Keeping Victoria Falls clean

From the June 2013 issue of the Zambezi Traveller. Click here to visit the Zambezi Traveller blog.

An important part of taking care of the Victoria Falls World Heritage Site is ensuring that the town and its surrounds are litter-free. The importance of proper litter disposal is highlighted in the Victoria Falls Wildlife Trust’s conservation education programme, working with more than 1,000 schoolchildren annually to promote conservation.

In 2012 the Victoria Falls Wildlife Trust decided to assist the town with keeping litter under control. A team was established, collecting rubbish from the main roads around the town six days a week. More than 2000 large bin bags have been collected since the project was initiated, making a significant difference to the town and its environment.

The Victoria Falls Rotatrians are now joining forces with the trust to expand this project and will be working with local partners in assisting with a recycling program. Both the trust and Rotary are inviting all Victoria Falls residents and businesses to get involved in this initiative.

Zambezi Traveller Directory:
Victoria Falls Wildlife Trust

Download the latest issue of the Zambezi Traveller here.

The secrets of Hwange’s zebra

Image by: Peter Roberts
Written by Peter Roberts for the Zambezi Traveller

The Hwange Environmental Research Development programme of France’s National Centre for Scientific Research, run by Dr Hervé Fritz of the Lyons University, has been researching the dynamics of the Hwange ecosystem, covering the National Park and the community and Forestry lands nearby, since 1999.

Elephants dominate the ecology of Hwange, accounting for over ninety percent of the Park’s large herbivore biomass. Medium sized herbivores, such as zebra, occur in much lower population densities than those recorded in most other African systems. The Hwange zebra population density is one fiftieth of the density recorded in Serengeti.

Monitoring changes in populations involves identifying and following the life histories of individuals, and with zebra the researchers have a key to identifying each animal – its stripes. The exact pattern of the stripes on each zebra are unique, much like the human fingerprint or a bar-code.

Working from photographs, researchers are able to identify and monitor individuals within the population, allowing the project to follow the life histories of some 250 zebra over nine years. Through this work the team has been able to build up information on survival rates, reproductive patterns and harem dynamics.

The project has identified high mortality rates for foals and two to three year olds and is currently working with the Hwange Lion Research project looking at predation and other causes of mortality.

The researchers have also identified interesting social dynamics within the Hwange zebra population. Zebra stallions maintain harems, and Hwange’s social structure has been found to be more unstable than elsewhere. In Hwange it is unusual for a female to stay with the same male for more than three years, and as stallions are known to kill foals sired from previous mates, the team is now investigating infanticide rates within the population to see if this increased social fluidity has an unexpected cost in foal mortality.

Read the full article in the March 2013 issue of the Zambezi Traveller here

Batoka Gorge Dam: to be or not to be?

The Batoka Gorge
Image Credit: Tom Varley

Written by Peter Roberts for the Zambezi Traveller

At the end of 2012 the Zambezi River Authority invited expressions of interest from companies interested in tendering for the development of the Batoka Gorge Hydro Electric Scheme, a joint initiative by the governments of Zambia and Zimbabwe and supported with funding from the World Bank. Sources expect the project to commence this year and reach completion by 2019.

Read the full article in the new issue of the Zambezi Traveller, available across the region and online here (external link, opens in a new window).

On the Old Hunter's Road

On the banks of the Linyanti
Image Credit: Tom Varley
Written by Peter Roberts for the Zambezi Traveller
At the turn of the last century Victoria Falls had only just appeared on the tourist map. Only known to the wider world since 1855, when David Livingstone made their existence popular knowledge, to reach the Victoria Falls required an expedition of many weeks, if not months, travelling overland by ox-cart along rough tracks through thick bush inhabited by wild and dangerous animals. Explorers, hunters and traders all made tracks towards the Falls, and before long a wagon road ran from the south. The Old Hunters’ Road, as it became known, now forms the border between Botswana and Zimbabwe.
Read full article in March issue of the Zambezi Traveller or online on the Zambezi Traveller website (external link, openins in new window).
Read more about the history of the Victoira Falls online here: To The Victoria Falls (external link, openins in new window).

