Peregrination-(n) a journey
I embarked on a peregrination traveling to South Africa
because I wanted to find direction and context for the rest of my life. I might
have found it this week.
I am writing this in bed in a home that belongs to the owner
of a private game reserve named Samara. I’m spending the week here as a part of
my Conservation Biology module and I’m having a great time! Here’s what we’ve
seen so far: waterbuck, gemsbok (Oryx gazella), kudu (Tragelaphus strepsiceros),
red hartebeest (Alcephalus buselaphus), Eland (Taurotragus oryx), bat-eared fox
(Otocyon megalotis), black-backed jackal (Canis mesomelas), steenbok
(Raphicerus campestris), nyala, dassies, hammerkop, corrie bustard, giraffe,
secretary bird, familiar chat, ant-eating chat, yellow mongoose, Burchell’s
zebra (Equus burchelli), vervet monkeys (Cercopithecus aethiops), Cape Mountain
zebra (Equus zebra zebra), black wildebeest, blessbuck, cheetah, spronghares (not
sure about that spelling), and Cape ground squirrel. I need to go look up the
rest of the scientific names.
This reserve is breathtakingly beautiful: quiet, removed
from society. Apparently, it’s the third largest private nature reserve in
South Africa but no one I told had ever heard of it. It’s marketed to
high-class, high-profile individuals who have the means to spend
twenty-thousand rand per night on luxury accommodations and private chefs. It
houses a tracker academy, a cheetah breeding program, two guest lodges, a
volunteering program, and 27,000 hectares of succulent Karoo, savannah,
thicket, and mountain grassland. The property is owned by a wealthy family who
lives in London and comes to South Africa to visit a few times a year. It would
be incredible if places like these were accessible to the average person. I
think if anyone came here, stayed for a week, and was shown to appreciate the
beauty, diversity, and complexity of the natural world, conservation biology
would face a lot fewer problems. People would still exist who would choose
parking lots and satellite television over sunset cast wide open spaces but the
average person would have a basic understanding of how important the world
outside society is. Conservation biologists will reach goals, will learn more
about ecosystems and how to manage them, and we will still be combating human
ignorance, human expansion, and lack of human compassion.
I have immensely enjoyed discussions with Prof Kerley simple
listening to the informed mechanations of an expert ecologist regarding the
problems faced by the natural world. Even more, I am thrilled to be posed
challenging questions whose answers will unlock more solutions (and more
questions in a ceaseless spiral of knowledge). Critical thinking is the aspect
of the human psyche that is a) incapable of replication by artificial constructs
and b) crucial to the successful existence of world, both the societal and
environmental components. I would like to become a conservation biologist. I
want to use my knowledge and experience as a scientist for something I believe
in. I want to be challenged with these questions that need answers and I want
to be equipped to provide answers that both solve problems and contribute to
the general knowledge of humanity. It seems conservation biology is an ideal
balance between scientific rigor of discovery and hand-on action that
legitimately aids threatened populations (both bipedal and quadruped). So much
of what we have discussed this week hinges on the idea that if conservation is
to be successful. a drastic shift in human thinking is necessitated. I think we
could exploit the charisma and cultural endearment of endangered species to
persuade people to change their lifestyles. Connecting driving your SUV to the
extirpation of chinchillas or vampire bats or redwood forests might motivate
you to think before you hop in the car. It’s not just consumption though. It’s
population and habitat fragmentation and lack of morals in business practices
and a shift toward clawing one’s way up to the top no matter whose face is
buried away in your exhaust fumes. I’m not sure we can fix all that with the
wonder of the bat-eared fox or the curlicue kudu. Not in today’s extant
population, anyhoo. The children of the future? I have some hope.
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| Can you see the Mountain zebra in the foreground? They had a foal and everything! Samara has 18 of them, which is about 1% of the world's population. |
I think conservation biology has a largely
anthropogenic/centric focus but in this day and age, it needs one. Humans are
the driving forces of our extinctions, humans are the ones who need to be
persuaded to change and humans, eventually, are going to be the source of all
of our environmental solutions. Unless, of course, a giant asteroid hits and
then we will no longer have any environmental problems to worry about. It is
somewhat depressing that we have to relate our problems back to the threats
they pose for survival of Homo sapiens sapiens when so much of the world is precious
in its own right.
We lecture/discuss in the mornings and take game drives in
the afternoon, exploring the vast property. The stars are cold, clear, and like
I have never seen them before. The whole disk of the galaxy was stretched
across the sky like a gash in the cosmic existence.
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| Lecturing in luxury, aww yeah. |
Today was rather spectacular: woke, breakfasted, packed a
picnic lunch, watched the waterbuck wading, drive to the mountain grassland
biome, watched blessbuck, black wildebeest, Mountain zebra, and eland sprotting
about the plains, had our lunch on the edge of the klip watching giraffes below
and open empty space above, drove down the pass, had a lecture on the theory of
nature reserves, went to watch a habituated cheetah with her kudu kill from
that morning, had a braai and roasted vegetable supper, then sat in front of
the fire reading and writing. It’s ludicrous that this place is enjoyed by so
few. I am one of the lucky few this week.
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| I spy with my little eye, Sibella! The Cheetah! No zoom! Her kudu calf was lying bloodied on the other side of that bushy pedestal, just out of frame. |
In a career sense, this week will likely mark the start of
another peregrination, one that hopefully lasts a lifetime.
