DSWT Community Outreach Report January 2018

COMMUNITY OUTREACH MONTHLY REPORT

JANUARY 2018 SUMMARY: The Community team visited villages namely; Ngiluni, iviani and Syusyani of beehive holders, to check on the progress on the beehive project. In order to facilitate easy follow up, the fence line had to be completed and we were able to take measurements and complete the fence line as shown in figure (4). Other areas lacked dummy hives along the fence line of which we put the dummy hives. We also supplied poles together with other dummy hives and put them as requested by the hive holders to cover the remaining areas of the fence line; we were able to put in place beehives in the newly put fence (fig 1). We also rewaxed beehives to attract more bees.

BEEHIVES Achievements The team dug holes and erected a total of 34 poles in the new fence. 22 iron sheets were put in hive poles and put in place 25 dummy hives during the same month       

Duly replaced damaged poles in the beehive holder farms.

Installed dummy hives in beehive fence erected without dummy hives.

Supplied the required poles and set them in the new fence line.

Put in place beehives in areas without.

Put iron sheets around the beehive poles to prevent honey badgers Cleaned beehives affected by destructing ants.

Applied gladiator to prevent further destruction to beehive poles.

Fig 1: Setting beehives in new fence line

Fig 3: Installing dummy hives in Ndetei’s place

Fig 2: Installing iron sheets

Fig 4: Earthing posts in the new fence line

Observation A number of elephants were kept out of the area by the beehive fence. This demonstrates the effectiveness of the beehive project as a mitigation measure of human elephant conflict.

Several farmers felt neglected especially those who did not have a chance to benefit from the older fence. They requested to be joined in the project. This depicts a positive adoption of beehive fences as a community mitigation tool to stop elephants from reaching their farms

SCHOOL FIELD TRIPS AND VIDEO SHOWS We were able to visit several schools including Kamunyu, Ngiluni, Syusyani, Iviani and Nthunguni primary schools to organise for February trips and video shows .

DSWT DONATIONS During January the DSWT donated desks to Yimbuvu primary school which were gratefully received.

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The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust is reliant on your kind support in order to keep our community outreach projects running.

For more information about these projects please visit www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.com/community or email info@dswt.org