Hell and High Water

Phillips Idowu (and Jack Dee in the background!) walking with local school children.
Image credit and copyright: Tom Dymond/Comic Relief Ltd/Rex Features

Written by Peter Roberts for the Zambezi Traveller

Six celebrities from the UK took on the Zambezi Challenge in January to raise money for the British charity Comic Relief. Former Spice Girl Melanie Chisholm, actress Chelsee Healey, DJ Greg James, Olympian Phillips Idowu and comedians Dara O'Briain and Jack Dee battled the rapids and dodged the rocks, crocs and hippos as they canoed and rafted over 111km down the Zambezi River over five days.

Read full article in the latest issue of the Zambezi Traveller and also available online on the Zambezi Traveller website.

Thornicroft’s Giraffe

Another old article from the Zambezi Traveller (Issue 5, June 2011)
Peter Roberts
Thornicroft’s Giraffe is a morphologically distinct subspecies of giraffe, identified by its dark star-shaped or leafy spot markings which extend down to the lower leg. It is one of two mammal subspecies endemic to the Luangwa Valley, the other being Cookson’s wildebeest.
The giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis) is the tallest of all extant land-living animal species and the largest ruminant. Related to other even-toed ungulates, such as deer and cattle, it is placed in a separate family, the Giraffidae, consisting of only the giraffe and its closest living relative, the okapi, and their extinct relatives.
The giraffe was originally thought to be a cross between a camel and a leopard, a mistake immortalized in the giraffe's scientific name of Giraffa camelopardalis. The giraffe’s ‘horns’ are correctly termed ossicones.
Giraffe populations are estimated to total less than 80,000 individuals and are notable for their highly fragmented distribution. There are currently nine recognised giraffe sub‐species, differentiated by size and the colour and pattern of the markings on the coat. Recent genetic studies have indicated that several of these subspecies are distinct species in their own right, and that the Thornicroft's giraffe belongs to one of possibly six unique giraffe species.
Despite its prominence, limited monitoring and research has been undertaken on the Thornicroft's giraffe. In 2008, the Wilderness Wildlife Trust established the Luangwa Thornicroft's Giraffe Project to collect baseline information through the development of a photographic database. Coat patterns are unique to individuals and remain unchanged for their entire lives (although shade may change with age) allowing researchers to identify individual giraffe and furthermore track their movement and habits.
As an iconic symbol of Zambia, the Thornicroft's giraffe is an important tourism drawcard for visitors to the country and thus an economic asset for Zambia. It is currently estimated that fewer than 1,500 Thornicroft's giraffe remain in the wild.
Websites: www.giraffeconservation.org, www.wildernesstrust.com

Man on a Mission

Here's another story of an amazing Zambezi Traveller - David Lemon.

David Lemon - A man on a mission

New boots please!

Photo Credit: Zambezi Traveller

Counting Hornbills

Here's another series of linked articles from the Zambezi Traveller (June 2012), this time on conservation efforts to save the southern ground hornbill and encouraging tourists and safari guides to submit their ground hornbill sightings from acorss the region (all articles researched and written by Peter Roberts).
Wanted! Have you seen this bird?
Counting Hornbills
The Southern Ground Hornbill
Hornbill - Unite to save iconic bird species
Southern Ground Hornbill Sightings
Photo Credit: Zambezi Traveller

Dynamite - The Livingstone Lion

Here's a series of articles I wrote for the Zambezi Traveller on the amzaing story of Dynamite, the Hwange lion who went walkabout and turned up on the outskirts of Livingstone, Zambia, having crossed the Zambezi River below the Falls. These stories are from the March 2012 issue of the Zambezi Traveller.

