To Independence!

In honor of Independence days everywhere (happy July 4^th!), we celebrated Madagascar’s independence last week on June 26^th. A few rituals were the same—fireworks in the sky, fireworks in the streets (mostly set off by adolescent boys)—it was a whole family affair. For days leading up to the 26^th I saw all these colorful paper lanterns being sold in the market. Could these really be for decorating a family’s home? I soon came to realize their true purpose after witnessing a band of small children swinging illuminated lanterns with reckless abandon in the dark streets that night, shrieking with joy and singing the national anthem. What I also realized was that these lanterns were lit with a real candle, and probably could burst into flames at any moment. No US toy regulator would let those go through. Ah, liability. Check out the kids walking back after the fireworks through the streets of Morondova…..

Getting to know Kirindy Mitea...

The first couple of days I spent getting to know the place and exploring the trails with Rebecca, who’s been very helpful in introducing me to the possibilities here. At Kirindy I’m going to focus on the experimental component of my lemur health project. Experiment you say? Like white lab coats and cooking up chemicals? Not quite, but I am trying to make it a controlled study in the midst of field conditions that are hard to control. I’m interested in how the intense dry season here in the west affects the health of lemurs. I’ll be looking at general body condition, stress levels, and parasite diversity in Microcebus over the course of the dry season in both disturbed and less disturbed habitat. My hypothesis is that as the dry season progresses, which decreases the amount of nutrients and water available to lemurs, their stress levels and general body condition will decrease, which will leave them more susceptible to parasite infections and disease. And all of this will be worse in the more disturbed habitats. More than you wanted to know, right?

I’ve marked out two of the four grids for my health study so far, and I set up the evaluation room (well, ...tent), where I’ll check out all of the mouse lemurs that I capture.

To test out methodology I set out 10 traps a few nights ago, and had some success on the first day! Meet our first subject, KM 001. A cute little guy, if I do say so myself.

Maztoa a Kirindy Mitea!

A mere 6 days after I left North Carolina…and I arrive at my destination, Kirindy Mitea National Park. A glorious arrival. I was greeted by Dr. Rebecca Lewis, the founder of the research station here, and researcher on sifaka social behavior from the University of Texas-Austin. She’s worked in Madagascar for several years now, but only recently began working in this park. Starting a new research station means a lot of work and a lot of waiting—for permits, for water, for the process to work its way through the Malagasy system. With a lot of patience, she just recently established the gridded trail system and infrastructure for research at Kirindy Mitea. She gave me a tour of my new home, which is comfortable and beautiful, but didn’t take long to tour……see for yourself!

The camp is a colorful, friendly mix of researchers, camp staff, and a Malagasy student, which means 3 languages may be spoken at any one time (Malagasy, French, or English, in that order of frequency). We all eat our meals together, which generally consist of rice with roasted peanuts for breakfast, rice and beans for lunch, and rice and beans for dinner. We try to spice things up a bit and throw in a few new flavors every once in a while. The grated parmesan cheese I brought from the US was a hit, although it was met with some skepticism at first. You mean…….cheese……….as a powder? After some inspection and a little smelling, the staff tasted it. “Tsara,” they replied, which means “good” in Malagasy!

(Top L-R) Tagloire (cook), Vagely (trail maintenance), Dr. Chris Kirk (Physical Anthropologist).

(Bottom L-R) Renari (driver & mechanic), Felana Rakotondranaivo (Malagasy master’s student), Dessy (camp manager), Dr. Rebecca Lewis (camp founder, Primate Social Behavior).

The Lepilemur sing us to sleep and the fosa keep us on our toes--I’m really going to enjoy living here!

Public transport, Mada-style.

Of course, if this 4x4 thing doesn’t work out, I always have another option for transportation.

Introduce: The charrette, the local transportation of choice.

Kirindy Mitea or Bust!

Getting to Kirindy Mitea National Park is no easy feat—in fact, it’s virtually impossible by road for most of the year. Over the 70 or so miles from Morondova, there are several river and water hole crossings only passable in the dry season. Be careful if you try a bit too early—your car may wash downstream into the Mozambique Channel. Visitors and researchers will often take a motorized pirogue (wooden canoe) down to a coastal town, Belo-sur-Mer, and then walk to the park. We’ll try that later this summer, but for now we’re cruising in the 4x4.

I’m excited to reach Kirindy Mitea and see what it will be like—I’ve spent many months wondering about this moment. Onward to the river!

Indri indri? Call for you!

Working with Indris last summer definitely captured my interest. They are beautiful, graceful and stately lemurs, and they possess a great importance to the Malagasy people. Tradition states that the Indri, or Babakoto in Malagasy, is the "grandfather of the forest," an ancestor to the inhabitants of Madagascar.

Click to hear the eerily beautiful call of the Indri. Groups of Indri use this call to communicate and demarcate their territory.



To learn more about this gentle giants, read here.

