Fond för bevarandet av malawiciklider

[Wilhelm]

Tummen upp Dev!
Du borde bli NCS medlem!

[Wilhelm]

Här kommmer ett mail från Ad Konings med senaste nytt om Stuart Grants fond för bevbarandet av malawiciklider:

Mera sådan info ifrån Ad som kan platsa i nästa CB!

[DaRe]

Sv: Fond för bevarandet av malawiciklider

Tummen upp Dev!
Du borde bli NCS medlem!

Jepp. Förresten, har vi inte siffrorna klara för publicering kring hur mycket NCS stöttade fonden med under 2012?

[maltandis]

Jag är lite dålig på siffror, men har för mig att det var ca 10400:-

/Jocke

[Mikael W]

Mera sådan info ifrån Ad som kan platsa i nästa CB!

T.ex. en artikel om odlingsprojektet med de två hotade arterna skulle vara intressant att läsa.

[Ola Svensson]

Mera sådan info ifrån Ad som kan platsa i nästa CB!

Jag brukade be Ad fylla ut texten samt skicka några foton. Det behöver inte vara så långt.

Ta en titt på den här t.ex. http://www.ciklid.org/artikelarkiv/c...201103&lopnr=4 Jag har för mig att jag bad om bilder på fisk som bara finns i nationalparken.

Den här är dessutom kortare http://www.ciklid.org/artikelarkiv/c...200903&lopnr=6

[Mikael W]

Ny info från Ad

Dear Malawi cichlid friend,
There have been some developments in Malawi regarding the conservation of the cichlids. If you have been following the Facebook page of Stuart M Grant Fish Farm (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Red-Zebra-Tours-Stuart-M-Grant-Fish-Farm/125606107492080) you will have noticed the photos showing the installation of the new shade netting, the preparation of the large breeding and grow-out vats, and that on April 20^th David had already about a 100 fry from his P. saulosi breeding group! Thanks David! At the end of September I will be joined by a group of Malawi cichlids enthusiasts and we will release the first batch of P. saulosi back at Taiwanee Reef! Needless to say that this event will be documented and we will post the photos and videos on the web. Before the release I would like to take a census of the P. saulosi by all divers so we can get an idea how many there are before we supplement the population. Next year I’m planning a similar census/release to see if we have made an impact.
On the AND front I have no progress to report yet. The lodge on Maleri islands has been completed but Leon du Plessis had, for personal reasons, to abandon the managing part of the lodge and Dimitri Giannakis told me that a new team will take over management at the beginning of June. The new managers are dive masters as well and we have to wait and see, after they have settled, where and how we can continue placing the 200 ready ANDs. The group of safari participants I’m with in September may actually help one day to place a few of the ANDs.
Dimitri writes further: “The engine [i.e. the diesel engine for the guard’s boat] remains in its box for now, and I am looking for a good second hand fiberglass boat in South Africa. In the mean time I continue supporting the National Parks’ team with 100 lts of fuel and food rations to support them 3 days per week, for what they spend camping on and patrolling of the islands. I am very pleased to say they seem to be doing a very good job, with fishermen respecting the 100 m protected zone around the island. There also seems to be very little fisherman activity in any of the coves and beaches, with a lot of natural vegetation re-establishing itself.”
We are really fortunate to have Dimitri so committed to the cause and I want to thank him for sponsoring Lake Malawi National Park in protecting the fishes. I also want to thank Leon and his wife Ingrid for the work they have done in the last two years in preparation for AND placement and procedures.
And, of course, I want to thank you all for your continued support.
Enjoy your Malawi cichlids!
Ad


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Ad Konings
Cichlid Press
P.O. Box 13608
El Paso, TX 79913
www.cichlidpress.com // www.elpasodesert.com
Editor of www.cichlidae.com

[Wilhelm]

Kan du översätta detta och maila mig, sså kanske, kanske det går att klämma in i CB!

[Mikael W]

Färsk uppdatering från Ad Konings

Dear Cichlid Friend,

There is good news from several fronts where we are trying to protect Malawi cichlids.
You all remember the 32 juvenile P. saulosi we released at Taiwanee Reef last September and why there were so few (see previous update). The good news is that since then, David Nkhwazi of Stuart Grant Ltd. managed to breed about 500 new Pseudotropheus saulosi that are ready to be reintroduced at Taiwanee Reef. He also managed to collect some breeding stock of Melanochromis chipokae and he has already about 100 juveniles to be reintroduced at Chidunga Rocks. Thank you, David!! At the moment we are looking for a SCUBA diver who could video the release of these fish at one or both sites. If necessary I’ll provide a small GoPro video camera but I’m not aware of any visitor going to Malawi soon. If you know of anyone interested to do this for us, please let me know.