Dynamite - The Tale of the Incredible Travelling Lion

A wild male lion captured last close to Livingstone after attacking and killing cattle in the Songwe area has turned out to no ordinary lion. Initially it was reported in the Zambian Press that the animal had escaped from one of the captive lion tourism experiences in the area, but through the dedicated effort of lion researchers and the wonders of modern technology, this lion has an amazing tale to tell.

The Zambian Wildlife Authority, together with local animal vets, decided to capture the problem lion and after a successful capture on 26th January were surprised to find that they had not noticed that the animal was carrying a GPS research collar. A quick bit of checking with lion research projects in the area identified the animal as having come from Hwange National Park, some 150km south of Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, and surprisingly, the other side of the Zambezi River.

Visitors to Sikumi Tree Lodge on the edge of Hwange National Park over the last few years will have undoubtedly have heard of, if not seen, the ‘Dynamite Boys’, a coalition of originally four male lions who were often seen in the area. Unfortunately, the group were reduced to this one remaining individual (it is believed the other three all died in snares). He was last seen in the area in December last year, having been ousted from his territory by two younger males, with nothing then known of his movements until he turned up on the edge of Livingstone on the 22nd January.

I was lucky enough to have seen this lion early last year when I had the pleasure of visiting Sikumi, and it was a special event for me, as several years earlier I volunteered for a period with Oxford University’s WildCru Hwange Lion Project, and was present with Dr Andrew Loveridge when he first captured and collared this lion as part of his research into lion populations and their movements in and around Hwange National Park.

Excited by the arrival of four young unknown males onto the local scene, the boys were prime targets for a GPS collar, which records the position of the animal every hour over periods of months and years and stores the data for transmission to portable receivers, yielding valuable data on lion movements and behaviour to researchers. The group were first found in the Main Camp area of the Park, close to a small waterhole known as ‘Dynamite Pan’, hence the adopted name of the group, and now this amazing lion, the last Dynamite boy.

The Amazing Zambezi Traveller

Lion Captured Near Livingstone

Travelling Lion Turns a Spotlight on the Species

Hwange Lion Research Project

The story has two interesting post-scripts. Firstly, Dynamite was kept in a cage for nearly a year before beaurocratic paperpushers decided to release him. Unfortunately he died in transit (see link here). At his age, and after a year in captivity, it was probably doomed to failure. Shame more wasn't done to effect an early release, highlighted in my editorial at the time.

Secondly, another lion from Hwange recently went walkabout, as fearured in the December 2012 issue of the Zambezi Traveller: . Another Zambezi wanderer

Photo Credit: Zambezi Traveller

A bridge too near?

Interesting historical persepctives on development. From Issue 05 of the Zambezi Traveller (June 2011).

Peter Roberts

The Victoria Falls Bridge is now such an integral part of the history and environment of the Victoria Falls area that it is hard to imagine that its construction in 1904-5 resulted in much division and controversy. Many protested that the bridge was an engineering act of vandalism and should not be built so close to the natural wonder of the Falls.

A writer for Scientific American magazine, in an article published in July 1905 to celebrate the building of the bridge, recorded: "To ascertain the general feeling of the visitors on the site chosen, a book was kept at the [construction] engineers’ camp, and a very large majority of the opinions are favourable to it, many visitors being converted from hostility to approval on seeing the facts of the case – in fact, one guest goes so far as to say the following: ‘The falls in their present position cannot possibly detract from the beauty of the bridge’."

Despite objections and engineering advice in support of an alternative site upstream of the Falls, it was Cecil Rhodes’ wish that the bridge should be built "where the trains, as they pass, will catch the spray of the Falls." This was even against the opposition of his own brother, Colonel Frank Rhodes, who is recorded as saying: "Well, I have done all I could to prevent the bridge being built… and nothing is now left for me to do but pray daily for an earthquake." His prayers were almost answered in 1910 when an earthquake shook the town of Livingstone and a shower of rocks were dislodged into the gorges below the Falls. The bridge however was undamaged.

