Educational Game Drives with The Elephant Foundation

education remains the key in managing human wildlife conflict.

Colin Dawson with local communities around the Kruger National Park.

Let’s first touch on the topic of apartheid. Apartheid or “apartness” in the language of Afrikaans, was a system of legislation that upheld segregation against non-white citizens of South Africa. After the National Party gained power in South Africa in 1948, its all-white government immediately began enforcing existing policies of racial segregation. Under apartheid, nonwhite South Africans—a majority of the population—were forced to live in separate areas from whites and use separate public facilities. Contact between the two groups was limited. Despite strong and consistent opposition to apartheid within and outside of South Africa, its laws remained in effect for the better part of 50 years. In 1991, the government of President F.W. de Klerk began to repeal most of the legislation that provided the basis for apartheid.

Essentially, the policy governed relations between South Africa’s white minority and nonwhite majority for much of the latter half of the 20th century, sanctioning racial segregation and political and economic discrimination against nonwhites. Although the legislation that formed the foundation of apartheid had been repealed by the early 1990s, the social and economic repercussions of the discriminatory policy persisted into the 21st century.

Causing high levels of poverty that have prevented many from ever stepping foot on the other side of the fence.

The Elephant Foundation is with The Koru Camp working with the Gogos (grannies) in the local communities. Imagine living your whole life next door to some of the most stunning wildlife areas on the planet but never having stepped foot inside. Never having seen an elephant, a rhino, a lion or giraffe, this is the case for these group of Gogos.

Educational Game drives

We work alongside local conservation organizations (Connected Planet Foundation, Transfrontier Africa, The black mambas) to help a group of local grannies and some Granddaughters immersed in the Greater Kruger surrounded by stunning wildlife and pristine wilderness. This week, we have done 2 educational game drives and the gogos have been getting environmental education lessons, plenty of games, nutritious plant-based food and more.

They have had some magical encounters with elephants, giraffes, zebra, warthog, and more and we hope will go back to their communities with a message of hope and connection to nature. The influence that they have in the village and the wider community is huge.

We are proud to make camps like this happen and we thank you for all your support in helping us make it happen. With this, we hope that the message of protecting wildlife will spread and help mitigate the ongoing human-wildlife conflict.

Singapore Authorities seized 20 pieces of rhinoceros horns in Changi Airport. 2 weeks after celebrating World Rhino Day.

20 pieces of Rhinoceros horns were found in transit baggage bound for Laos.

Source: Channel News Asia

Rhino Horns estimated to be worth USD1 million seized at Singapore Airport, largest haul in Singapore to date.

SINGAPORE: The National Parks Board (NParks) on Tuesday (Oct 4) seized 20 pieces of rhinoceros horns that were being smuggled through Singapore Changi Airport.

Airport security and NParks' K9 Unit detected and inspected two bags and found 34kg of rhinoceros horns, estimated to be worth around S$1.2 million, NParks said in a media release on Wednesday.

This is Singapore's largest seizure of rhinoceros horns to date, it added.

"The owner of the bags, who was travelling from South Africa to the Lao People's Democratic Republic through Singapore, was immediately arrested and the rhinoceros horns were seized by NParks."

Rhinoceros are protected under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), to which Singapore is a signatory.

Under CITES, international trade in rhinoceros horns is prohibited.

Singapore is committed to international efforts to curb illegal wildlife trade to ensure the long-term survival of these animals, said NParks.

"Genetic testing is being carried out at NParks' Centre for Wildlife Forensics to identify the rhinoceros species," it added.

"The horns will subsequently be destroyed to prevent them from re-entering the market, disrupting the global supply chain of illegally traded rhinoceros horns."

Under Singapore’s Endangered Species (Import and Export) Act, those who are found in possession of CITES-scheduled species in transit in Singapore without valid CITES permits face a fine of up to S$50,000 per scheduled species, not exceeding an aggregate of S$500,000, up to two years in prison, or both.

"Singapore adopts a zero-tolerance stance on the illegal trade of endangered wildlife species, and their parts and derivatives," NParks said.

"Our agencies collaborate closely in a multi-pronged approach, which includes working with our international partners, to maintain vigilance in regulating and enforcing against illegal wildlife trade."

Rangers dehorning Rhino to prevent poaching for its horn. Rhino horns are believed to have medicinal properties in traditional medicine although to date, no scientific and medical study has proved the benefits of consuming rhino horn. Rhino horns are made up of Keratin, the same protein which forms our hair and nails.

Celebrating World Rhino Day

OI Pejeta

On the 22nd of September, we celebrate our planet’s rhino species.

There are five species of Rhinos which are all considered on the ICUN’s red list:

1. White Rhino (Near Threatened)

2. Black Rhino (Critically Endangered)

3. Greater one-horned Rhino (Vulnerable)

4. Sumatran Rhino (Critically Endangered)

5. Javan Rhino (Critically Endangered)

Rhino horns are made up of keratin, the very same substance that forms our nails and hair. There are no medical benefits in consuming Rhino horn. Say no to consuming Rhino Horn.

