By Dr. Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka | Founder and CEO
This report covers the progress on Conservation Through Public Health’s project on GlobalGiving, The Gorilla Guardians of Bwindi, Uganda #44078.
Our last report on this project was submitted in March 2021. By this time, our supporters towards this project had grown in number from 20 to 80 donors, with 4 monthly donors and 1 fundraiser. To date, we have received 155 donations from 107 donors with 8 monthly donors and 1 fundraiser created by a supporter.
What we have done
Gorilla Health Monitoring
Conservation Through Public Health Field Team has continued to carry out gorilla health monitoring through our routine gorilla fecal sample collection from gorilla night nests in all 22 gorilla groups around Bwindi Impenetrable National Park. In March 2021, the team managed to collect 162 samples, 165 in April, 160 in May and 165 samples in June. All these samples are currently being stored in RNAlater for analysis at the Gorilla Health and Community Conservation Center.
In May, 2021 Bitukura gorilla group was blessed with a new baby born to adult female Thursday. This increased the group number to 13 individuals.
In May 2021, Rushegura gorilla group foraged in the community of Mukono for 5 days where some people’s plantations were destroyed. This showed us that the Gorilla Guardians still have work to do especially in this period of the COVID-19 pandemic. In the next quarter we intend to carry out a refresher training for all the Gorilla Guardians to remind them about COVID-19, the new strains that have come into Uganda and how they can get vaccinated against the pandemic that has continued to claim people’s lives in Uganda and other parts of the world. The Gorilla Guardians will also be tested for COVID-19 so that their status is known before they come close to the gorillas.
During this training, Guardians will also be retrained and empowered to collect gorilla fecal samples whenever gorillas have strayed in community.
On a sad note, Kisho, adult female in Muyambi lost her baby in May 2021. The team was called to look for the carcass and carry out a postmortem, but the carcass was never found.
In Memory of Kate Thomas
In the last report, we reported about the loss of a great supporter who passed away in February 2021. Funds raised by her family and friends have been used to build a furnished fire pit at CTPH Field site at Bwindi Impenetrable National Park. Plans are under way to design plaques with Kate’s favorite words which will be put on the chairs at the fire pit. Another plaque will be put on a tree so that we can all continue to remember Kate Thomas and the good things she did while she was still alive. We will keep you updated.
Links:
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can recieve an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
Support this important cause by creating a personalized fundraising page.
Start a Fundraiser
