More Research From the Mara!

Special thanks to UNESCO-IHE for facilitating all this research on the Mara River.  Here are three more theses.

Mturi James Mturi
Linkage between flow patterns, wetland size & functions.  A case study of Kirumi wetland, in the Mara River catchments, Tanzania (April, 2007)

Gladys Zachariah Ng’umbi

Nutrient cycling functions in a natural wetland in Transboundary Mara River Basin, Tanzania (April, 2009)

Wande Maduhu Kema

The significance of Ecosystem Services in sustaining people's livelihoods; a case study in Mara wetland, Musoma and Tarime District, Tanzania (April, 2010)

Mara Flows Inception Workshop

Mara Flows is a program developed by the minds of UNESCO-IHE with funding from the Dutch government.  The program will fund four PhD students to conduct their research on the Mara River.  We will also work to provide funding for several Master's students through GLOWS to work on discreet projects on the Mara River under the supervision of those four PhD students.  Dr. Michael McClain is the head of both projects.  We just held the inception workshop for the Mara Flows program at UNESCO-IHE in Delft, The Netherlands. 

We are all excited about the great students recruited to be the PhD candidates!  More to come on this in the future...

Water Samples

One third of our water samples from the last two years...at UNESCO-IHE in Delft.

Memories...

As you all know, Amanda and I going back to school soon.  I was going through some of our old pictures and was reminded of the time our Land Rover got stuck at the bottom of a hill with a boat on the roof.  It was our low-flow EFA sampling event...we had completely bald tires...but also just happened to have 100 meters of rope in the truck.  Thankfully, there just happened to be about 30-40 young men (including members of the Water User's Association!) around that could help us pull it up the hill.  

Ecological Society for Eastern Africa Conference

Ecological Society for Eastern Africa 3rd Annual Conference

Opening remarks....

Amanda...representing the Ecological Society of America at the reception....

Two EXCELLENT Reports Now Available

You may recall from the December and January issues of the Mara River Flows Newsletter about two UNESCO-IHE students visiting us in the Mara River Basin.  They were both doing their Master's research on some of the issues facing us here in the basin.  Well, now they have wrapped up their analysis and have provided their results to us.  Check out their work below...

Omengo O. Fred
Carbon cycling in the Mara River system – Influence of land use and location in the fluvial network on organic matter processing and CO2-production (April, 2010)

Veronica G. Minaya Maldonado
Land use influence on the benthic macroinvertebrate communities of streams in Nyangores and Amala tributaries of Mara River, Kenya (April, 2010)

Details and photos of lions poisoned in Masai Mara

http://baraza.wildlifedirect.org/2010/05/13/details-and-photos-of-lions-poisoned-in-masai-mara/

...The lions lay dead in a traditional homestead where they had been poisoned by eating a cow laced with pesticides by a Masai family. A lioness had died about 5-10 meters away from the cow carcass. The carcasses of a juvenile male and second lioness lay some 30m away. There were piles of dead flies around the cow carcass and the lions had not yet been scavenged. KWS arrested a local man who admitted that he had poisoned the lions with his neighbors. He produced a container that contained pink powder, which he had used to poison the lion. The same pink coloring was visible on the laced meat of the cow carcass used for the poisoning.  KWS have sent samples of the lion carcasses and the pink substance have been sent for toxicological tests to confirm what pesticide was used....

Mistrust at Nile treaty meeting

Water ministers of five countries meet in Entebbe on Friday with the signing of the Nile treaty on the utilisation of the world’s longest river high on the agenda.

However, Kenya and Burundi are not expected to sign with their upstream partners as their ministers will not be travelling to Uganda.

Poaching Hippos from the Mara River with a Shotgun?

http://www.dailynews.co.tz/home/?n=9858&cat=home


POLICE have arrested two men in Wegero Village in Musoma Rural District, Mara Region, in possession of 32 hippopotamus teeth, the Regional Police Commander (RPC), Mr Robert Boaz said today.

The RPC named the suspects as Nickson Abdhala (55) and Juma Masanja (55). Both are residents of Wegero Village in the vicinity of Mara River on the Tanzanian side.

The suspects were also found in illegal possession of a shotgun and dozens of live bullets, according to the RPC. "It is likely that the suspects have been using the gun to kill hippos in Mara River," the regional police chief said.

Mara River is shared by Kenya and Tanzania and it traverses the world famous Serengeti National Park and Masai Mara Game Reserve on the Kenyan side.

The arrest follows information volunteered to police by a good citizen, he said. Wildlife experts working with the Ministry of Tourism and Natural Resources are expected to assess the value of the teeth, according to Mr Boaz.

"We don't know the value of these teeth but natural resources people will find out soon," he said. The suspects were arrested late last week. They have already been arraigned in a court of law in Musoma , the RPC said.

Meanwhile, two suspects have allegedly been caught with a bomb at Sirari border in Tarime District, police reported today. The Tarime Regional Special Police Zone Commander, Mr Constantine Masawe, named the suspects as Selemani Idd (35) and Ramadhani James (28).

Both are residents of Tarime District in Mara Region. The bomb was immediately examined by members of the Tanzania People's Defence Forces at Nyandoto Military Camp on the outskirts of Tarime town, according to the RPC.

"After we realized that it was a bomb we alerted TPDF officers at Nyandoto and they came to destroy it. It was made in 1913, according to their findings," the regional police chief told the 'Daily News.'

The suspects, he said, were till being questioned in connection with the bomb while under police custody in Tarime. A preliminary investigation indicates that they have been using the bomb to cone people out of their money, according to the RPC.

Meanwhile, a resident of Kwisarara Village in Tarime District, Nyagwaka Mwikwabe, has surrendered a homemade gun and live bullets to police in Tarime, the RPC said.

Buffalo Skull

Amanda's EFA/BSAP Technical Presentation

This is the full presentation that Amanda gave the to the audience at the Official Launch Event for the Environmental Flows Assessment and the Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan for Sustainable Management of the Mara River Basin that was held on April 22nd, 2010.


Part 1


Part 2

New Project Report Added

I just added a new project report to our database that we just received from Nasser Brahim.  Nasser was a student at Florida International University several years ago who received research funding from GLOWS.  He has since moved on from FIU and is getting ready to complete his graduate degree at Yale University.  Check out his informative report on the best local farming practices in the mid-lower catchment of the Amalo River.

You can also read one of his student dispatches from the field at the FIU website.

Mara River Flows Newsletter - April 2010

Download it now to get informed about...

• the Official Launch Event for the EFA and BSAP Reports,
• how the Mara River did during April,
• the new MaraFLOWS graduate students,
• upcoming changes to our research,
• and MORE...

Dr. Tom Okurut's Speech at the Launch Event

The Executive Secretary of the Lake Victoria Basin Commission, Dr. Tom Okurut, also spoke at the EFA/BSAP Launch Event on April 22nd, 2010.

Here is his speech and introduction of Amanda Subalusky.

Reports Now Available: EFA and BSAP

The Environmental Flows Assessment for the Mara River and the Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan for Sustainable Management of the Mara River Basin are now available.  Download them now.

Kardamili