FEATURE
Ol Kinyei Conservancy
From Porini Mara
Ol Kinyei conservancy is one of 15 in the world, accorded a place on the IUCN’s green list. The International Union for Conservation of Nature has awarded Ol Kinyei, Lewa and Ol Pajeta, in Kenya, that accolade
M
y friend and I stroll from our tent, which is one of six, that meander on the banks of the Olaitole stream. We sit medieval style at the mess table, eating wild honey gathered by locals from the surrounding bush and listen to the international banter - all excited. We are on the eastern side of the conservancies north of Maasai Mara National Reserve. This morning, we walk around the property with Jimmy Lemara, a senior guide and a wizard of plants. His father was a herbalist, and he fascinates us with his deep local knowledge accompanied by latin names that roll off his tongue as if they were his native language.
16 | NDEGE NEWS DECEMBER 2021 - FEBRUARY 2022
I’m familiar with at least one – Acokanthera schimperi, the poison arrow tree, which is in itself a double edged sword. On the one hand, the ripe fruits are bitter-sweet to taste and an important famine food. On the other hand, when unripe, the fruit and seeds are highly toxic with many cases of accidental poisoning of children and birds. All parts of the plant are poisonous with the only treatment of arrow wounds being excision of flesh and sucking out the blood. The plant contains glycosaid oubane which in small doses is used to treat cardiac arrhythmias. It has been found to have strong anti-microbial properties and help heal wounds. Nearby is a shrub of Rhus
natelensis, which is an anthrax anti-dote. Maasai apparently will still eat meat from livestock that died of anthrax poisoning. Castor oil plant contains ricin, a potent toxin; and so we learn that pretty much all medicinal plants have the potential to kill. He continues to tell us of other paradoxes. The Croton megalocarpus was introduced as a forest tree but it killing the orange leaf croton. We see Carissa edulis’s red berries turning purple and I remember a jam I can buy in Nairobi. The African Olive is sacred and can only be used for toothbrushes not to be cut down for bomas –fencing, as ancestors live in it. There’s an undeniable passion for
