On this visit to the Budongo forest our attentions were focused on the bird banding team which since our last visit had matured into a very efficient operation. We hadn’t set aside any time to specifically follow monkeys or the star attraction, chimpanzees. But this is Budongo, any spare half hour could be put to excellent use.
Blue Monkey
The key to photographing the monkeys is simply to take your time. Approach quietly, when they start to examine their escape route just settle. After a while they resume feeding or grooming and soon you’re just part of the background.
They may walk right by you.
Olive Baboons
In that instance I was sitting on the ground and found myself shooting up at mum and her youngster. An older youngster got left behind and came running to catch up …
Olive Baboon
The next character and I conducted a lengthy study of each other.
Olive Baboon
The Colobus and Red-tailed Monkeys are a tougher prospect because they spend so much of their time high in the trees.
The Budongo Forest covers an area of about 435 km² which reportedly makes it the largest forest in Uganda. It’s a mixed forest and was once important as a source of mahogany. Left to itself the mix would simplify, at climax it would be dominated by Ironwood (Cynometra alexandrii) more valuable timber species would be excluded. Mahogany is much more attractive to foresters. The efforts to encourage a rich mix to persist were successful but Celtis (hackberries or nettle trees) and Ficus (figs) species were more inclined to grow than Mahogany. These have no timber value but do provide food for primates and birds.
The forest looks natural enough but the parts that have been molested are better for birds and primates than a couple of reserved areas that have never been touched. Who’d have thought.
We were kept hard at work but a couple of hours every afternoon were ours to go for a walk down the Royal Mile or around the camp.
Moreen was keen to get as much from our visit as possible. There would be no slacking off.
Her field assistants were just back from Kenya where they had undergone some additional training provided by the Nairobi National Museum. She was keen that they put their new skills to use under supervision to really consolidate what they had learnt.
Much progress had been made. Patrick and Godfrey had been very efficient at the mechanics of catching and handling birds but had struggled a bit with measurements, partly because of poor equipment and partly because of inexperience. Experience had been gained in the last 18 months and we’d brought some first class equipment which would be theirs to keep.
Field Assistant Patrick Arua surrounded by paparazziField Assistant Godfrey Andrua with a Blue-breasted Kingfisher
The routine was simple. Nets were set in the afternoon and closed for the night. Where possible they were set in one continuous line … 228 metres long. Which is way more net than a small team would attempt to handle in Australia, but some of the hazards we face are absent in Uganda – no Butcherbirds, Kookaburras or birds of prey to start eating your catch; the cool shade of the forest interior rather than a dessicating sun and on average larger more robust birds. Not a bird was lost.
The nets would be opened at first light, birds caught, processed and released until about 1pm when the nets would be packed up. After lunch they would be carried to the next day’s catch site.
Gayle and Patrick taking birds from the netMark with a Speckled TinkerbirdMeasuring tail length of a Fire-crested AletheDigital scales – what luxuryAfrican Dwarf Kingfisher
The team heading to Uganda this time consisted of the three Aussie bird banders that had visited in 2017 plus one.
Dr Will Steele and Dr Mark Antos are both professional biologists who find the natural world so fascinating that they go on studying it even after they’ve knocked off work. Along with the McGee we had had the pleasure of doing some training with the fledgling bird banding team at the Budongo Research Station. We would be returning to offer some more encouragement, some more training and some more equipment.
Our new recruit was the lovely Gayle McGee, also experienced in the process of catching and banding birds.
It is most of a day’s drive northward from Entebbe to Budongo. Our first call was in Kampala where we picked up Moreen Uwimbabazi who heads up the project.
Moreen Uwimbabazi
Then it was a long but fascinating drive via Masindi to the Royal Mile and Budongo.
Much of life in Uganda goes on in the streets. Foodstuffs and furniture …
hustle and bustlethis way to the Rich Dad Junior School
some instruction from the Australian Government
and having bought your food and furniture you load it onto a van, or a motorbike or even a bike.
chair manthree men and a sheepplantain – a staple
From time to time on the highway street vendors rush every vehicle that stops.
street vendors
As well as the fresh fruit and drinks you can buy chicken and goat meat on skewers … maybe not a great idea for the unpracticed intestine.
Lake Victoria is a very large expanse of fresh water about half way up the continent of Africa and somewhat east of the midline.