ANDs and markers

Recently I received an email from Estelle and Matt at the Blue Zebra Island Lodge that they started to place floaters that will demarcate clearly the 100 meter no fishing zone around the Maleri islands. By doing so there will be no further disputes between the fishermen and park guards about where exactly the boundary is. Matt is using the pneumatic drill and the compressed air in a dive tank to drill holes in the rocks underwater. The floaters consist of discarded gas tanks that have been modified so that they cannot be used as cooking pots or for any other household purpose. They painted LMNP on top of them in yellow as required by the park. They did this together with the park rangers and have already placed at least 10 floaters. They intend to complete this demarcation before they will place the ANDs. Thanks Matt & Estelle!!

Other news items that Estelle mentioned:

- There is a new patrol captain, Charles, and he is really willing to fight against poachers. We have changed our way of patrolling and he will come more often and for shorter periods on unexpected visits (so that fishermen cannot be advised).

- Last but not least: the small camping hut for the park rangers has been built on the largest island (Maleri).

Unfortunately fishermen are still around and are now coming with bigger boats and nets. We are trying to take pictures of the boats when we see them, file the pictures and report to the park guards who then report to TA.... A long process, but we are optimistic!

Boat

There is also some good news on the diesel engine that we provided a while ago. Dimitri located a suitable (aluminum) boat and he is currently negotiating the fitting of the diesel engine. The boat, however, will be custom made and the price tag will be somewhere around the $14,000 mark. He chose for aluminum as it will be much more durable than wood or fiberglass, and it will be maintained and anchored right at the lodge. At this point we have about $10,000 in the fund available (also thanks to a very generous donation at the end of last year by Dick Au, thank you Dick!) and have asked Dimitri how we can assist in realizing this diesel boat for the park guards.

Encouraging news all around. The online update will have some photographs I received from David and from Estelle ( http://cichlidpress.com/smgfund/smgfund24.html ).

As always THANK YOU very much for your continued support!
Enjoy your cichlids!

Ad


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Ad Konings
Cichlid Press
P.O. Box 13608
El Paso, TX 79913
www.cichlidpress.com // www.elpasodesert.com
Editor of www.cichlidae.com

[Lars Andersson]

Odling av Ps. Saulosi och Mel. chipokae för utsättning i sjön

Hej,

Jag har inspekterat odlingen och måste säga att det verkar fundera bra. Mel. chipokae var det mycket svårt att hitta avelsdjur till i sjön då de ju är nästan utfiskade. (ja, det är ju anledningen till odlingsprojektet). Av Saulosin finns det just nu ca 800 yngel men de är lite väl små för utsättning. Jag anser att de bör vara ca 4 cm. Av Mel. chipokae finns det ca 130 varav 90 finns i en yngeltank. Mel. chipokaen odlas i en jättebasäng. 5 x 10 meter, detta för at de är ganska aggresiva och det måste finns möjlighet för jagade djur att fly. totalt tror jag att det är ca 8 honor och 3 hanar i odlingsprojektet. Även Mel. chipokae är lite väl små men det finns ca 20 som är 4 - 5 cm. Det är dock för dyrt att åka och släppa ut dessa så vi väntar någon månad. En fantastiskt bra anledning att åka om en månaf igen.

En eloge till David Grant som personligen engagerat sig i detta, Utan hans hjälp och alla insamlade pengar hade detta inte varit möjligt. Pengar behövs för de projekt som i första hand Ad Konings planerar och ansvarar för. Inget görs gratis (utom av mig förstås). Jag har inte belastat projektet med en enda krona den här resan.

Hoppas ni får det trevligt på stämman. Själv är jag i Malawi. Livet är fullt av val och jag valde bort stämman denna gång. Prisskillnaden är inte enorm.

Skall försöka posta några bilder, men internät här är inte som man är van vid. Får se om det går

Har det så bra

Lars

[Lars Andersson]

bilder på odlingen

Skall försöka posta några bilder.

Akvarierna är ju inte för display och inte så lätta att fota i men här är beviset på att bet ni betalt´r till finns och fungerar.

Lars

[Mikael W]

Hej

Det går framåt med projektet. Här Ads senaste brev:

Click here if you like to read the update with photos and videos


Dear cichlid friend,

It has been a long time since the last update, but we have some great news. To start off, David Nkhwazi had 104 juveniles/subadults of P. saulosi ready to be released early September when Larry Johnson and his safari participants arrived in Malawi. Again David has had problems with the weather in May and June which is the coldest time of year in Malawi. Juveniles are of course the most vulnerable fish, but the ones that survived the cold were looking good and bigger than those we released last year.

