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dungon. the field station mascot. rescued from some crazy small little cage inside a temple...now his ego is of holy proportions. demanding breakfast and dinner.another type of conflict
more prescient than the lion-tiger conflict...is the
human-elephant conflict. and I don't mean ganesh.
i've never been this close to real, live wildlife conflict.
a most grateful guest, i visited the field station of the Sri Lanka Wildlife Conservation Society outside of Wasgamuwa Park for several days (and by outside, I mean like an hour from a proper little village. middle of nowhere basically.).
http://slwcs.org/visitus.html recuperating from my nasty buddha-belly-bug, i only got to help out (or rather, tag-a-long) a tad, but I learned a whole lot.
arrival to the field station:
night, after a very, very bumpy ride. makes it more authentic.
the next morning, rose at 6 to a rising sun,
to a landscape which immediately set off my internal gramophone on Circle of Life.
...as I sat pondering which animated friend may come plop its adorable disney self next to me, a small, real live furry face animated indeed, peering at me from north, northwest, and east coordinates, hiding above in the rafters.
After a treacherous evening clutching the toilet, I was in no mood, and didn't feel like getting
rubbing my eyes in disbelief
did my open-air field station quarters really look out over this elephant country? rabies. so I tried to sort things out calmly with my new friend....
but he was relentless.
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turns out, he's the resident field post mascot.
rock squirrel.
so, Capn', there's your first fun wildlife story.
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here's the not-so-fun wildlife story:
elephants = big
people = small
people = crop farmers
elephants = crop eaters
you balance the equation...
...the projects of 'Lankan Wildlife Conservation Society are brilliant. stuff WCS probably wishes they were doing...
simple, effective. sustainable.
really, check them out (and donate!):
http://slwcs.org/visitus.html the motto:
Saving Elephants by Helping People
for someone like me, who quite honestly until Senegal had always put animals in front of people...i totally get the 'Lankan Society's approach to conservation.
so many talk about this type of stuff, but these guys are actually doing it. and with a smile on their face.
advising people on:
new crops that elephants find uninteresting
composting
kitchen garden design
elephant behavior
environmental education
fencing
data collection.
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and better than tracking those elusive majesties through cinemagraphic heights:
I heard my first
trumpeting elephant in the wild!
then the
whoop d do d doo-doo
there's nothing like the smell of elephant dung in the morning. inspected and GPS'd each pile. those pachs probably think we're off our bipedal rockers. next night, saw an amoebish grey blob in half moonlight.
and that was enough for me.
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yeah, i'd like to hide in a treehouse while elephants roamed beneath me
yeah, i'd like to see them parade across a savanna
yeah, i'd like to see a leopard
yeah, i'd like to hold a conversation with a chimp
yeah, I'd like flipper to come sonar cure my aches and pains
yeah, all those wildlife dreams...that I keep chasing...
but,
besides hugging my camel (and that with a metal bar between us),
I know the best kind of human-wildlife contact, is snuggling up to my cat.
that is, before she notices, and sets out the claws to begin the human-feline conflict.
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