Catch a falling star

This summer I'll be focusing on the smaller species, namely the mouse lemurs. But last summer and in the future I'll continue to work on Eulemur and Indri, who both require a little more complicated capture strategy.

People often ask just how exactly we go about catching a lemur, so I thought I might share this little video and describe the process.

The capture team, made up of a darter, a couple of spotters and 4-5 people designated as runners, walks slowly through the forest. If a lemur is spotted, the darter waits and maneuvers to get the perfect shot. The dart gun, pressurized with carbon dioxide, is fairly accurate, but you usually only get 1 chance before the lemur is long gone. No accidents here either.....in over 450 lemur captures, the Prosimian Biomedical Survey Project has not had a single lemur injury. If the dart successfully hits the lemur (it's best in the meaty rump!) the team watches to see the lemur's reaction. I've seen some lemurs take off and cover 300 horizontal feet through the forest in a matter of seconds. Other lemurs, such as the Indri, gaze down and wonder peacefully what has transpired. In either case, the runners of the team position themselves under the lemur and....wait. And in some cases, we wait and wait and wait. I've seen an Indri take over an hour and a half to go under the anesthesia, but some will take just 10 minutes. See our neck muscles of steel in the picture above.

When the lemur is ready, it's grip will slip on the tree branch and we are there to catch it. This was a million dollar catch of a black-and-white-ruffed lemur from almost 100 feet up. Gol!


At this point the lemur health evaluation process begins, which takes about 40 minutes. We'll hold the lemurs (and sometimes keep them warm under our jackets) until they've fully recovered. Then they're released to their original location.

Morondova--last stop before Kirindy Mitea National Park

Greetings from Morondova, gateway to the Baobabs! I flew in yesterday morning early on a small D60 plane, with propellers and all. There wasn’t a safety presentation, but needless to say, for once in my life I read through the safety card thoroughly, cover to cover. But all was well, even when the pilot got the plane steadied at our cruising altitude and started reading the daily paper. Such is life here….

I love Morondova—it’s a bustling, friendly town on the shores of the Mozambique Channel, a mere 300-400 kilometers from the African continent. I head down to Nosy Kely, the strip of land that juts out into the channel for dinners, where I can watch the sunset on the beach, eat lots of fresh seafood, and sip Malagasy rum flavored with lychee (there are perks to fieldwork). I watched a local woman come into a restaurant last night carrying freshly caught langostines, or lobsters. They were gorgeous, with bright blue, yellow and red coloring.

I’m getting all my supplies (i.e., toilet paper and chocolate) ready to head out for my first stint of field work. I’ll be in Kirindy Mitea National Park from tomorrow until the 4^th of July, with a possible break on the 25^th and 26^th of June to come back to Morondova to take part in Madagascar’s Independence day festivities. I’m sure it will be a party! I’ll send stories from the field when I get back….wish me luck with the ol’ mouse lemurs.

Tana: the land of rice and taxis

Tana is an interesting place—the largest urban center in Madagascar and the political, economic and industrial capital of the country. About 1.7 to 3 million people live here, most of them perched in small houses on the hillsides. The flat valleys are reserved for rice production, right smack in the middle of town.


Tana is fairly spread out, so it’s best to take a taxi if you need to go to the downtown area. I love walking around the city, checking out different streets along the way, but I think saving my lungs from sucking down fumes will be worth it in the long run. The town is overrun with taxis so you never have to wait long. And no taxi ride is the same—on several of them now my driver has asked for my fare early so that he could fill up with just enough gas to get to our destination. That usually ends up being about 2000 Ariary, or about a $1.30. Gas (or l’essence, as I’m learning) is pricey here—about $8 - $10 a gallon, which makes our $4 a gallon hike in the US seem measly. Most of the taxi drivers have taken to popping their old puttering Peugots into neutral down the steep hills of town to save gas. Never a dull moment, I tell you.

Last night I met 3 American researchers on a countrywide quest to find the blind, un-pigmented, cave-dwelling fish that live only in Madagascar. I felt rather run of the mill with my lemurs!

Landed in Tana!

After a near-miss of my flight at the Paris airport (a minute to spare), I made it to Tana, where miraculously all of my bags arrived as well. Things are looking up, since last summer I spent 3 weeks without my luggage. A change of clothes is a beautiful thing not to be taken for granted.

I'm here in Tana for a few days to arrange for all of my required permits and my extendable visa. Madagascar has a fairly serious permitting process, with a full application and review process that takes about 3 months, so researchers have to apply far ahead of time. The process is facilitated by MICET, an organization that supports and coordinates visiting researchers throughout Madagascar. Each foreign visitor that does work in the country also sponsors a Malagasy student. I met my assigned student today, a master’s student named Herman. He’s interested in comparing the feeding preferences of mouse lemurs in the dry and wet forests, which will fit in nicely with my project. We did pretty well with our communication, although my bad French and his limited English will be an interesting combination.
Photo: Steve Evans, 2005, Wikipedia