Second release of P. saulosi

Larry and friends took the bagged fish up north and their first stop was Taiwanee Reef to release them. Before they released the fish Larry and three other divers swam around for 15 minutes and did a count of the P. saulosi they saw. Last year we did the same rough estimate of the number of P. saulosi and then we encountered on average 40 fish. This year Larry and his team counted on average 55 P. saulosi! Although this is significantly more than the year before I don’t think it was caused by our initial introduction. It is because of concerned hobbyists like you who do no longer demand wild-caught P. saulosi and so, I think, there is now less pressure on the population. This would also mean that P. saulosi can recover when they abandon fishing for a few years. Larry estimated that with a few losses during transport he and his friends released about 92 P. saulosi, about three times as many as last year! Great news all around! Thank you so much David, Larry, Pete Barnes, Marc Boulton, Kathy Brown, Dave Hale, Greg Irvine, and others who assisted them. The video clip was shot by Pete Barnes. Thank you, Pete!

We have got a guard boat!

Dimitri wrote me three weeks ago that they had finally found a suitable boat for our diesel engine. The previous candidates were too big and too expensive for our purpose, but now they located a 6 meter-long boat which they can adapt to fit the engine. Dimitri had already brought the engine back to South Africa where the company doing the fitting is located—Dimitri paid for all transport back and forth between South Africa and Malawi. The boat with the placement of the engine and everything else necessary will cost us about $14,000. Jay Stauffer and I agreed to go ahead and purchase the boat with the fund’s funds. Thank you very much Dimitri! I can’t wait to see a photo of it on Lake Malawi.

Children get involved!

Estelle and Matt at the Blue Zebra Island Lodge continued placing the 100 meter no fishing zone markers. They have now at least 25 buoys placed around Nankoma and Maleri islands. But they did something much more important: on July 16th they started their educational program whereby groups of children (15 per group) visit the lodge. Estelle and Matt, together with Malawi National Park’s game scouts, want to raise awareness of the conservation issues among young people and invited the children, 12 to 17 years of age, of the Maganga Primary and Secondary School’s Wildlife Club for a visit. Apart from giving the children insights in the lodge’s operation they were also taught about the benefits of the environment and in protecting the cichlids. After a good meal provided by the lodge, they headed to the conference room for a dynamic debate about the environment’s growing concern for future generations which was monitored by Dennis, the park ranger. Dennis mainly discussed the problems of overfishing with the children and what they could do about it. The visit was a huge success and is planned to take place once every month. Thank you, Matt, Estelle, Dennis, Dimitri!

Breeding endangered Lake Tanganyika cichlids

As I mentioned in the last update Chris and Louise Horsfall were planning to breed and reintroduce overfished cichlids. Chris now has made a very professional design for eight vats with shade covers (see figure) and which are supplied by lake water on a continuous basis using a solar pump. They run everything at their Lakeshore Lodge on solar power and also have a solar pump in operation for the lodge’s water supply. Chris likes to use a similar setup for the breeding vats as it proved to work perfectly for many years. He sent me an estimate of how much all would cost (he’s a builder by profession so he knows) and all together with solar pump, panels, switches, etc, would run about $15,000. I hope you all agree that the fund pays for this important endeavor.
At present the species most at risk in Lake Tanganyika are Tropheus duboisi “Maswa”, Tropheus moorii “Tanzania Murago” (just heard that an exporter found the tiny population, so we need to work on that fish as soon as possible before they are all gone), Ophthalmotilapia boops “Blue Neon”, and Petrochromis sp. ‘red’ (which we’ll keep for last as that will be the most difficult to breed).