Facts and Figures (Rhinos in the savannahs)

They are one of the few remaining megaherbivores that weigh more than 2,000 pounds. They preserve the diversified African grasslands and woods, which support a vast array of other species. The savannahs and woods the rhinos call home will change significantly if the rhinos do go extinct.

There are diverse plant and animal species found in the habitat of rhinos. The preservation of rhinos benefits not just the ecosystems on which they depend but also other species that share their habitats, such as elephants, buffalo, large carnivores, and antelopes.

The Greater One Horned Rhino

The Sumatran Rhino

The Javan Rhino

Hong Kong University scientist develop test to tell elephant and mammoth ivory apart.

Scientists at the University of Hong Kong are developing a rapid test capable of distinguishing between an elephant and mammoth ivory that could help fight the illegal trade in elephant ivory. The new method, which measures isotopes in a one-gram sample, could return results within a day, much faster than sending samples overseas for age dating or weeks-long DNA analysis, said associate professor David Baker, from the university’s school of biological sciences.

“Our hope is that we can help at least distinguish these two things and close this loophole that exists here with the legal sale of mammoth ivory”

— David Baker

Selling mammoth ivory is legal in Hong Kong and mainland China, but they have both banned trading in elephant ivory. Traders might claim elephant ivory is mammoth ivory to cover up illegal sales, according to global conservation body WWF.

Jovy Chan, the manager of wildlife conservation at WWF-Hong Kong, said that if the new tool was made available at the border, it could make it easier and faster for the authorities to identify smuggled elephant ivory. “Before Covid-19 border controls, some smugglers transported large batches of ivory by boat to the mainland, while some individual travellers carried smaller pieces with them through the border,”.

She said that before Hong Kong banned the sale of elephant ivory at the end of last year, some traders had told WWF that mammoth ivory did not symbolise good luck in the same way as elephant ivory, was not as durable and carried a smell, and that was why they did not sell mammoth ivory chopsticks. However, such chopsticks are now on sale.

According to National Geographic, some 30,000 African Elephants are killed by poachers each year for their tusk. Mammoths are long-extinct, but their tusks, preserved in the tundra in places such as Siberia, are dug up from the permafrost.

The HKU team said two of the samples sold as elephant ivory had been identified as mammoth ivory in isotopic tests at the HKU laboratory, and they would now be retested using another method to ensure the accuracy of the new tool.

Baker, who is also director of HKU’s stable isotope laboratory, said the team was aiming to expand its data set from 20 to more than 60 samples to better prove the method’s ability to distinguish between the two kinds of ivory.

“Our isotope lab is a full-service facility,” he said. “If this works, and if the government wanted us to do that test, we could do it at very short notice. This helps to circumvent some of the challenges of not having an age-dating facility nor a rapid test for DNA.”

Baker said it could take months for the authorities to obtain results from overseas radiocarbon age-dating facilities, which determine whether the ivory is ancient or modern. Hong Kong does not have such a machine and one can cost around HK$40 million (US$5.01 million).

Meanwhile, extracting DNA from elephant ivory was complicated and challenging because there were few living cells with DNA in parts that were not close to the root of the tusk, where it was connected to the tissues of the mouth, Baker said.

“When you complicate things with mammoth ivory, a material that is 10,000-plus years old, it gets even harder to extract any usable DNA. It can be degraded,” he said. “We also have to digest all of the ivory to try to liberate some of that organic matter.”

Baker said another way to distinguish between them was to have trained personnel observe the lines and patterns on the tusks, called Schreger lines.

But not all products showed those lines clearly, especially when the ivory had been carved into an ornament, he said. It was also not practical to ask for a product to be sawn in half to show its cross-section.

Baker said the new method was minimally invasive to ivory products because only a small amount of sample was extracted with a dental drill.

“For example, for a statue mounted to a base, we can remove it from the base and drill into it from below,” he said. “It doesn’t change the cosmetic appearance of the artwork so it’s not entirely destructive. We only need less than a gram of material, which for ivory is just a stack of powder.”

The researchers would then measure isotopes, atoms of the same element that have different numbers of neutrons. Baker said that was a way of fingerprinting materials to understand where they came from.

“When we looked at the oxygen and hydrogen isotopes, which can be derived from water or the water released from food, we found a very clear separation [between elephant and mammoth ivory],” he said, adding that stable isotopes do not change over time.

“Most of the poached elephants come from tropical areas – the savannahs and the forests of Africa – which are at times arid and at times wet,” he said. “It’s a completely different type of environment to where mammoths roamed, which were high-latitude, colder, more arid environments.

“It’s not really a surprise that we would see these dramatic differences in the isotope ratios of the water that they’re exposed to.”

Source: South China Morning Post