Simon Thomsett

Category: Crowned Eagles | Date: Oct 23 2007 | By: admin

14 Oct 2007
Slow Sunday morning. Duchess jumping about in shower room dragging the back-pack around finally got me out of bed at 6.30am. A hearty breakfast with Joe the camp manager. We made a plan to go to the top forest around 11AM. Took pictures of Narina’s Trogon and flowering trees.

11AM found Amos, Joe, Duchess and myself climbing a very steep road in a Land Cruiser. We passed smooth rounded hills, and half expected to see Julie Andrews running over the ridge with two pails of milk, except that the forested canyons beneath were home to things more frightening than dairy cows. The landscape looked half alpine half typical African savannah. The secluded valleys all sprouted lush tall forest trees and as you left the bowl the thinner the tree would get, till there were none on the ridge tops.

We cleared a ridge and there was a stunning view, more large than the grandeur we’d already seen. An open glade, with a waterhole and fresh elephant signs everywhere. Amos was happy to be here again, Joe an old ranch hand with plenty of bush experience but relatively new here was shaking his head with amazement. There were 6 guards on patrol stationed nearby. Duchess made an impression and all were keen to help if need be. Joe left for camp holding both thumbs up.

At noon, that same male Crowned Eagle from yesterday displayed nearby. I suspect his territory lies within the same canyon that leads to the camp below. I therefore opted to release Duchess to the south west, which so far as I could tell, was on the edge of his territory.

At 1.30pm I walked away from all, and in a moment of solitude removed Duchess’s jesses and cast her down hill into a small patch of forest. She took off magnificently and one would have been moved with the whole spirit of the thing, except that she landed on a branch too thin to hold her weight. It cracked and down through the tree she crashed! It has been the same with nearly every large eagle flown in un familiar terrain. At home the Yellow Fever is all we have, and they are strong. Here there are different sort of trees, that have no strength. She’d learn.

Amos and I went through the ins and outs of the radio receiver. I also convinced him that there was too much focus on large animals. Now he had seen Duchess and realised she was no bird, but a major predator I suspect we have another convert.
Amos gave me a radio, a call sign ‘Sierra Tango’, and bid me farewell.

Amos and Duchess

I now (4pm) sit this with a cellphone keyboard in one of God’s fairer creations with Robin Chats calling all around and sunlight filtered through giant trees overhead. Bright butterflies dance over the forest floor, and Duchess sits in a tree above happy with her new surroundings.

She flew very well coming hundred of metres to the glove, through the forest and over the open glades. Got some ok pictures of her coming head on. Some colobus monkeys starting growling and for a moment it look as though she was ready to catch one. Although they are a typical prey species for wild Crowned Eagles they are heavy and very strong. There must be a technique in which wild eagles take them alone and by surprise. Although a pair of eagles more than doubles the odds and must insure protection from the troop. Instead I diverted her attention and called her back. Then let her fly across a small valley into a high tree, when out of nowhere came two White necked Ravens. They attacked her and she stupidly flew away in panic to be hard hit and forced into the top of a tree. The Ravens asserted their authority and flew away after 10 mins. 7 Kongoni walked into the clearing seemingly out of place in this highland forest.

Evening came rapidly and I pitched camp under Duchess. At 7pm I radioed in that all was well. Cooking a much too salty packet of noodles and chewing a rather tasteless sausage from a packet next to the fire I heard hyrax, an alarming Bushbuck, Freckled Nightjar but as yet no owls or galagos. Elephant are smashing branches and trumpeting very close. Rain threatens, which is bad news because my tent is less than waterproof.

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Category: Uncategorized | Date: Oct 22 2007 | By: admin

13th Oct 2007- Diary Entry
Duchess spent night in the shower sitting on the back-pack. At 6AM the camp suddenly arose with people bustling about. My first raptor faintly heard was an African Goshawk. The ‘click click click’ sounding like two hard stones tapped together.

Duchess although very lively yesterday afternoon and seemingly recovered, was again slightly slow, and despite a good walk to the escarpment edge remained too lethargic to consider even an exercise flight. This is not a bad thing as she is taking in her surrounding calmly and without fuss.

