (15 feet) off the ground, to as high as 25+ meters (75+ feet) in the canopy.

View of a fresh nest from above (notice field assistant on ground below)

The equipment allows us to safely achieve such heights, as well as giving us security while we search the nest and surrounding branches for samples. 

Searching a nest for samples

The view from the canopy is incredible, it's no wonder chimps love sleeping up here. 

Hanging in the canopy

After the nest is searched, and samples found, we make our way safely to the ground.  

Descending from nesting tree

It's hard work, but SO worth it!  

Ah, finished!

The lion of Gabon is back on camera

More camera trap images of the Gabon lion & a great article too! A big thank you to our collaborators at this site!: Agence Nationale Des Parcs Nationaux Du Gabon, Panthera and The Aspinall Foundation

http://tinyurl.com/mr2kx8v

Field Update: Camera Traps in Gabon

Rolland and Ivonne surverying their TRS in Gabon

I'm really happy to announce we are going to try to do a monthly feature on updates from the field (as long as we have good enough internet to do it!)

Our first field update is from Ivonne Kienast from the Batéké Plateau in Gabon where she and Bo Larson are working as temporary research site (TRS) managers for the MPI-EVA Pan African Programme: The Cultured Chimpanzee's collaborative research site with the Aspinall Foundation and l'Agence Nationale Des Parcs Nationaux Du Gabon.

Ivonne writes:

You know it is going to be a specially exciting day. You can feel the tickling in your fingers, the impatience makes you walk faster, and you just want to arrive to the spots you know so well. It's camera trap day ! Meaning... that you are coming back to camp with SD cards full of amazing footage. You know you will have videos of elephants, duikers, leopards, red river hogs, hopefully pangolins, aardvaarks and golden cats. You cross your fingers for a lion video and of course and number 1 in the charts: Chimps ! You are excited to find out if the female with her fluffy baby you saw the other day in the forest will have passed by one of the cameras, or if you are going to see again on a video those 3 amazing huge males sitting in front of the camera studying it carefully. Or maybe the young male you called Tango pushing the camera and throwing a stick at it.

C&S citizen scientists you can look forward to the video this camera caught ;)

 Like every month you arrive excited to the camera. And you know something went wrong, because the camera is not there. It is lying on the ground, ripped in peaces, smashed and crashed. You could give it so many definitions ! And it is also how you feel in that moment. You look at the pieces, shaking your head, feeling frustrated. Resigned you check if you can save the SD card. You think: “Even if you loose the device, please don't loose the data.” Then you start searching for all the pieces of the plastic box, of the camera and all components which were used for the setup. In 13 months it have been 11 cameras, the last 8 ones in the last 3 months ! Elephants are reacting extremely aggressively towards the cameras. You cannot blame them. It's their forest. Your cameras scare them, or they just might have a bad day and decide to make your work a bit more difficult. As you always look at the bright side of life :P, you think: “Ok, better the cameras and not us. Or the cameras AND us”.

Well, thanks to our partner and host PPG (Projet Protection des Gorilles – The Aspinall Foundation), we found a perfect solution. PPG has been working with camera traps for gorilla monitoring for a while, and because gorillas are very touchy and curious apes, they needed to protect their cameras very well. So they designed a metallic box, which is fixed to the trees with wire, and the camera is just placed into this box. The setup is pretty stable. But PPG was having big problems with the humidity, and every month they were taking out cameras which were not working properly.

We did not have problems with the humidity, as our cameras are protected by a plastic box, covered with cling film, and having silica gel in the interior to absorbe humidity. PPG was clever ;). They decided to put their cameras in plastic boxes, covered with cling film, silica gel in the interior and all together in the metallic box. What a great idea ! So, we decided to do the same. We got 15 custom made metallic boxes and we have all our hopes on them. Unification of two different systems used at one site will allow us to get lots of amazing videos without loosing our cameras. For elephants it won't be impossible, but more difficult to destroy the new setup. We hope that out of 10 we might save 9. And we have high chances this will work ! Thanks PPG for this great idea.  

Leopard cubs in Gabon

A little taste of what's to come on Chimp&See (in late 2016 or 2017) and what's happening in the field right now! This is from southeast Gabon and part of our collaborative work with the Agence Nationale Des Parcs Nationaux Du Gabon, The Aspinall Foundation and Panthera.