Stop Wildlife Poisoning

Category: carbofuran | Date: May 10 2009 | By: Martin Odino

I have seen birds in thousands dot the skies above Bunyala rice scheme. A deceptive view when you have not witnessed the poisoning documented on this blog.

Many of these, once poisoned soon become food.

No doubt the largest proportion of poisoned birds are consumed by humans. But even with the little informal awareness I have tried to raise amongst some poachers and consumers, majority adamantly stick on to the belief that the furadan that intoxicates the birds does not affect them, arguing that they have been on that diet for a greater part of their lives, averaging between 1 & 15 years.

I realized a variety of raptors at the rice scheme in the recent survey which was characterized by poisoning mostly of doves and pigeons. I could not help inferring a positive corelation of more raptors hunting about the field with increased poisoning of medium and small seedeaters, namely doves, pigeons and weaver birds.

On two occassions, I believe the same immature Lanner Falcon knocked and caught an intoxicated dove in mid air. The falcon, wrongly reffered to by poachers in vernacular by a term whose equivalent in English is a shortwing (technically an accipiter or the group of goshawks and sparrowhawks) is common during poisoning of doves and pigeons. The raptor is notorious for disorienting the seedeaters settled to eating bait and the poachers loathe it since once dispersed by the falcon who strikes one of them, the targeted seedeaters tend not to return to eat the bait and fly away the farthest they can to safety.

Such pigeons eating bait constitute quary for the falcons and the disoriented less powerful member is easily killed.

Disoriented, intoxicated doves perching on nearby euphorbia are also caught unawares.

I also saw a melanistic Gabar Goshawk pursuing a flock of doves stirred up from bait. The gabar and the Lanner Falcon were too fast and brief for my camera.

Black-chested Snake Eagles are common in the skies above Bunyala Rice Scheme. I particularly have been observing an immature member of the species who on some occassions comes down to feast on a dead birds out in the field.

Same bird (Black-chested Snake Eagle), airborne and perched

The male Eurasian Marsh Harrier was a daily routine hunter, harrying over the fields pursuing scurrying pigeons mostly in the evenings. His particularly less swift movement compared to the other birds of prey predisposes him to relying on poisoned weaklings from furadan poisoning.

The Eurasian Marsh Harrier.

The Black-shouldered Kite might be safer, relying mostly on locusts and other insects. He might be in greater danger during poisoning of the likes of Abdim’s Storks during which time termites and locusts are laced with furadan to poison the birds.

The Wahlberg’s Eagle was seen to steal moments to also scout the rice plains and I saw it attempt to pursue some small birds on a few occassions but was mostly mobbed by the Black-chested Snake Eagle.

A Wahlberg’s Eagle, hunting above the rice scheme, then perched for a break.

But how come these raptors seem to be doing just well?May be the furadan in the doves is little and does not attain the lethal dose amount in the birds of prey. But then what of the repeated exposures to the poison? I believe it is putting some strain on the predators’ immunity and could with time cost them their lives. Or are the likes of the falcons dying far away? I followed one observing it using my binoculars and he flew with his catch well beyond the farthest that my binoculars could see.

This guy’s feeding habits may not be very appealing but probably he amongst the few birds treading on safer grounds in these poisoning fields.

Yak! That is a big toad!

I was not sure if the fish would go down his throat. It did!

Even baby fish were not spared!

Keep reading.

Tags: Bunyala Rice Scheme, furadan, Poacher, poisoning, raptors

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Category: carbofuran | Date: Mar 11 2009 | By: Martin Odino

While it is more obvious that there is poisoning of small to medium-sized birds using Furadan around Bunyala Rice Scheme, the larger raptors are seen to kite, soar and hover searching for their food. It is almost hard to suspect that even the birds of prey are possible victims of  Furadan posoning because; nobody directly targets raptors for poisoning and the issue of secondary poisoning by Furadan poisoning remains a debatable theory. But reality is that they too are subjects of poisoning and the locals will not spare them for a delicious accompaniment for the staple maize/millet flour preparation otherwise locally known as Ugali.

The Western Bandded Snake Eagle below was photographed perched on a tree overlooking one of the paddy stretches and where poisoning was reported to take place. The Western Banded Snake-Eagle is one of the scarce Snake-Eagles of Kenya with the preferred range of this species known around this region in Kenya. A threat by Furadan to this species in this region therefore means a big risk to this species population.