The woodland around camp averages 8m, and is a mix of Acacia seyal, nilotica and Terminalia, Erythrina, commiphera, combretum and many others of which I have no idea. It is extraordinarily diverse and apparently neatly organised, possibly the work of elephant and fire over a millennium. Tsetse fly occur here, supposedly the scrouge of Africa’s livestock industry requiring vast sums for their eradication, but for the occasional low hum flight and very rare bite, I am glad they persist.

Peter arrived and we had a quick discussion re: best location for release. A forest higher up the slopes and to the south may be better.

At mid morning I took Duchess for a bath in a clear pond and took some pictures. Then we sat in a tree together and she enjoyed her after-bath sun bathe.

At noon, still having seen no raptors I heard the last thing we needed. A male Crowned Eagle high over the valley displaying. Duchess unaware of the significance of this cocked an eye at him.

Crowned Eagles, like most raptors and predators keep territories from which they exclude competition. It is a difficult task to find a location today in Kenya where indigenous forests persist. Only 1.7% to be exact. It has been the case that formerly marginal woodland, never supporting Crowned Eagles may do so today. This is not good news. It does not mean the population has swelled and it is spilling over into these ’sub-optimal’ habitats. It does imply that the indigenous forest, as they are felled and settled by people (or worse ‘re-afforested with exotics), displace some eagles into areas not usually colonised. As those few ‘good’ or optimal habitats shrink, forest animals may be forced into smaller territories. Like catfish in a drying pond there comes a time when the population crashes and then stabalises back to the normal population density. All supposing the prey species such as monkeys and forest duiker remain at equal density, one should be able to guess/estimate the holding capacity of Crowned Eagles and their total numbers. But the sum of all this is that any forest worth releasing eagles, must already have eagles. And these eagles are now threatened in Kenya and certainly ‘conservation dependent’. If by good chance one produces captive bred Crowned Eagles, one cannot ignore the importance of their release albeit fraught with problems. It is superfluous to remind ourselves of the only logical solution……and that is to fully protect existing forests and to increase the forest size to something that nears the national goal of 10%. But high yield commercial exotics and plantations will not help biodiversity or act as water catchment areas.

We always try to prepare our release birds well before release. This is something many rehabilitators of raptors take far too lightly. If raised in a pen, no matter how large an eagle will not know how to turn a corner, will not have the muscle mass or tone for strenuous flight, will not know prey from a dangerous animal and will not know how to kill. Without going into details we fly them everyday and get them hunting well and often. It is an exercise requiring some expense not so much in fiscal terms as in time. A large eagle takes months to get fit. For release it must be very fit and very good at hunting. Volunteers Shane McPerson, Mia Jessen and Laila Bahaa el din had all helped get Duchess up and hunting. Shane a huge New Zealander had been able to handle her well and had taken monkeys, hares, springhares and Thomson’s Gazelle back in June 2007. I had flown her too for the last 2 years and had also seen her take a fair number of monkeys. I must admit however that the last month or so I have been too busy to work with her at the level she deserved.

Fierce battles for territory can occur and the rightful owner always wins, especially over less fit captive eagles. If raised in a pen, or housed in one for two weeks it stands no hope at all in a life threatening situation.

I had it the past released Crowned Eagles in territories I knew not to have wild eagles. I came under some criticism. ‘How will it find a mate?’. ‘How will it fit in and be taught by its peers?’. and finally ‘Is it right? After all if nature had intended……..’

In Tsavo West I had released a total of 6 Crowned Eagles in a habitat few would have believed could have supported them. The riperine forests and the spring fed 30 acre forest surrounding Finch Hattons spread over harsh dry open woodland seemed too small. But in Zimbabwe a colleague the late Ron Hartley, found Crowned Eagles in similar terrain nesting on Baobabs. A situation we here in Kenya would never associate with the forest designed Crowned Eagle. In reconciling the fact that forests have gone, and would never return it seemed worth a small experiment to see if these releases could induce pairs to try nesting in ’sub-optimal’ areas. It worked.

