I know we have gone on and on about the Brits koppies  -  but so has the mining.  It seems to continue unabated and unchecked - except for Andrie Loubser and the Brits Bankeveld Bewarings Forum, and our specific group of Bateleur pilots who have taken on this issue and who provide Andrie with a vantage view of the koppies on a regular basis.  Please see Andrie's letter to us, below.

We hope you will find interesting the diverse missions we bring you.  We have actually flown quite a few more but due to space restrictions will have to leave them to our final newsletter of the year in December - it might even have to be two!

50/50, on Sunday night 22nd October, featured a story on the threat to the World Heritage status of the Greater St Lucia Wetland Park, due to the uncontrolled development in the Kosi Bay area.  It was depressing!  The aerial footage captured during a Bateleur flight by Barry de Groot illuminated the serious consequences of unhindered human expansion in this special ecological area.

In his report Andrie Loubser of the Brits Bankeveld Bewarings Forum writes:

     “On 17 December 2005 there was a major Bateleurs operation, when Craig McKenzie in his Cherokee Six flew the 50/50 team to get an update for a new programme on the granite mines in the Brits koppies.  Thys Basson in his RANS S10 and Abrie Kruger in his BEAVER also assisted by taking still photographs.  Since then there have been periodic short specific target flights flown by Thys and Abrie and the photos taken during these flights, some of which appear below, tell their own story.

The last specific flight was on 10 September 2006.  Abrie was kind enough to take my 1.82m, (belly circumference included) into the skies above Brits koppies.  The purpose of the flights was to take photographs of the present state of the granite mining on the western side of Brits. The eastern side was flown by Thys as recently as June 2006.

The koppies are being destroyed. There is nothing mitigating to say. It is not only the area where the dimension stone is taken out (mined), it is the additional pristine areas that are, to my mind, being destroyed for so-called dumping areas, working areas like dressing yards, storage areas and maintenance areas, to name a few. These areas are vested in a slovenly manner and in the cheapest way possible."

"Please note the homestead of the farmer (bottom left corner).  He and his family are biting dust on a daily basis from the mines and transporters passing their house on the way to the railway station."

     “The existing policy of the Department of Minerals & Energy (DME) states that rehabilitation is regarded as an ongoing process, and should be attended to at the same time that mining is being carried out.  But we do not entirely get that picture from hob-knobbing amongst the Black Eagles and their sorts.

What we see is that some form of growth medium is chucked over the dumps of granite waste. So, they are digging burrow pits to camouflage the waste rock. Destroying more pristine area for the soil to chuck over the rocks? What about the animal and bird life whose habitat has been destroyed - and where are those beautiful animals now? This sort of “rehabilitation process” can be compared to giving a rape victim a piece of sticking plaster as medical care.

50/50 flighted its programme in early October, but the Department of Environmental Affairs was not prepared to state openly what its role is in this issue as protector of the environment. 

Lessons learned from the last trip with Abrie include:  A six-footer in the passenger seat of a Beaver?  Well . . . there is no space for twisting, the belly is in the way of the joy stick (sometimes), and the bi-focal lenses and the wind do not mix.  The rest was terrific.  The height and the speed flown were conducive to still photograph monitoring.  Pre-flight planning and GPS route settings once again paid off by cutting down unnecessary flying time.  The use of Microlights makes more frequent and shorter trips possible, and helps to make the environmental monitoring more visible."

Since our last newsletter The Bateleurs have flown another two monitoring trips for the Cape Leopard Trust, and Quinton Martins has sent us the following report and photographs:

     “Once again The Bateleurs have played a vital role in assisting the Cape Leopard Trust with data collection on the movements of leopards in the Cederberg.  Johan Ferreira and Jock Kannemeyer have been on top form as per usual!  We have had some awesome flights tracking all three collared leopards, succeeding on all accounts!  It is very difficult to quantify the extent of this assistance, but, to give one an idea - if I were using traditional VHF telemetry equipment I would have to be in the field every day tracking each individual leopard we have collared.  First, this would be physically impossible due to their massive ranges, and even if I were tracking just one leopard, the costs and time spent in the field would be astronomic.  Secondly, the data would never be anywhere as accurate.  For example, a recent study of snow leopard in Mongolia has demonstrated how vital the use of GPS telemetry is.  Using VHF telemetry the home ranges of these animals were estimated as being between 14 and 47 km2, whereas GPS data provided home ranges of well over 1000 km2.  Incredible!

