Liv in Kenya

Lots of mangrove time this week! Anti-poaching surveys, planting in the nursery, walking the mangrove boardwalk...   More 'groves Only way to get through food poisoning (again) is lots of Harry Potter Tagging turtles and taking their mugshots A hedgehog family! How precious Beach cleanup! So sad to see how much trash we picked up in just a small stretch of beach. And from one of the cleaner beaches too.  Sad to say goodbye to this beautiful place. These are a couple of homes from the village, an examples of the places where we traveled for turtle rescues.  Flying back to Nairobi for a few short days before HOME! The past month has been a blast with these two, going to miss them and our time at Local Ocean Conservation dearly. 

 Can't believe we've already been here for three weeks!  Lots and lots of turtles. These three were feisty! Post anti-poaching survey! We snorkeled over the reef for a couple hours to look for pieces of turtle shell. Sadly we found some, which indicates recent poaching. Also saw a huge puffer fish, zebra fish, sea snakes, urchins, starfish, stone fish... We went fishing with three local fisherman on Mida Creek. We walked out at low tide and set up a large circular fence made from palm fibers and raffia grass. In this photo I was learning to tie the knots to set up the enclosure. When the tide rises and then goes back out, the fish get caught in small pools within the fenced area. This traditional method of fishing, called uzio, is eco-friendly because there is no bycatch. Aside from slipping and landing on a jellyfish (ow ow!), this was an incredible experience. After setting up the fence we took a dugout canoe back up the creek.    The beautiful greenery and recycle...

Straight to the pictures today!  Lots more turtle rescues! Aili is taking the measurements of this little guy before he goes back to the ocean.  We organized the mangrove nursery at LOC by species and then planted 200 saplings at a site on the nearby tidal creek.  Went to a sunset yoga class at the top of a treehouse with Issy and Gray. Very relaxing experience, if I ignored the drones that were filming the class... Last week we admitted a turtle (named Bumps) suffering from tumors. Here we watched as the vet surgically removed tumors that were covering the turtles eyes. After one more day in recovery, Bumps is back to the ocean!! Not the most enthusiastic, but she swam off eventually.    Very large cabbage for lunch.  LOC conducts routine anti-poaching surveys along the beach to look for signs of illegal fishing and turtle poaching. We found a few old pieces of turtle shell (called scutes), but nothing that indicated recent poaching activity.  This se...

 Wow, what a week it's been! Aili, Bre, and I flew into Malindi from Nairobi on Sunday and have been settling into our independent study at Local Ocean Conservation in Watamu. LOC is an organization working to protect sea turtles and conserve the Kenyan coast. One of their programs is a bycatch and release project in Watamu so that local fishermen can call LOC when they accidentally catch a turtle in their fishing nets. After receiving a call we drive to the turtle, collect data and tag the turtle, and then release it back to the ocean on a stretch of beach protected by the Kenya Wildlife Service. LOC pays fishermen a small amount for calling in a turtle, in recognition that they could alternatively sell the turtle for meat on the black market. It's been really inspiring to see the success of this program, and the relationship that has developed between LOC and the Watamu community.  Though I'm certainly not yet adjusted to the heat (or the massive spiders), no complaints w...