Many donations

I’m very pleased to let you know that more and more concerned aquarists are donating to the cause. I would like to highlight a few of large and far away donations.
Wojciech Sierakowski of the Klub Malawi in Poland (www.klub-malawi.pl) organized an auction among their members in April this year which culminated in a donation of $716! Thank you Wojciech!
We received a donation from an unfortunate event, i.e. the dismantling of the Minnesota chapter of the Midwest Cichlid Association, of $640! Thank you Bob Randall for thinking of cichlid conservation!
The Babes In The Cichlid Hobby donated this year a staggering $3000! You don’t pay admission to their great parties, uhhh, auctions, but you really want to reward their efforts in raising awareness of conservation. Thank you ladies!
The most interesting effort of raising money for cichlid conservation was performed by Dave Schumacher of Dave’s Rare Aquarium Fish. He challenged the East Coast Monster Fish Konvention (a convention put on jointly by East Coast Cichlids and Monster Fish Keepers in NJ), where he spoke in August, that because they had given him a hard time about his hair and beard they could cut his hair or trim his beard however they'd liked, if they could raise $1000 for the Stuart Grant Fund. Well, they raised over $1100 on fundrazr.com even before the convention started, and by the end of the convention, they had raised $2315 in total!! If you consider the cut they gave Dave’s hair you understand his commitment to saving cichlids! Wild idea, Dave! Thanks for keeping the cichlids in the wild as well! Dave’s response: “My hair will come back, but there are many Malawi cichlids that won't.”

My sincere thanks to all other private sponsors; without your commitment there would be less cheerful news to report. Together we can save cichlids from extinction. Enjoy your cichlids!
Ad


Det finns foton och en film i anslutning till brevet på http://cichlidpress.com/smgfund/smgfund25.html

[Mikael W]

Tittade just på filmen. Slående, ja nästan lite komiskt, hur svårt det ser ut att tömma en fiskpåse nere i vattnet.

[Mikael W]

Hej

Här kommer en ny uppdatering från Ad:

Dear cichlid friend,

As some of you may have seen in the TFH magazine inside front cover March issue,Omega One has now joined our fight in conserving Malawi cichlids by donating tothe Fund 25¢ of each package Frozen Cichlid Formula sold!! I’m very grateful to Kelly Randall, the marketing director of Omega Sea, for pursuing this project. So, please, check the frozen food section in your local pet store and help us all preserving Malawi cichlids in their natural habitat!


LakeMalawi

LastDecember the Fund transferred $13,465, most of what we had in our coffers, to finance the new boat for the guards and for the fitting of the diesel engine.They subsequently encountered some problems with the fitting and needed outside advice on how to proceed. This has now been solved (hopefully) and they are now back working on it with an anticipated completion 6-8 weeks from now.

I have not yet received any update on the placing of demarcation buoys around the Maleri islands, but Dimitri tells me that Matt is very committed to all conservation efforts and is keeping the National Parks patrols up every month.We will have more from him in the next update.

Another bit of good news from Malawi is that Larry Johnson is again going to release P.saulosi at Taiwanee Reef with a group of visitors later this year. At the sametime they will make a rough inventory of this species at the reef.

LakeTanganyika

The breeding station setup in Kipili, Tanzania, is taking shape and Chris Horsfall hopes to have water running in the vats in June when I’ll be there. I have attached a photo of the completed vats that Chris sent me about a month ago. In the meantime he has obtained a solar pump in Dar es Salaam and is currently fitting the pipes and tubes. That is the good news; the bad news is that a German exporter has by now about extirpated the Tanzania Murago Tropheus, one of the species we were hoping to breed in Kipili. I’m planning to visit the site in June and will report on the situation.

In the meantime Chris and Louise presented their project of breeding endangered Tanganyika species at a Great Lakes 2 Great Lakes conference in Kigoma last February and impressed the head of Fisheries Development in Tanzania, Hosea Gonza Mbilinyi, so that he issued a statement that the four species they are planning to breed are now officially off limits for exportation. We all know that it is not that easy to control exports of fish but at least they managed to get the Tanzanian government on our side regarding conservation. A big THANK YOU to Chris and Louise!

More Thank Yous

Without the generous donations of many of you, we would have had little or no impact on the preservation and restoration of cichlid habitat. In the last six months three clubs have committed in a grand way to the cichlids’ cause: the Ohio Cichlid Association with a donation of $1250, the Greater Chicago Cichlid Association ($1000), and also the British Cichlid Association with a donationof $785!! Thank you to these clubs and their compassionate members! Also a big thank you to Steve Lundblad of the Wet Spot in Portland, OR, who donated $750,and to Steve Edie, again, who regularly donates his travel reimbursement checks to the Fund. His last two checks together were $936! He’s seriously committed. I also would like to thank a friend of mine in France, Patrick Tawil, who regularly donates the royalties he earns by publishing on cichlidae.com. It adds up: over $640 to date! Thank you, Patrick.

Thank you ALL for your concern for the cichlids’ future!
Ad

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Ad Konings
Cichlid Press
P.O. Box 13608
El Paso, TX 79913
www.cichlidpress.com
www.elpasodesert.com

[Wilhelm]

Gör du den tryckbar i CB? dvs på svenska?