 The Western Banded Snake-Eagle is not  purely a snake-eater and will eat other non-snake prey. The eagle was overlooking the rice fields, possibly scouting for weakened birds as would be the case during smaller bird poisoning by the hunters. The other birds seen from  my team’s and the eagle’s view included Ruffs, Sandpipers and the Common Greenshank (see photo below; apologies the birds are not so distinct).

 One of our ‘bicycle transporter’ told us he had poisoned a couple of waterbirds for his evening meal with his family the previous evening. From what we showed him later on while teaching him how to use binoculars, he pointed out the birds as either Wood or Green Sandpipers which are migrants. he had used termites and laced them with Furadan. Well, it may not be possible to know exactly which migrants are at risk at the moment but we noted that quite a number of migratory birds were feeding around the rice fields. During data collection there will be acurate documentation of the same. Amongst other migrants, we observed the Blue-Cheeked Bee-eaters, Eurasian Bee-eaters, Spotted Red Shanks, Common Greenshanks, Ruffs,  Common sandpipers, Green Sandpipers and Wood Sandpipers

Tags: Bunyala Rice Scheme, furadan, migrants, raptors

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Category: Uncategorized | Date: Sep 24 2008 | By: Martin Odino

Hi,

I am just heading back to Nairobi from a place called Machakos, about 70km from Nairobi. One of Kenya’s 60 Important Bird Areas (IBAs) is found here and is known as Machakos IBA. I have a personal interest in this area; I have been monitoring a Wahlberg’s Eagle pair in the area for the last 3 years which comes in around August of every year and leaves by April of the next year. Wahlberg’s Eagle is an intra-African migrant raptor and also the smallest of the dark Eagles otherwise called Aquila eagles.

I have watched a number of wild animals in this area, especially in a local agricultural Institute center (Kenya Agricultural Research Institute-KARI) where I made reference to in an earlier post, ‘no poisoning here’. Bordering this area is the Athi-Kapiti plains with its wildlife ranches such as Hopkraft’s Ranch. It is in these plains that the worst of the recently vulture poisoning incidences took place and 187 of the species succumbed to poisoning in 2004. For a while I felt the research institute had every reason to boast a fairly intact habitat relative to the surrounding almost absolute natural habitat depleted neighbourhood. For another reason, I have seen vultures and other raptors pass over this area and sighed, “mmhh they must be confident the chances of coming across baited carcass in this area is minimum compared to the neighbouring Athi plains”.

Fairly intact vegetation on KARI.

The view from mid photo into background is cleared, settled and cultivated land.

It is in this research centre that the Wahlberg’s Eagles found a safe confine where to put up a nest and renovate it year in year out before laying their egg or two utmost. Naturally, only one young survives in case they were two hatchlings because of the phenomenon called canism which essentially is the killing of the weaker hatchling by the stronger. Canism is well explained in one post in Simon Thomsett’s blog. Unfortunately, for the last two years I have monitored the eagles, their nesting has always been a failure especially because intruders somehow always cut down the tree where the Eagles nest. I even went on to request for the large, high canopied trees to be closely monitored by the institute’s farm management which seem to be this small eagle’s favourite. However, today, in my morning scouting around the institute’s premises, I still realized this is on-going, though the tree that the eagles last put up their nest is still intact.

The eagles‘ nesting tree is the tallest in the photo.

Tree stump of recently felled tree

The birds literally left for their southerly bound journey (to Angola most probably where they spend their time when they are not around) without nesting, probably because of human disturbance or the time for their departure had just reached. Normally, they would be renovating the nest at about this time (September- October). Last breeding season, the tree on which they were nesting and were actually incubating in November 2007 was cut down. They ended up staying much longer and after identifying another tree, constructed a nest then left.

(Check the nests in the photo taken from the underside of the canopy. The one on the left was left. The one to the right might be the active one though dominant at the moment)

I was hopeful I would get them in their nest today especially when I heard a loud domestic chicken, chick-like quick squeals which I have heard them make while courting and nest-building but it was not them. I walked around avoiding disturbing them in case they were in the nest but actually they were not even in sight. I went back up the river valley and saw one individual airborne. At least they are around but may be this once safer haven no longer has hope for them especially after no nesting successes for the last 2 breeding seasons.