From the little I could fathom of the Njuruman’s Crowned Eagles had not been recorded. I had visited the foothills on a number of occasions and tried in vain to mount a rock strewn road up to its summit. I had previously been struck first by the abundance of raptors and game (from 1980 to 1995) then to an apparent absence of raptors, paucity of game and the increase in people. But the misty tops on which I now sat, had somehow eluded me. Now that I was here, with Duchess and all the signs saying ‘GO’, it was a sombre awakening to see this eagle calling out as would a lion ‘This is my land’.But this wasn’t the end of the world for Duchess. She was still a juvenile. Born almost white for a very good reason. They stand out like sore thumbs and their parents can see them and feed them for at least a year. Thereafter they take 5.5 years to get spotted and dark like the adult. At this age they are recognisably adults and will be challenged aggressively. Because she as pale she may even be tolerated. I once saw a juvenile from an adjacent territory successfully beg food from an unrelated adult.

Of all the variables to consider we simply have exhausted all choices. And this was as good as it ever could get. We have the back-up of rangers and one of the most extensive and healthy forests in Kenya.

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Category: Uncategorized | Date: Oct 18 2007 | By: admin

12th Oct 2007- diary extract

Me holding a martial eagle

After a week of rapid communication Mark Jenkins confirmed that they could fly Duchess and I down to Ol Donyo Laro on Friday morning.
I prepared a radio transmitter for Duchess by soldering a lithium 3v camera battery to an old transmitter. The soldering iron sat in the flame of a gas stove that was also making my early morning cup of coffee. Once complete it was covered in exopy resin to keep it all together. I had hoped to put it on her central tail feather last night but the oral valium I gave her refused to make her anything other than obstinate. I had checked on her late last night, and although she was groggy she was still set to do battle. This morning I gave her an injectable sedative, and Mwanzia and I were able to put the radio on with strong cords and super glue. You cannot see it at all and with luck it will last for 4 months or so.

The plane arrived bang on time at 10.30AM on the airstrip near my house at Game Ranching. We loaded in my back pack and I sat in the back with Duchess awake, but still sedated on my lap. We flew over the southern end of the Ngongs down the Great Rift valley and passed Kwenia amidst great scars running north to south. These scratches in the soil were huge cliffs that mar the earth as far as Israel.

Still beautiful, dry but visibly settled now with shinning corrugated roofs in seemingly hostile terrain. Kwenia, a temporary lake still remained aloof and untouched. It is a place I had worked in because of its Ruppell’s Griffon Vulture breeding colony. From up here it still looked amazing and a place to which we must return.

Duchess woke up a few times. James the pilot, ex police, seen everything kind of guy admitted on the intercom that he was terrified of birds, having been attacked by a turkey as a small boy. I reassured him he was doing fine, and then tried to scare him with some exploits I recalled of Crowned Eagles killing people……the plane lurched a bit!

The Njurumans rise out of hot bleak pans of rancid lakes filled with soda. The mountain ridge cloaked in cool forests appeared before us and the plane dropped its nose to face a plateau that lay mid way up. There an airfield appeared flanked by spindly trees. Duchess had behaved the entire way, bar for a few thrashes. It was a painless journey, from her back door to her new home in less that an hour. Instead of a backbreaking and potentially lethal 6 hour drive we stepped out alive and well. I was very grateful for this.
It was hotted than I expected. Drier too. But the mountains behind were the obvious locations to consider for her release.

A kilometer or two away was the camp. At first impression the camp was based on the traditional old Kenya safari theme. Open to wildlife (not fenced off as are so many camps). I met Betty who introduced us to Amos Wambua, the scout that would be attached to this release. I was shown a tent, and after making sure Duchess was ok and seated on her perch I phoned the owner Peter Bondi-Neilson to say all was well. We were being treated in some style!