The Victoria Falls Bridge has been cited by engineers for its elegance of design and to the way it relates to its natural setting. According to the American Society of Civil Engineering, the bridge "embodies the best abilities of the engineer to enhance the beauty of nature rather than detract from it". The President of the Institute of Civil Engineers, Sir Alexander Kennedy, recorded in 1907: "The lines of the structure, themselves quite beautiful, brought out at once the vastness of the gorge itself, which without the structure could not be realized. Before the bridge was built the gorge was something very beautiful but quite indefinite, but directly that beautiful arch was put up it gave an entirely new interest to the landscape. He did not think anybody who had seen the Victoria Falls bridge would ever find fault with the engineers who designed it". Like Rhodes, one wonders how many of the actually saw the bridge in its setting with their own eyes, rather than from photographs.

The bridge soon became a popular tourist attraction in its own right, offering pedestrians, as well as train passengers, a spectacular new view of the Falls and gorges below. Today the bridge is the second most famous landmark of the region, after the Victoria Falls themselves, hosting a 111 metre bungee jump with a hair raising 80m bungee swing and 300m zip line. The recently refurbished Visitor Centre with viewing platform and restaurant and bar is located on the northern bank.

Today views on the bridge are still divided. In one recently published coffee-table book on the Falls, the authors make the following emotive statement: "Once construction is complete, it is much more difficult to remove it than if it were simply disallowed in the first place. In time it becomes an accepted part of the landscape, and eventually an object of historical curiosity. Few now would wish to see the Victoria Falls Bridge removed, but it is, in truth, a hideous monument to Victorian vanity" (Teede).

Peter Roberts, freelance writer and researcher, has written a book on the history of the Victoria Falls Bridge in association with the Victoria Falls Bridge Company.

Website: Sun, Steel and Spray: A history of the Victoria Falls Bridge

Photo Credit: Sun, Steel and Spray

When is a Christmas bug not a Christmas bug?

... When it's a Christmas cicada. From the Zambezi Traveller, Issue 11, Decemner 2012.
Christmas beetles are a southern hemisphere phenomena, a blessing brought by the summer rains and another reason for seasonal cheer – for some of us, anyway! Across southern Africa various species of cicada of the genus Platypleura are commonly known as Christmas beetles, despite not even being true beetles. Cicadas are amazing insects with incredible life cycles and phenomenal sound making abilities, for which they are often cursed.
Read more: Zambezi Traveller - The Sound of Summer
Zambezi Traveller - The Special Life of Cicadas
Photo Credit: Peter Roberts/The Zambezi Traveller

Botswana to end sport hunting

From the Zambezi Travller, Issue 11, December 2012.

The President of Botswana, Lt. Gen. Ian Khama, announced in November that from 2014 Botswana will stop commercial hunting of wildlife in public areas.

Read more: Zambezi Traveller - Botswana to end sport hunting

Mining in Lower Zambezi Park thrown out

From the Zambezi Traveller, Issue 11, December 2012

In a landmark decision, the Zambia Environmental Management Agency has rejected mining activities in the Lower Zambezi National Park, under the Environmental Management Act of 2011. Despite the ruling, Zambezi Resources, the developers behind the proposed mining development, have lodged an appeal to the Minister of Lands, Natural Resources and Environmental Protection.

Red more: Zambezi Traveller: Mining in the Park thrown out

Livingstone's Lechwe

When David Livingstone reached Linyanti on the banks of the Chobe in 1851, he not only found the upper reaches of the Zambezi, but also large numbers of a species of spiral-horned antelope specially adapted to the seasonally flooded marshlands, the lechwe (Kobus leche). Livingstone had been the first to describe this species to science when he became the first European to reach Lake Ngami in 1849, and he later discovered another subspecies when he travelled upstream and into Kafue Flats.
Read more: The Zambezi Traveller: Livingstone's Lechwe
Photo Credit: Zambezi Traveller