In March and November of 2005, the NAA International Workshop visited the Western Cape Region of South Africa. Dalton Gibbs, who manages the public system of nature reserves for the City of Cape Town, served as the naturalist for both trips. NAN recently contacted Dalton for an update on his work with protecting and managing biodiversity in one of the richest natural areas on Earth—the Cape Floral Kingdom.

Dalton tells NAN that “lots has happened since the 2005 International Workshops. In terms of our work in the City of Cape Town, we have finally gotten some staff, although the number of reserves that I am looking after has increased. We continue to work with endangered plant species. A colleague and I are starting with an Erica (heath) species that is extinct in the wild, with only two plants left alive. We got some cuttings of these two plants out into natural habitat this last winter and will see how they go. The drought has broken, but we had an extreme fire season this last summer. Sometimes we were fighting three fires in a day; these went on for days in some cases. Since most of our reserves were burnt, it will take a year or two to see what plant species we may have lost. In September 2006, we opened our latest education center, in an old building that I got a hold of three years ago. The building now can sleep 120 children, most of who come from poorer communities where we are trying to do as much environmental education awareness as possible.”

In July 2006, Dalton and a colleague traveled to the Democratic Republic of Congo to conduct a faunal assessment for a proposed gold mine in the area. “We were in an area that has been very poorly studied in terms of zoology and is very seldom visited. It is on the Western side of the Albertine Rift (03S 29E), a poorly known area of high endemism. The area potentially harbors Africa’s only extinct bird species—Chapin’s crombec (Sylvietta chapini Schouteden, 1947). Other bird species found in the area are known from as little as three specimens. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get up the mountain where it was last seen; travel in the country is somewhat limited (20 years of civil war, armed gangs, cannibalism and those sort of things...). We flew in with the mining company (which was an interesting flight...) and collected birds, reptiles, frogs (including a 37cm species), birds, and mammals. Unfortunately, all of the larger animals (and I mean ALL of them) have been shot and eaten. However, there was plenty of smaller stuff that was really interesting. We found a little Agama species (rock lizard) that just may be new to science. All-in-all, a really interesting trip.” 

As to NAA itself, Dalton thinks that the international scholarship is a fantastic opportunity for conservationists from developing countries to be exposed to first world conservation perspectives, or to share lessons and get insight from other developing countries’ conservation challenges. “I know from the workshop visits to my reserves that for my conservation managers and students it was a good eye-opening experience to have them meet NAA people. Here in the Western Cape we have high levels of endemism. On the lowlands, it is not unusual for small reserves (as small as 16 acres) to have their own endemic plants species, or sometimes several. As a result, it is hard to get managers to understand the responsibility and privilege they have of standing between that species and extinction. Having an outside person to help them understand that what they have here is not the norm in most parts of the world is important.”

Dalton has also been involved in setting up a small trust for qualifying students that can be employed for their first year, similar to the NAA Summer Internships (see article on page 5). “We desperately need people on the ground,” Dalton says, “and they need experience. So we are getting community groups and all of our managers to make monthly payments into the fund. We also have quite a number of volunteers from overseas (UK, Germany, Holland, USA) that come to help run our environmental education programs. Without their help, we wouldn’t be able to do the education that we do.” [Dalton asks if NAA encourages young graduates (or students) in the biological fields to volunteer overseas. While not now a facet of the International Program, this is certainly a great idea for expanding the program in the future.] “We could really do with some help on our reserves for basic research like species baseline studies. Considering the discovery in the past three years of both a plant and a lizard that are new to science, we have a long way to go!” To learn more about the City of Cape Town Nature Reserve System, visit http://www.rondevlei.co.za/, or contact Dalton Gibbs at rondevlei@sybaweb.co.za.

Dalton also mentioned “Baboon Matters” [see accompanying article], one of the groups visited during the trip, which “has been going well and received some funds from the government lottery to continue their work with the endangered chacma baboon (Papio ursinus).” Baboon Matters received a donation from the International Program, which gives money to one or two of the local efforts visited during each workshop. To learn more about the International Program and its future workshops, contact Abi Rome at abirome@earthlink.net. ▪