Uganda sits on top of the lake sharing borders with Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, DRC and South Sudan. The country straddles the equator.
The surface area is roughly similar to my home state of Victoria, Australia or England, Scotland and Wales. It has a population approaching 50 million people and expanding rapidly. The median age of 15 years is the lowest in the world. The birth rate of very nearly 6 children per woman is among the highest in the world.
In the colonial era Uganda was a British protectorate. It gained independence in 1962. Government since then has changed hands by military coup. The effectiveness of government has been reduced by internal armed conflict such as the civil war with the Lords Resistance Army.
The current president is Yoweri Kaguta Musaveni who gained power in 1986 after a six-year guerrilla war. Transparency International has rated the public sector as among the most corrupt in the world, an estimated $286 million US is siphoned off annually. Uganda provides one of the best cases for the suggestion that foreign aid is a process that takes money from poor people in rich countries and gives it rich people in poor countries.
The human rights situation is depressing, child labour is common, the police and armed forces are often accused of torture.
More than 40 languages are spoken, the main groups are Bantu, Nilotic and Sudanic. A couple of Kuliac languages are also spoken. English is the lingua franca in the south, Swahili and English serve the same purpose in the north.
For all the bad news it is a beautiful country. From dry savanna, through fertile agricultural land, dense forest to snow-capped mountains. The people are certainly tough but vibrant and industrious.
In Kampala at the very comfortable Metropole Hotel … with excellent wifi.
Not for long though, it’s back to the bush in a couple of hours. It has been an outstanding trip so far. I will have plenty to share once I get home. Meanwhile a teaser from Kidepo National Park.
… could be a day in your life that you will never forget.
Earthwatch have written to me …
If you have any friends, family, or colleagues who you think might benefit from the once-in-a-lifetime experience of living a day in the life of a chimpanzee, please let them know that we have a team in need of more volunteers running from October 7-18, 2017, as well as 6 teams scheduled throughout 2018 that need a good head start on their recruitment …
You can be in Budongo soon. If you need a refresher on the delights that await you there skip back in this blog to July 10th. The link again … Investigating-Threats-to-Chimps-in-Uganda
I left the Genocide Memorial with many more questions than answers.
The genocide began on April 6, 1994. It had its origins long before that.
The Germans colonised Rwanda in the 1890’s. They found a monarchy with a Tutsi ruling class holding power over a Hutu and Twa underclass. Their interpretation was that there were three races, they believed that the Tutsi were of a northern origin and were higher in the racial scale although not so high, of course, as the Germans themselves. The Germans left the monarchy in place but made sure that they did as they were told.
During the First World War control shifted to the Belgians. They too, chose not to overturn the social structure that they found. One particular action of the Belgians had far-reaching implications, they issued ID cards with the ethnicity of the holder on it.
The modern myth in Rwanda is one of a rosy past, these were not racial divisions, society was fluid, intermarriage was common, the descriptors were of a class, caste or occupational nature. That is, until the Belgians forced a racial structure upon them. In the Genocide Memorial the date is given as 1932 and the dividing line as possession of 10 cows. Another version has it that the division was based on stature and facial features.
There is ample historical evidence that the division existed prior to Belgian involvement. It is generally accepted that the Twa were the first inhabitants perhaps earlier than 3000 BC. Bantu people came from about 700 BC onwards, clearing forests for agriculture. Pastoral people followed and the rate of their arrival reached a peak around 1500 AD.
There is some genetic evidence for a different origin for Hutu and Tutsi. There are some markers that suggest the Tutsi may have come from the Horn of Africa (Somalia, Eritrea, Djibouti, and Ethiopia) and there are differences in rates of lactose tolerance and sickle cell trait. About 75% of Tutsi adults are lactose tolerant, some Bantu peoples are totally lactose intolerant as adults, about 33% of Hutu are tolerant. A particular haplotype of the sickle cell trait, which confers some protection from malaria, is found in central African people including Hutus but is almost non-existent among the Tutsi.
On the other hand there is plenty of evidence of genetic intermixing. In the spurious terms of racial purity there are no modern Hutus or Tutsi of pure pedigree. Such a degree of intermarriage would indicate that there was no general belief in a racial difference.
The Germans found a feudal structure in which Tutsi chiefs were the equivalent of Lords of the manner, the Hutu underclass held land in return for labour. But there was a degree of social fluidity, intermarriage occurred and successful Hutu could join the ranks of the nobility. The entire community spoke the same language, Banyarwanda, a Bantu language.