There is still evidence small game though. Dik diks, mongooses and hares are typical. Below are the crepuscular hare’s pellets/droppings, fresh from early morning deposition I would suppose.

I have observed a whole lot of variety of migrating birds stop over to replenish their energy packs before proceeding on south or north. These include the Pallid Harriers, Montagu’s Harriers, Black Storks, Red-backed Shrikes, Red-tailed Shrikes, Barn Swallows, Common House Martins just to mention but a few. All these roost and forage on the research institute’s grounds, but the whole lot of optimum conditions seem to be collapsing. Besides the human encroachment on the habitat, even the wetland has dried up! I never saw this wetland dry up completely even during the driest of the months. Global warming I would suppose. As a result, skulking coloured rock lizards on the rocky river bed are nowhere (I only saw one) whereas the once flowing river only has only a few pools of stagnated water. I wonder how the frogs are doing!

Dried up mud and surrounding rocky river bed where the river flowed out of the wetland

Drying up reeds

Remnant water pools

Generally, this wildlife haven just looks like it is going down.

Tags: eagle, frogs, global warming, habitat, lizards, migrants, raptors, Wahlberg’s Eagle, wetland, Wildlife

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Category: Uncategorized | Date: Sep 13 2008 | By: Martin Odino

Hi,

I just thought it would be refreshing if you took a look at these handful photos for your weekend. These are part of my collection that I have from wildlife poisoning surveys.May be you could test your knowledge on these African raptors as well and put it as your comments? I will give you a hint for each. By the way a number of these raptors are vultures. Raptor refers to a birdof prey in contemporary ornithology. Traditionally the term was reserved for killer birds of prey; I mean birds of prey that literally killed their prey for eating. Vultures are scavengers and therefore would not qualify to be called raptors. They (vultures) are now also considered as raptors simplified to mean birds of prey. Raptors are sadly part of biodiversity that have and continue to suffer heavy casualties from pesticide poisoning. Nonetheless, I hope you enjoy!

Hint: A snake-eater

Hint: A young bird or immature whose adults could attain one of the three colour morphs known of this species.

Hint: Also an immature bird; one of the two species of East African vultures whose young individuals are so identical.

Hint: The commonest East African vultures.

Hint: Afish-eater.

Pleasant weekend and keep checking our blog.

Tags: pesticide poisoning, raptors

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Category: Pesticides, carbofuran | Date: Sep 07 2008 | By: Martin Odino

Hi,

Bunyala Rice Scheme is in Busia District, Western Province in Kenya. It is actually located at the border to Siaya District which extends southerly and easterly of Busia district.

Hardship area

The area is a flat expanse with characteristic scrubland and savannah conditions. This vegetation is scanty and poor short grasslands around homesteads whereas the grazing fields are a mixture of tufted grasslands with thick bushes and scrub whereas there is reed vegetation where water floods during the rains mostly resulting from the River Nzoia (a major river that drains into Lake Victoria) bursting its banks rather than from the rains flooding the plains.

A photo showing some of the vegetation typical of Bunyala plains. The tufted grass is typical of its grazing fields(also note the almost bare area used in baiting birds using furadan)

Significance of the rice scheme

These conditions clearly define the area as one with low agricultural productivity. Livestock keeping is still the dominant human activity though the growing human population has shrunk the grazing fields thereby reducing livestock herds significantly. It is however not uncommon to find herds of over 50 heads owned by a family and these herds mix at the communal grazing field into super herds of indigenous animals. Even with such many animals, dairy production is low and milk is for domestic consumption and local sell. It is not wrong to state that these animals are mostly kept for prestige rather than livelihood sustainability.

A boy herding livestock (some of the sheep he is looking after in the mixed herd cut out at the top of photo).

Poaching, also an old practice carried down the generations still goes on in the area though the hunting grounds are now confined to the hills such as Wanga hill where wild game, especially antelopes have retreated following habitat destruction and terrorism by man’s aggression to them for meat mostly to trade in. Laughing hyenas in the distance in the night is a usual thing and claims of leopard visits in the dead of the night is an occasional but known possibility in the area. The fabled ogre in the traditional folklore according to my grandfather may have been the lion. The mighty strength, hairy body with tail, unpleasant odour (typical of beasts) and tendency to strike in the night (may be just as the man-eaters of Tsavo or an old lion with a high affinity for easy to catch human prey. This may have accorded this beast the description that it attacked in the night when in reality the younger, robust individuals may have been hunting normally in the wild) all befit the King of the jungle, the Lion. But now there is no more of the ogre/ (might be) lion.

