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| Antantetiambo sign in front of Désiré's house |
The day
after Faye and Erik flew in from Tana, we made the move out to Andapa. Specifically, Désiré’s house is in Matsobe,
which is sort of like a small suburb just outside the main town. It is situated at a crossroads and is along a
river. Our tents are adjacent to the
kitchen, where Désiré’s wife Valerie cooks the meals. A typical meal here is a generous portion of
rice with some non-rice in it, topped off with more rice and with a hot glass
of rice tea on the side. I can’t tell
whether I’ll love rice or hate it by the end, but right now I’m really enjoying
Valerie’s delicious cooking.
Although
we are obviously lacking a few Western luxuries, I am quite comfortable here
and have no real complaints. Désiré’s
family has been incredibly hospitable.
From the house, we have a great view of the scenic mountains and golden
rice fields. On clear nights, the lack
of light pollution makes for some of the best stargazing I’ve ever seen. The Milky Way is very visible. Since this is my first time in the Southern
Hemisphere, I’ve been excited to see some of the things invisible from the
north, such as the Southern Cross constellation, the Coalsack nebula, and many
amazing star clusters.
The day
after we arrived here, we started our work in Antanetiambo, Désiré’s nature
reserve. It is a green hill that rises
like an island out of a sea of golden rice fields. Our first project was to flag the trail
systems, which will facilitate ecotourism as well as monitoring by the ranger. We measured out and flagged
every 25 m and also made a GPS map. The
two main trails, both just over 1 km, are named after the two types of lemurs
found in Antanetiambo: Tsidy (mouse lemur)
and Bokombolo (bamboo lemur). We also
marked 24 smaller side trails named after other local plants and animals. Faye and I have seen a variety of these
during our work, including trees, insects, birds, snails, and a few
chameleons. But I was of course most
excited when we saw the lemurs.
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| A small juvenile chameleon we saw while flagging trails |
Our
first lemur sighting came unexpectedly when marking a side trail through a
dwarf bamboo grove. Désiré pointed out a
few nesting mouse lemurs (Microcebus sp.)
in the trees above us. Mouse lemurs are
nocturnal lemurs, and this genus contains the smallest primates in the
world. The multiple species of mouse
lemur all look very similar, so we are not positive which species these are (perhaps Microcebus mittermeieri). Even though mouse lemurs come out primarily
at night, these ones were awake and watching us. Perhaps our noise woke them up. After marking more trails, we returned to
that spot at the end of the day to check up on them. They were still there, and we also found
another group. The next day, we spent a
little bit of time looking for lemurs, and we found three more groups of mouse
lemurs. One group was very active and
was actually hopping through the trees.
I was surprised to see one individual leave one nest and enter another
nearby. That group of five eventually
hopped away through the forest. I’m also
proud to say that I found one mouse lemur on my own. Désiré had assumed one nest was old and
abandoned, but I looked closer and noticed a small mouse lemur head.
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| Mouse lemurs! |
That
day, we also saw our first northern bamboo lemurs (Hapalemur occidentalis).
These were spotted by Jackson, the other guide we’re working with. Three individuals were moving about and
feeding in the trees above us. Much of
our project later on will consist of observing them. Since they were hard to see up in the
treetops, I can already tell that this will be difficult, but they were still a
joy to watch. Unfortunately, darkness
was falling, so we had to return before long.
After
the trail marking, our next project was to flag several 10 m by 50 m botanical plots
in preparation for a botanist coming in June.
Since this required us to mark straight lines at right angles to each
other through thick vegetation, this was much more difficult than the
trails. Still, we managed to complete
nine plots in a variety of Antanetiambo’s habitats. It looks like the botanist will have his work
cut out for him, trying to identify every plant species in the 4500 m² of
plots. I am curious about the process, so it will be interesting to see how it goes.
Tomorrow,
we are going to Marojejy National Park, an excursion that was one of the things
I was most looking forward to about coming to Madagascar. This mountainous reserve is home to
incredible biodiversity, including an incredibly rare lemur called the silky sifaka (Propithecus candidus). You can actually see the boundary of the park
from Andapa; there is a distinct line on the mountains where the slash-and-burn
agriculture ends and the protected area begins.
At the moment, I am in Sambava for the night, and we will depart for
Marojejy early tomorrow morning.
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| My next destination: the mountains of Marojejy |