So yes, the past was entirely rosy, but the nobility got the flowers, the peasants got the thorns.
After the Second World War there was a movement for independence throughout colonised Africa. By this stage the Rwandan populace had embraced Catholicism and in return were receiving an education in church schools and status as officers within the church structure. The old upper class had some competition from an emergent middle class.
The Tutsi pushed for an early independence on Tutsi terms but in 1960 the Belgians dismissed most of the Tutsi chiefs and organised communal elections. The tide had turned in favour of the Hutu majority. The king was deposed. Independence followed in 1962.
Purges of Tutsi followed, refugees departed to neighbouring countries from where some waged an insurgency, more irritating than effective.
In 1973, Army Chief of Staff, Juvénal Habyarimana seized power in a coup d’état. Rwanda became a one party state, his followers were required to sing and dance in adulation at his public appearances. Tutsi’s were discriminated against in employment and education.
In the 1980’s some exiles in Uganda under the command of Fred Rwigyema took up arms with Ugandan rebels in the Ugandan Bush War which led eventually to the overthrow of Milton Obote by Yoweri Museveni. The Rwandans stayed on in the Ugandan military but had plans of their own.
In October 1990, Rwigyema led the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) across the border. France and Zaire came to the aid of the Rwandan Army, Rwigyema was killed in action. Paul Kagame took command, led a tactical retreat into the Virunga Mountains. With funds from the Tutsi diaspora he improved the arms and built his forces. By January 1991 he was ready to begin a guerilla war.
The presence of a rebel military force in one corner of the country galvanised the more extreme Hutus to an even more hardline and overtly racist position. The situation for Tutsis became worse.
The RPF was having sufficient success to undermine the government, the French, sympathetic to the Hutu establishment pushed for relaxation of the one party state to produce a broader coalition. The RPF called a ceasefire and peace talks began.
At this point there were four groups taking positions. The government under Habyarimana and propped up mainly by his wife’s family members and connections, a fairly orthodox and moderate Hutu opposition, the Hutu hardliners and the RPF.
The hardliners were forming militia groups and preparing for a final solution. The French were training the militias. When a peace accord and power sharing arrangement with the RPF seemed likely the hardliners unleashed the militias on the civilian Tutsis. The RPF abandoned the ceasefire and took a significant swathe of the country.
The government was forced back to the table, the Arusha Accord was signed. The UN provided a peace keeping force. The RPF would play a part in a Broad-based Transitional Government. By March 1993 the hardliners were drawing up lists of those they intended to kill.
Sentiment in the general Hutu community, alarmed by the Tutsi rebellion, was hardened further by events in neighbouring Burundi. The first Hutu to be elected president was assassinated by Tutsi army officers.
On January 11, 1994, General Romeo Dallaire, commander of the UN peace keeping force informed the UN that Rwanda was on the brink of genocide. Kofi Annan instructed him to do nothing.
On April 6, 1994, the aeroplane carrying Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira, the Hutu president of Burundi, was shot down as it prepared to land in Kigali, killing everyone on board. It is unclear who brought the plane down but the hardliners were suspiciously well prepared for such an event.
A crisis committee met that evening. The Prime Minister Mrs Agathe Uwilingiyimana should have taken the reins but the committee refused to allow her to do so. General Dallaire endeavoured to persuade them to follow the constitution. When this failed he sent 10 Belgian troops to move her to a safe location. The Presidential Guard intervened. The prime minister and her husband were murdered. The Belgian soldiers were tortured and then murdered. The genocide had begun and it was very well organised. Moderate Hutus, journalists, judges were all early victims.
The UN peace keeping force did nothing.
The killing went on for 100 days. It was brought to and end by the advance of the RPF. Kigali was encircled quite early in the campaign but control of the country was given precedence over taking the city. The genocide continued within the capital even as the rest of the country fell.
When the international community woke to the disaster it finally came to the aid … of the Hutu refugees in UN refugee camps in Zaire. Camps that were housing the perpetrators and run by the former military establishment.
Paul Kagame, leader of the RPF, became the President and is the president still. He was reelected just the other day with almost 99% of the vote. For those of us who live in a western democracy that seems an unlikely figure but from personal conversations I can tell you that he is a very popular figure.
bobmcgee 