The wife to the lion; lioness.

Crop farming (maize, millet and sorghum alongside a number of tubers), a revolutionarily acquired practice like in many livestock keeping communities also goes on at painfully minimal levels of zeal, the result of which the harvest is almost always zero. This is aggravated by the irregular and low levels of rainfall in the area, needless to mention the flooding calamity which always strikes and chokes the crops dead while in the field.

The Bunyala Rice Scheme established in the 1960’s in the area therefore brought some relief to the situation. Paddy did just well and everyone in the above activities was soon doubling up as a paddy tender, earning some daily income besides a portion of the rice crop in their holdings to supplement their starch requirements at home.

A section of Bunyala Rice Scheme

Furadan induction

In the early 1980’s Furadan made a debut in Kenya and Bunyala Rice Scheme like many other local rice schemes benefited from this awesome reliable nematicide pesticide. Birds were flocking the rice scheme to gorge on the grain and organisms that thrive in water when the floodgates are opened to supply water to the rice scheme. Grain-eating and wetland birds therefore flocked in such large numbers as any native had ever experience. Man’s desire for bird protein given the dwindling wild herbivore population shifted to the grain-eaters and wetland birds. Catapults by youngsters and herdsmen became common (These are no more since Furadan took over). Hunters quickly snatched the opportunity and shifted their focus to birds from wild game. With a wild instinct on boosting catch bounty they discovered Furadan as an effective bird-killing substance. Man’s bird meat consumption therefore rocketed and has been a normalcy to date.

Significance of Furadan to wild animals and birds

Birds are poisoned in such horrific numbers. Domestic and wild animals including snakes are known to have died from feeding intoxicated birds. Biologically, man is also an animal and from his wild, primitive, feeding behaviour, I must painfully say a wild one. He gets a dose of his intoxication by feeding on the poisoned birds. What may also become disastrous is the status of raptors in the area. Raptors target the smaller birds’ flocks which increases their chances of getting food while conserving their energy for hunting periods during the times when the fields are harvested, but the situation is more worrying even then. Smaller birds flock in smaller numbers and while poisoning progresses on, it means a large proportion of birds in these smaller flocks gets to eat the poison-laced food. In my survey in the area 3 months ago, I saw 7 species of raptors in 5 days, 3 of which are Accipiters, otherwise ‘shortwings’ in the temperate countries and which feed mostly on the smaller grain-eaters. Naturally, the easier, sluggish bird will be caught and predated upon by a bird of prey. These weaker, less sleek subjects to escape are poisoned individuals. Since the raptors go for the soft tissues first, the entrails of their quarry are the first to be eaten, exposing the raptors to high possibility of getting poisoned by eating Furadan contaminated entrails from the just ingested Furadan-laced food. Not so far from Bunyala area is the Lake Victoria where a number of cases have been reported of Furadan poisoning on fish which again the Banyala (People of Bunyala) and their Luo neighbours eat lavishly.

As site of our interest for education and awareness in the Stop Wildlife Poisoning Campaign at Wildlife Direct, such is the status quo in and around Bunyala Rice Scheme.

Tags: Antelope.Furadan, Birds, Bunyala Rice Scheme, Kenya, Lake Victoria, Lion, raptors, Stop Wildlife Poisoning Campaign, Wildlife Direct

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Category: Uncategorized | Date: Aug 29 2008 | By: Martin Odino

Chris Rollie, RSPB Scotland’s area manager for Dumfries and Galloway, said: “When great efforts are being made to attract visitors to rural areas, the negative message of an illegally poisoned countryside is the last thing we need, while the effect on wildlife is appalling.”

Dumfries and Galoway is notorious and recently this year, four buzzards were found poisoned and baits recovered from the area.

And so the police, the government and RSPB aare at task with investigations given the outrageous raptor poisoning cases tha thave led to calls by a charity for crackdown on bird poisoning.

The charity’s investigations staff received a total of 229 reports of possible persecution incidents in 2007 in Scotland, 16 of which were from the Dumfries and Galloway area.

Tags: bird poisoning, buzzards, Dumfries and Galoway, raptors, RSPB, Scotland

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