I got to take Zoey out for a spin today. My first time! She’s a bright orange Land Rover Defender,
which has always been my dream car, but I figured I’d never get to drive one
b/c they are so expensive. She’s fun to
drive on the rough roads here and a challenge with the steering wheel and stick
shift being on the other side of the vehicle.
I’ll also probably be driving Kemit while I’m here as well. Kermit is a neon green extended trunk land
cruiser that Todd owned even way back when I was in the field with him in 2004.
I had to drive down to River camp in order to meet a
potential field assistant in order to interview him. River camp is where I stayed with Todd way
back in 2004 and lots has changed. When
I was there, it was only a few army style tents, with a dining tent. Now there are fancier tents, a fancier dining
tent, and even some bandas. They have
also built an electric fence around the camp, which takes some of the fun out
of it. I remember having elephants walk
through our camp and a lion brush up against my tent one night.
Down at River camp I met Jake Goheen, who was Todd’s
post-doc back when I took the class.
He’s a really cool guy. We’d
stayed a bit in touch over the years, especially when I was a field assistant
for Roger Baldwin the bear guy as they were grad students together.
I had my safety briefing today by the head ascari
(guard). They have guards that patrol
24/7, mainly for safety from wildlife that may get through the fence. But I think the reserve also has guards
stationed throughout to help prevent poaching too. He gave an interesting piece of advice. If all of a sudden you find yourself
surrounded by elephants, don’t scream or make loud noises b/c the elephants
that have been involved in poaching incidents and witnessed family members
killed tend to react violently to loud noises as the guns the poachers use are
loud and the poachers are often yelling as they try to coral the
elephants. Elephants have great
memories, so they tend to remember things like that. Elephants actually return to elephant graves
to mourn the loss of their family members when they have died.
Kermit had been in Nanyuki being worked on but was returned today. So stories about Kermit were being told today at lunch (tasty lunch with chapati, Moroccan style chicken and fresh passion fruit and mangoes) by Todd's post-doc and some people who have been here for a long time. Kermit's been through quite a lot, and it's amazing how it's still going. The exciting thing I remember about Kermit during my previous trip involved Elephants. Todd was driving a group of us students back to River Camp going through a fairly narrow road due to trees on either side when we suddenly rounded a corner and were face to face with a bull elephant and his family. Todd immediately flipped the car into reverse and did some amazing driving in reverse as the elephant charged at us. But my story pales in comparison to its other stories. Todd was driving Kermit quite fast one time in order to get to town for a deadline when he flipped it on the rough roads. Another time, one of his post-docs got stuck in a river. The guy tried to avoid telling Todd about it as he was driving it for his own personal use and not on research time, so he tried to get help elsewhere to pull it out. But it was difficult to get help and before help could come (in a few days) a flash flood came through and carried poor Kermit downstream and covered it in 4 feet of sand. Needless to say, the post-doc got fired for lack of communication and recklessness. Most recently, one of Todd's field assistant flipped it. His brother had just died, and he had been driving fast at night under the influence of alcohol. Todd found out about this personally from the field assistant who called to tell Todd that Todd should fire him. Todd has a big heart and is willing to forgive if people are up front and honest, so that guy still works for him to this day.
I've been trying to find a field assistant to hire to help me...someone who will help out a lot, but more importantly functions as our guide and guard and lookout for wild animals. It's been this drama filled project. Two of Todd's field assistants (who are awesome) brought a guy along they said would be my field assistant. But he hardly spoke english, didn't seem to know much about science, and looked to be about 17. I said I would like to interview some other field assistants and it caused all this drama, b/c of course the original field assistant was a family member of one of Todd's assistants. I interviewed a guy today, Zachary, who seemed like a pretty good options. Good English, good science knowledge and experience. But I got a text from him this afternoon that said, "don't allow anybody to interfere with our dealings b/c there are some people who are selfish to my position". He also wanted to meet with me again to make sure I understood this, b/c there were other assistants who wanted their family or friends to get the job, so they will tell you bad things about the others. I emailed Todd about this and his reply was funny "sweet..i'm super glad to hear about zachary-- that's awesome news. the text you mention is classic kenya. i love that stuff."
