Towed to Dakar

Sunday afternoon we got the news that the local mechanics were not going to be able to adequately repair the electrical system in the car to work with the new engine. The advice of our friends Billy and Mamadou (who know alot more about engines than...Read More

Lac de Guiers Manatee Rescue, Part 2

Late yesterday morning Tomas got a call that another baby manatee had been found entangled in net in Lac de Guiers. It was near the location where the first one had been caught the other day, so we wondered what was going on with the...Read More

While we wait in Richard-Toll…

On Thursday the new car engine was put into our car. Yes, that's it hanging from a tree in the photo above! The mechanics spent hours hooking up the various tubes and wires, and I naively thought this meant we were close to being finished...Read More

Manatee Rescue at Lac de Guiers

Late on Tuesday evening we got a call that a fisherman had found a manatee calf entangled in a fishing net near Tocc Tocc Reserve in Lac de Guiers. He said the calf was able to get to the surface to breathe and that there were...Read More

Off to a great start, but then there was a big bump in the road…

We left Dakar last Saturday, in a car loaded full of supplies for manatee sample collection and camping,  thrilled to be getting out of the crowded city for a couple weeks of fieldwork in northern and eastern Senegal. Tomas had found a private businessman willing to...Read More

Back in business in DakarTime is flying! I've already been in Senegal a week and a half, but it seems much shorter. I hit the ground running and have had several very productive meetings while in Dakar. Last week I met with Alain Seck, the...Read More

Time To Go! Sunday morning I head out the door and back to Africa! My doctoral qualifying exams are finished and I'm now an official PhD candidate! So now I'm really excited to get back out to the field. I'll spend the next 3 months in...Read More

New book from Save Our Seas Foundation

Save Our Seas Foundation has published a lovely new book highlighting the work they support, including my West African manatee research. Click here to access a web version, and scroll to page 51 to see the West African manatee section....Read More

The Trainee is Now a Trainer!

I am so impressed and proud! Aristide Kamla, who came to Florida for training last November, has already held his own training workshop in Cameroon! Last weekend Kamla provided training in data collection and use of field equipment (including collecting environmental data, looking for signs of...Read More

Bittersweet Some of you may recall my joyous posting on January 25, when I received the export permits for the samples from Mali after waiting 13 months. Well, as I predicted, shipping the samples would turn out to be another challenge. I spent several weeks...Read More