The Amboseli ecosystem is vast. While the system of tarmac roads is growing, many of rural communities are located far from it.  And that means providing services to remote parts of the ecosystem can be challenging. Being able to move through the bush quickly is not only a matter of efficiency, but of safety.

So we are especially proud of Joan Seleyian for getting her motorbike license recently, the first female employee at Big Life in Kenya to do so. Joan is our Community Health Program Assistant, and her role is to support the Ministry of Health nurses and clinical officers to provide essential health services in remote areas of the Greater Amboseli ecosystem.  She helps to convene community meetings dispelling the myths and misconceptions that surround family planning, as well as managing a team of Community Health Volunteers. And she will also be at the forefront of a new program aiming to tackle the high child and teenage pregnancy rates in the area. Being able to safely use a motorbike makes a world of difference for her ability to do her job.

While motorbikes are common in East Africa, it’s not common for women to ride them, despite the employment opportunities having a license opens up. Joan is an inspiration to other Maasai women for challenging the status quo.

Congratulations, Joan! We hope more will follow in your footsteps. 

Our thanks to CHASE Africa for funding this essential work.

Some days we take small steps, other days they’re more like jumps. Today we’re very excited to announce a jump.

You might be familiar with the Kimana Sanctuary. Right in the heart of the Amboseli ecosystem, it is a critical link in one of the last corridors for elephants and other animals to move between Amboseli National Park and the Tsavo ecosystem.

The Sanctuary was created in 1996 as one of the first community-owned wildlife sanctuaries in East Africa, but mismanagement of early tourism enterprises led to their failure. For more than a decade the Sanctuary stood still, a forgotten paradise that received few visitors.

Conservation-related benefits were minimal, leading to growing impatience among the Sanctuary’s 844 collective landowners. Something needed to change, and in 2018 Big Life and Sheldrick Wildlife Trust took over management of the Sanctuary.

Slowly, we dusted it off and picked it up. We purchased and upgraded the infrastructure through support from the D.N. Batten Foundation and UNDP/Global Environment Facility, but we knew that long-term success depended on increasing income to landowners.

We renovated a guest house, created campsites, and fixed up the road network. Visitors started to trickle in, and then flow. Revenue increased, but still we relied on our partners and donors to fund most of the costs of conserving the Sanctuary.

That is about to change through an exciting partnership with Angama, owners and operators of Angama Mara safari lodge in the Maasai Mara. A sub-lease agreement will give Angama tourism access to the Sanctuary, with resulting revenue streams that will allow Kimana Sanctuary to become self-sufficient, simultaneously covering its own running costs and increasing income to its landowners.

Big Life will retain the head lease and management responsibilities, and Sheldrick Wildlife Trust will continue its support through funding for community rangers (until such time that these costs can be covered by tourism revenue), alongside the financing of land leases in conservancies elsewhere in the Kimana corridor.

This is truly cause for celebration, a moment that changes the future. It’s a clear example that where wildlife thrives, tourism will follow, creating sustained revenue that can protect important wildlife refuges for years to come.

It’s a model that we will pursue in the other areas where we work across Amboseli, to achieve our goal of building local economies that rely on conservation, not destruction, of nature.

Photo: Jeremy Goss

As you may know, 2020 was supposed to be a Maasai Olympics year, but we postponed the historic games in an effort to keep our community safe. We’ve continued to monitor the impacts of COVID-19 across Kenya, holding out hope that we could safely resume plans in 2021. Unfortunately, as numbers continue to spike, we’re left with the no-choice decision that the only course now is to officially cancel the 2020 games and pick up where we left off next year. The Maasai Olympics will resume in 2022 on our traditional timetable.

The Maasai Olympics were born out of conversations and collaboration with the Menye Layiok, or Maasai “cultural fathers,” and warrior chiefs to devise an alternative to the long-held tradition of hunting lions as a mark of manhood, bravery, and prestige. Instead, local warriors compete for medals by participating in events that mimic their hunting skills: rungu and javelin throwing, high jump, and 200m, 800m, and 5000m races. The inaugural games were held in 2012 and have happened biennially until 2020.

