Butynski responds to Croze: hyrax, galagos, veg. changes...

From: TButynski@aol.com

Subject: Re: Karura Mammals

Date: 3 September 2015 19:52:13 GMT+3

Dear Harvey,

Thanks for your email.  

I have inserted a few comments below...after [[[[[[[[

Best regards,

Tom

In a message dated 9/3/2015 9:22:07 A.M. E. Africa Standard Time, hcroze@karurafriends.org writes:

Dear Tom (and everyone else),  

Many thanks for your quick reply and the further clarifications. Couple of comments.

Whereas I’m pleased that you agree with my assessment of the hyraxness of the Mystery Mammal, I’m intrigued that you think it might be D. arboreus. We’ve been living right on the border of Karura with a clear view into the canopy since 1985, walking in the forest since then, and have never glimpsed one. Still, nothing is impossible, and they are nocturnal. Out of over 100,000 camera catches, exactly one burst of five frames has been of the MM. But your comment about hearing it call makes me wonder if the night shrieks we hear nearly every evening (kek-kek-kek-kek…) are not Otolemur as we have always thought, but in fact the hyrax. Still, we have actually glimpsed the bushbabies ostensibly in association with the noises, and caught them occasionally on the camera traps, but not one sighting of a hyrax-like critter, until the early morning of 19 March. I shall try to record the next burst of vocalisations and send it to you and this group for comments.

[[[[[[[[[[[[  Tree hyraxes are seldom seen...even where common.  Even a night, when night-lighting, one seldom see tree hyrax as their eyes give little reflection.  The call of D. arboreus does, as sometimes described, sound a bit like a person being strangled.  A long drawn out call given in a series.  Go to www.wildsolutions.nl to hear the loud, advertisement, calls of D. arboreus and of Otolemur garnettii.  The two calls are very different.  The O. garnettii loud call might be described as a 'kek' followed by a brief (ca. 1 sec. pause), then a 'trail' of seven rapid 'keks'.  Have a listen.

‘Syke’s’ it is then: what a relief!

On senegalensis, never seen one here at home nor in the forest, but have heard a few forest neighbours say that they’ve seen the little fellows as garden visitors. No solid confirmation to my knowledge.

[[[[[[[[[[[[  Best place to look will be in good groves of yellow fever trees...if you have any of those in Karura.  G. senegalensis and O. garnettii should be the only two galagos in/near Karura.  Listen also to the loud 'honk' call of G. senegalensis at www.wildsolutions.nl   This is another very distinctive call...one often heard...but one that tends to go unnoticed by people.

On reforestation, yes indeed, on top of our list, after security and maintenance of infrastructure. I’ll attach a sampler of some of our planning maps that show the distribution of indigenous (ca. 25%) to non-indigenous (ca. 75%) with indications of where we plan to attack and what progress has been made.  Work so far has involved (a) clearing old degraded plantations and letting the suppressed natives (basically those that you have named, plus others like Brachylaena, Vepris, Markhamia, Croton, etc, etc) come back, with or without a bit of re-planting; (b) clearing the stretches of invasives like Lantana and Caesalpinia and replanting as necessary with indigenous treelets. So far over 60ha have been treated, which is getting close to 10% of the area that needs restoration. Not only does the programme move us along to getting the forest back to a more natural state, but it’s a great way to engage the surrounding community and corporate donors to participate and take ownership of the forest.

[[[[[[[[[[[[  Sounds excellent.  It will be interesting to see how different wild animal species respond to these vegetation changes.  Leaving a few big eucalyptus is not a bad thing...especially as nest sites for raptors.  

All for now. Let me go enter the

proper names on Facebook.

Let’s keep in touch.

Best, Harvey

PS: Perhaps it’s time to turn this email exchange into a blog...

[[[[[[[[[[[[ That would seem a good idea.  Once FKF has its initial mammal list in place, it can present each new, additional, mammal species as a 'news item' or blog on its website...with a bit of natural history and a photo.  Same, of course, for the birds, reptiles, amphibians, butterflies, dragonflies, plants, etc.  END.