Our plan is to continue monitoring leopard movement in the Cederberg over the following three to four years, contributing to a PhD thesis on the ecology of leopards in this region. 
Data downloads will be attempted once a month, by aircraft, and we hope to collar six  males and six females during this study period.

Presently we have three leopard cage traps set,  trying to capture and collar at least two more, and hopefully three more, leopards this year. The females remain elusive – even more so than the males – so it will be a major bonus to capture one soon.”

"The range with a border around it is the home range for 'Houdini' and is more than 300 square kilometres.  To the right is the home range for 'Johan', which is almost 700 square kilometres.  Right at the top is the range for 'Kooitjie' in the Bushmanskloof reserve area - we do not have enough data to estimate a home range for him yet."

In his usual forthright and fiery style, Bateleur pilot (and director) Steve McCurrach wrote a report about his flight with Andre Rossouw of the Wattled Crane Programme (EWT) which has to grab the attention of pilots as well as conservationists:

     “I just did two consecutive weekends of Bateleur flying for the South African Crane working Group ( EWT) Wattled Crane programme, and it was both fascinating and very demanding work. The Wattled Crane species numbers 250 birds worldwide, with only about 60 pairs breeding - a critical situation indeed.  Their primary habitat is wetland in the KZN mist belt/midlands area and we have the 'green cancer' (commercial afforestation) to thank for the diminished habitat and subsequent depletion in crane numbers.

Thank goodness I'm writing this by email and I can feel good that I haven't thus contributed towards the use of more paper = more trees = less wetland = less cranes. ??I digress too easily - on with the story:

So EWT has spent eight or so years collecting a substantial database of the cranes' preferred and few remaining nesting sites, all of which is kept in their Arcview software. I translated this data into a format friendly to that of my Garmin GPS and then spent a bundle of time correlating it into regions and then planning optimum routings, viz. aiming to be done and out of the most mountainous areas before the wind and thermals developed for the day.  Also for best economics in terms of fuel burn, building in some 'leg stretch' breaks at convenient local airfields, etc. ??This all had to happen on a 'Now' basis, (Aug/Sept) in order that this flying coincided with the cranes' incubation period and that the eggs (if any) in each nest site could be counted.

Now I guess you're already figuring how the heck we count birds eggs from an aeroplane. Well, you fly to the known wetland, orbiting overhead whilst searching for the visible mound of reeds, which the birds build for their nest. These are not too difficult to see and it’s really a case of if there is a nest then we will see it. Upon identification of a nest, the trick then is to position a flight pass, to be into the wind, for lowest ground speed, gear the plane for a low and slow, in landing configuration, and then to pass the nest with it on the observer's side.

The eggs are sufficiently large and distinct at our 'tree top' height that Andre Rossouw of EWT can and does count them as we pass overhead - and this whilst I 'blip' the exact position on the GPS.  Quite often it occurred that a bird was on the nest, in which case on the first pass we'd flush it off and then come around again to do the counting.  Care had to be taking in this 'flushing off', to be sufficiently gentle so as to not have the bird break its own eggs in its haste to flee, and also in order not to leave it distressed – so  a quiet, low power and discreetly spaced pass overhead.??

Now this all seems very straightforward and logical, until the nest is directly in the leeward side rotor of a big mountain and of course Sod's Law says that there will also be a mature plantation of trees adjacent to the same wetland.  It makes the flying seriously interesting. Of course there's also the snag that wetlands aren't found on the right of ridges, they’re mostly in the valleys - and then the manoeuvering of the aircraft must all occur within some really tight constraints.  I can tell you that flying skills exceeding those I've used in air-shows had to be employed at times.  All in all, I did 900kms and over seven hours of flying in two outings - none of which had any part of it where the usual 'trimmed out', hands-off and cruising was the case.  Rather, it was all eyes wide open, very hands-on stuff and bloody tiring.

That was my job done, now the poor Andre has to warm up his 4X4 and don his waders to go paddling in the wetlands where he harvests one egg from each breeding nest - but only in cases where there are two eggs in a nest.  It is a given that these cranes mostly lay two eggs, but one is seen as insurance because the moment the first chick hatches they abandon the remaining egg and go foraging, with the resultant loss of the second egg. With the decline in numbers these surplus and abandoned eggs are collected, reared in captivity and then reintroduced to the wild.   All in all an incredible effort by mankind, just in order to offset the very same mankind's wanton destruction of habitat.