The Maasai Olympics is more than just a single day. Events run through most of the year, starting with conservation education meetings. In May, the first level competitions to select the warrior athletes for each of the 4 participating teams normally occur, and regional competitions then run from July through September, culminating with the finals in December, now planned for December 2022.

We know that this is disappointing to the local communities, especially the warriors already training for team selection and excited to compete. We look forward to resuming next year when it is hopefully safe to do so once again and gather as a greater regional community to celebrate the incredible athleticism of the Maasai and the recovery of the local lion population.

To kill a rhino, they would have to kill the rangers first.

This was the only thought that ran through my mind at 2 am, as I lay hidden behind a rock in the densely forested Chyulu Hills. 

We had gathered intelligence that indicated a gang of poachers was planning to breach the rhino territory using a local guide. Knowing roughly where the guide lived, and which direction he would likely go, we organized three teams of Big Life and Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) rangers to set up ambushes along these paths.

We worked under the cover of darkness, moving rocks to form a wall so that each ranger, his firearm, and GPS, were hidden.

And we were right.

It didn’t take long to hear people coming down one of the paths. I alerted the five other rangers near me, and as the poachers rounded the corner, one of the KWS rangers shouted for them to surrender.

But the poachers were armed with AK-47 assault rifles, and as they prepared to fire, my thought came to life: the poachers would stop at nothing to kill a rhino for its horn.

Open fire ensued, and all I could hear was the bullets striking our only protection, the rock wall. I was forced to shoot – to protect the rhinos, to protect my fellow rangers, and to save my own life. In the end, one poacher was shot and killed and one escaped, but the rhinos and my friends were alive.

My name is Nderu Loormunyei.

I am a veteran in Big Life’s ranger force, commanding a platoon of over 50 rangers. I am also one of the original six Big Life rangers who were hired at the start.

In the early 90s, we believed the Eastern black rhino was extinct in our part of Kenya. That is, until one day while on patrol, I found rhino tracks and droppings. It took five long years to get photographic evidence of one of these rhinos. But a small population had been there all along, hiding and waiting.

Since Big Life started protecting the rhinos in the Chyulu Hills, we’ve tragically lost six rhinos because of poaching attempts, including a one-year-old calf, Bahati, who had previously survived a poacher’s bullet wound but later died while vets were removing a snare from around his neck.

Over the years, we’ve intensified our patrols, increased our manpower, and improved our operations. Things have changed since I first started, and we now have 61 rhino rangers in 10 units, with 39 camera traps across the rhino territory. We have an intelligence network, monitoring team, aerial surveillance, and new roads and fences.

As a result, the critically endangered Eastern black rhinos in our area have experienced ZERO rhino poaching incidents in the past 5+ years, and we are almost ready for the inbound translocation of new rhinos. This is imperative, as there are only 745 Eastern black rhinos left in all of Kenya.

A lot has changed since I first joined Big Life, but sadly, the demand for rhino horn has not.

If you can, please make a donation today to support Big Life’s rhino protection program. I can truly say that your support means the difference between life and death – for our rangers, and for the wildlife they protect.

Thank you,

NDERU LOORMUNYEI
Big Life Platoon Commander

It costs $455,465 a year to protect the eight critically endangered rhinos in our area of operation.

This population is of incredible value to international rhino conservation efforts, as it is one of the very few genetically independent populations of Eastern black rhino left in East Africa today. The habitat itself is also vital, as it is suitable and has been approved by KWS for the reintroduction of additional rhinos, which is key for the growth and survival of the species.

2021 has been a challenging year for Big Life and our conservation programs. Support is down, and the threats are high. If you can, please consider making a donation to support Big Life’s rhino conservation efforts. Only together can we protect wildlife and wild lands, now and far into the future.

Watch Big Life’s new 2-minute film to see the threats facing rhinos today and the work Big Life is undertaking to prevent their extinction.

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