Kirsten's husband is visiting for a few days to pick up their daughter, cute little 2.5 year old Morgan. So Kirsten took us on a game drive tonight in Kermit. When we were leaving the research center, there were some kids playing on the soccer field outside of the electrical fence. The fence where the cards drive through is lifted up with dangling electric wire coming down that scrapes the top of the cars as they go through, but keeps the elephants out. Well, the little kids came running up to say hi to Morgan. Kirsten stopped right under the fence so that the wires were draped down on the vehicle. The kids came up to wave and say hi to Morgan, but one of them touched the car door, which was full of electrical current being that the fence was dangling onto Kermit, so the little girl that came to shake Morgan's hand got quite the shock. Very sad, but she perked right up when Kirsten gave her some chocolates.
We got a late start on the game drive b/c of a big thunderstorm, but it was a pretty good one, nonetheless. Besides the usual, we saw some Elands, which are pretty rare to see here. We also saw a giant herd of buffalo with calves. We passed by a herd of Elephants with several little ones on tow. We also saw a herd of highly endangered Grevy's zebra on the airstrip. The highlight was probably seeing a hyena den with a mom and a cute little pup
Kermit had been in Nanyuki being worked on but was returned today. So stories about Kermit were being told today at lunch (tasty lunch with chapati, Moroccan style chicken and fresh passion fruit and mangoes) by Todd's post-doc and some people who have been here for a long time. Kermit's been through quite a lot, and it's amazing how it's still going. The exciting thing I remember about Kermit during my previous trip involved Elephants. Todd was driving a group of us students back to River Camp going through a fairly narrow road due to trees on either side when we suddenly rounded a corner and were face to face with a bull elephant and his family. Todd immediately flipped the car into reverse and did some amazing driving in reverse as the elephant charged at us. But my story pales in comparison to its other stories. Todd was driving Kermit quite fast one time in order to get to town for a deadline when he flipped it on the rough roads. Another time, one of his post-docs got stuck in a river. The guy tried to avoid telling Todd about it as he was driving it for his own personal use and not on research time, so he tried to get help elsewhere to pull it out. But it was difficult to get help and before help could come (in a few days) a flash flood came through and carried poor Kermit downstream and covered it in 4 feet of sand. Needless to say, the post-doc got fired for lack of communication and recklessness. Most recently, one of Todd's field assistant flipped it. His brother had just died, and he had been driving fast at night under the influence of alcohol. Todd found out about this personally from the field assistant who called to tell Todd that Todd should fire him. Todd has a big heart and is willing to forgive if people are up front and honest, so that guy still works for him to this day.
I've been trying to find a field assistant to hire to help me...someone who will help out a lot, but more importantly functions as our guide and guard and lookout for wild animals. It's been this drama filled project. Two of Todd's field assistants (who are awesome) brought a guy along they said would be my field assistant. But he hardly spoke english, didn't seem to know much about science, and looked to be about 17. I said I would like to interview some other field assistants and it caused all this drama, b/c of course the original field assistant was a family member of one of Todd's assistants. I interviewed a guy today, Zachary, who seemed like a pretty good options. Good English, good science knowledge and experience. But I got a text from him this afternoon that said, "don't allow anybody to interfere with our dealings b/c there are some people who are selfish to my position". He also wanted to meet with me again to make sure I understood this, b/c there were other assistants who wanted their family or friends to get the job, so they will tell you bad things about the others. I emailed Todd about this and his reply was funny "sweet..i'm super glad to hear about zachary-- that's awesome news. the text you mention is classic kenya. i love that stuff."
Kirsten's husband is visiting for a few days to pick up their daughter, cute little 2.5 year old Morgan. So Kirsten took us on a game drive tonight in Kermit. When we were leaving the research center, there were some kids playing on the soccer field outside of the electrical fence. The fence where the cards drive through is lifted up with dangling electric wire coming down that scrapes the top of the cars as they go through, but keeps the elephants out. Well, the little kids came running up to say hi to Morgan. Kirsten stopped right under the fence so that the wires were draped down on the vehicle. The kids came up to wave and say hi to Morgan, but one of them touched the car door, which was full of electrical current being that the fence was dangling onto Kermit, so the little girl that came to shake Morgan's hand got quite the shock. Very sad, but she perked right up when Kirsten gave her some chocolates.
We got a late start on the game drive b/c of a big thunderstorm, but it was a pretty good one, nonetheless. Besides the usual, we saw some Elands, which are pretty rare to see here. We also saw a giant herd of buffalo with calves. We passed by a herd of Elephants with several little ones on tow. We also saw a herd of highly endangered Grevy's zebra on the airstrip. The highlight was probably seeing a hyena den with a mom and a cute little pup
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