Viewed like this, we can see why there are such strict laws governing the maximum percentage to which any farm can be planted with trees, and the limitations of the proximity of trees to any watercourse. It’s all because the trees sap up the groundwater, drying out previously lush wetlands into bone dry valleys. Of course the greedy landowners feel that they are being 'done out' of many hectares of arable forest and they routinely break these laws without caring about what happens downstream. The Bateleurs have in fact flown previous missions for Timberwatch in which assessments were made of illegal afforestation.  Some of these assessments led to subsequent prosecutions by the relevant authorities, but I still feel that this has not been enough.

Even with all the efforts to artificially rear Wattled Cranes their numbers continue to decline, and will continue to do so as long as the cause is not treated - viz. more active policing of habitat destruction through afforestation.”

A baby Wattled Crane learning to feed from a hand puppet "parent".

The Bateleurs received a Flight Request from Gavin Donaldson-Selby of the African Conservation Trust (ACT), who wanted to fly over the new RDP housing section in KwaMsane, Mtubatuba.  ACT’s objective was to acquire aerial photography for the purpose of generating a 3D terrain model of the area, including houses, rivers and vegetation. The  photographs will also be used to position houses in the model, as there are no existing drawings indicating the position of the RDP houses in KwaMsane.  The model itself will be used to plan urban greening in the area, and to promote urban greening to the community, civil authorities and tribal authorities.

Barry de Groot volunteered to fly the KwaMsane Survey team, and the group photo below shows (from the left) Angus Forbes (Director of the Programme of Geomatics, UKZN), Barry de Groot (Pilot) and Gavin Donaldson-Selby (Consultant for ACT).  Carl Grossman (Chairman of ACT) took the photograph. 

Following the mission we received a detailed report from Gavin, excerpts from which appear below:  

     “Worldwide, a growing body of evidence shows that plants can create opportunity, and transform the economic and aesthetic landscapes in which people live.  The skilful use of plants thus represents a practical way of protecting and enhancing the amenity of the total living environment. 

The KwaMsane urban greening project entails an approach that will give practical expression to sustainable development aspirations by using plants to promote environmental, aesthetic, nutritional and economic possibilities in the new low-cost housing development known as Ndlovu Village, KwaMsane, Mtubatuba. Such housing developments are typical of the South African governments’ efforts to address the acute housing shortages among the previously disadvantaged communities. Although the provision of housing is an important national priority, the African Conservation Trust believes that houses and infrastructure are only one aspect of creating well-balanced and viable communities within these developments; and that the establishment of acceptable living environments is essential to the long-term sustainability of such endeavours.

Before we begin the actual fieldwork in Ndlovu Village we need to create 2D plans and 3D visualisations of what the area looks like now, and what it could look like in 5/10 years time if the urban greening project were implemented.  Without support from authorities in general, and residents in particular, urban greening projects often fail. The purpose of the 3D visualisations is, therefore, to engender support for the project from the community, who would be able to conceptualise, understand and participate in the urban greening proposals.

With this in mind the African Conservation Trust approached The Bateleurs to fly the mission for us. They approved the project and Barry de Groot volunteered to fly the mission for us.  The Programme of Geomatics then began the process of building a camera frame that attached to the seat runners of Barry’s Cessna 172, used for the flight. A special cutting tool was made to cut the precise slots into aluminium blocks that then slid onto the seat runners with the main camera frame bolting onto the aluminium blocks. Both a digital camera (Fuji Finepix S2 Pro 12 Meg) and a broadcast quality digital video camera (Canon XL1s) were mounted onto the bracket and cable tied for extra security!"

     "The mission was a great success and provided us with invaluable still and video imagery for the planning and visualisation of the urban greening project.  The African Conservation Trust would like to thank The Bateleurs for making the mission possible, and Barry de Groot for his expert flying of numerous strips in gusty wind conditions. We will provide The Bateleurs with imagery and an interactive fly-through of the project when the visualisations are complete.¨

In mid-2006 we received a Flight Request from the Oceanographic Research Institute (ORI) asking for assistance with regular flights over the Mhlatuze Estuary.  Their objective was – and is - to count fishermen and evaluate estuarine fishing activities as part of a survey of fishing in the Richards Bay area. The first of these flights took place in August when Donovan Barton-Hobbs flew Sean Fennessey of the ORI over the estuary.  Although the first flight was not entirely successful it provided some valuable insights as to what is needed for future missions to achieve better results.  Consequently a decision has been taken to continue with regular monitoring flights at least until the end of this year.  The second of these flights is due to be flown as soon as weather permits.

We would like to welcome the following three new recruits to our team of volunteer pilots:

• Rudi Botha  -  Western Cape
• Nicolaas Louw  -  Namibia
• Brenton de la Harpe  -  Western Cape