Later I had lunch with Duchess hooded on my glove, now feeling a bit more co-ordinated, but still reeling her eyes around like a drunk. Then I was in for a surprise. I was shown the main tents that overlooked the presipitous valley beneath. Nothing except for a few valleys in Ethiopia could beat this in the magnitude, depth and beauty of the view. Deep in the river stood gigantic trees, fed by both the clear river beneath and the mists created in the locked-in environment. On either side were cliffs of hundreds of feet on which Peregrines or perhaps Taita Falcons must have their eyeries. This gorge housed elephant, buffalo and leopards.
It is this place where Duchess looked with sharpening eyes and despite her impending hangover focussed a fixed glare at something unseen to us a thousand feet beneath.
The main tents, set high on wooden pillars looked out directly onto the valley. Their design and decor and setting was perfect. Unbeatable. Duchess and I relaxed by my spacious tent. By tent I mean a generous twin bed, enclosed shower and flush choo (loo).
At 5pm Duchess was rapidly getting clear headed and we went for a walk. Keen to vanish on my own and give Duchess a respite from people as is our custom at home I tried to exit unseen. But like a shadow Amos appeared carrying a 458 rifle.

Duchess like all eagles knows the difference between a harmless looking person and one in a paramilitary uniform with a gun. It was no good explaining that we’d rather be alone, and orders were orders. Turned out of course that he knew a few good paths to get to that pillar of rock perched in the valley beneath. The walk would have been a breeze except that Duchess weighs a clumsy 12 pounds. She was hooded as it would have been impossible crouching through thick scrub and descending steep ravines with her flapping about. Mid way down the buffalo tracks were very fresh. The hooves crushing the quartz rocks give a brief but distinct smell of cordite, in fact the animal itself smells like gunpowder. These tracks were seconds old. Then one on our left crashed through the bush. It could not have been more than 20m away but impossible to see. I loosened Duchess’s jesses, ready to cast her off should we all have to scatter. I was grateful that Amos was there, as he was leveled headed and we sat in thick scrub listening quietly till the buffaloes were a safe distance. Hopefully.
There is one wicked sabre-like plant called sansivera. It grows on slopes like this and it went right up my left short trouser leg and dug into my leg. Great! We got to the boulder and it towered up too sheer to carry an eagle up. I left Amos looking after Duchess tied to a tree and climbed up to a stunning view. Quite possibly no”one had ever been there before. At it highest it must have at least a 175ft vertical face. Beneath the river was bigger than I had imagined. Noisy too. The glades within the high forest trees were created by rocky pans and swirl pools. I did not have much time to spend, took a few pictures and returned to Duchess and Amos. The way back was easier, and when we had a good view of the valley I fed Duchess and explained to Amos how to feed and take care of her after release.
We talked on the way back of the wildlife and the problems. He said that lion, cheetah and leopard were around but not easily seen. Elephants and buffalo were in good numbers as were zebra. Lesser Kudu in the hills. Of eagle food there were dik dik aplenty, hyrax and vervet monkeys.

I asked the most important question of all. Had he seen any other Crowned Eagles here? No. He had not. Nor had anyone else.

We got back at sunset. Duchess is now wide awake and I have little choice then to place her on my back pack in the shower. It is dark, an African Scops Owl calls.

Reflecting on the day I saw not one raptor since landing. I did see a Fish Eagle about 1500ft agile on the approach over the Ewaso Nyiro river from the plane. But this absence is something I have noted in the last 2 to 4 years. I hope that it is not a true reflection.

Making rapid assessments of wildlife numbers is very trendy these days. I term in ‘galloping horse’ research (the numbers of things you see from the back of a galloping horse!). Often you need months before you get a real picture.

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Category: Crowned Eagles | Date: Oct 17 2007 | By: admin

An unreleasable pair of Crowned Eagles, have produced 12 young. All are released and some have gone on to breed in the wild. This story covers the release of ‘Duchess’.

Laila Bahaa-el-din is holding ‘Dutchess’ here prior to release

Crowned Eagles are one of the world’s most powerful eagles. On average they kill heavier and more formidable animals than any other. Some such as the Harpy Eagle of Central and S. American forests and the Stellar’s Sea Eagle of Russia and Japan are heavier but they do not routinely kill full grown male monkeys or animals as large as Bushbuck.

The Crowned Eagle has massive feet. Gigantic 10cm hind talons are powered by muscles as large as the mastider muscles on a Spotted Hyena’s skull. To be gripped by this foot and punctured the full length of its talon is one thing. But the bone-breaking grip, enough to fracture a human arm in 4 layers of cow-hide glove is another. It probably evolved to be a specialised monkey predator in high canopy rain forests, but it has adapted to drier forests and those animals found on forest edge within its Eastern and Southern African range.

If one was to predict what guild of wildlife species would be the most vulnerable in East Africa one would without hesitation state that the forest species are most at risk. The same is true anywhere.

That being the case, the single-most threatened would logically be that which requires the largest territory within a forest and that which is the largest consumer of the ‘higher vertebrate’ biomass. Work in Ivory Coast and Kibale has proved the Crowned Eagle as ‘King of the Jungle’, with all other predators combined, leopards, hyenas and golden cats included, coming a poor second.

That an animal of such ecological stature is ranked low down on the list of African conservation priorities is of personal annoyance. But the sense behind this sequential identification of a potentially ‘at risk’ species is increasingly accepted.

Conservation focus in the past rested squarely on the shoulders of the charismatic photogenic mega-fauna, and things haven’t changed that much. But attitudes are changing. There is a general understanding that the large glamorous animals are not always the best indicators of ecological health. It is a mistake to assume that the conservation of elephants for example, solves the overall needs of all wildlife. In fact the abundance of elephant equals the removal of many large eagles. This mostly amicable rebuff should not be taken too far however as recent studies have shown that where there is a profusion of large mammalian carnivores there is an abundance of raptors. The point made here is that raptors offer a unique window in viewing the ecology and sustainability of an ecosystem. Buzzwords aside, my personal view is that there remains a lamentable lack of holistic approach to environmental conservation in Africa.

Things tend to be piece meal, one-off solutions aimed at a group of economically valuable animals. In tough times this is excusable, but we must think as broadly as possible as long as we still have the natural resources. When so many admire the apparent integrity of the Mara and its vast herds of transient ungulates congregating from a vast reservoir outside our national border few would pause to listen to what my colleague Dr Munir Virani and I have to say.

A near complete collapse of raptor diversity has happened in less than a decade. The speed of loss is so rapid it has caught us off guard, scrambling to get better more conclusive data from yesteryear when we too were so complacent. That a ‘Silent Spring’ could occur unnoticed in one of the greatest wildlife spectacles in the world, is ominous.

Birds of prey have been my passion since I was six. I have been fortunate to have lived with them uninterrupted ever since. I have had many hundreds of raptors brought in for rehab. Most are trauma victims. Spoiled so young, just standing in my parents’ garden staring at the sky, it is hard now to articulate the profusion witnessed then, and the vacant skies of today.

As a boy I was introduced to Rosy a badly named male Crowned Eagle. 30 years have since passed and he now sits with his mate Girl in a shed at home larger than my house on his 13th egg/offspring.

This is rosy

The direction my life has taken, its ups and its downs I owe largely to him. He has enriched and confined my life and may continue to do so for the next 30 years.

This story is about the release of Rosy and Girls’ daughter born 2 year ago. She was hatched and raised with her parents looking after her for 4 months post fledgling. In her mind therefore she is a wild Crowned Eagle not a mal-imprint on humans. She was taken out of the shed wild and terrified of humans (as all should be) and trained, using falconry techniques.

There is little as straight forward as training a hawk. It has a few vast improvements over cage management not the least of which is that they can fly and hunt as they would do in the wild. It is immaterial to hold any anthropomorphic view over the rights and wrongs of an eagle hunting. They have to do so, and they cannot do so without many attempts and months of failure. She learned well and would take wild vervet monkeys easily. But release would require months of supervised yet distant monitoring. Slowly she would be ‘hacked out’; released softly, duplicating the same severing of dependence as would her parents over a year period.

Ideally she should remain always the concern of anyone who would wish to care. With luck, 30 years from now a young eagle enthusiast should be able to know that somewhere in the bend of a forested river there is an eagle called Duch

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