Sowing Seeds of Change in the Sahel

Tree nursery

2008-05-05T15:56:00.009-05:00

The work that we are concentrating on right now is tree nurseries. We are facilitating our villages as they plant their tree bags with Australian acacias and indigenous trees. It is important that the nursery is set up now in the hot season so the trees will be big enough to plant in the farms when/if the rainy season comes in June or so. In this photo is our director, my boss, Peter Cunningham and Jaho. Jaho has been working with the project since he was a young man, he serves the project in many ways, mainly as a skilled teacher in the villages.

The dry season is in its eighth month in Niger. People are hungry as their grain reserves become depleted and the prices of food increase. Animals are hungry as the few trees and bushes are being browsed down to twigs. Temperatures can get up to 110 in the day. During these months the seed of the Acacia colei, and Acacia torulosa can be harvested. In this picture from the village of Zoday, all the women are sitting down to clean the seed so that it can be pound into flour for food or sold. During this month of May as people look for extra sources of income the trees on the farms can be cut to sell as firewood in town. The farming system we promote, teaches people how to prune the acacia species as well as FMNR. Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration is a way of pruning indigenous tree species so as to get the most wood.

This is Isa, one of our nursery workers who was selected by his village to be trained in our two-day course in March. He is here with his son.

USAID used to work in Niger but then they left due to poor sustainability of their projects. This is a huge problem within this country and it is not easily solved. Onc cannot keep sinking money into a project where the local people are relying so much on handouts that they will not work to step out of poverty. This photo shows a can that is being used as a watering can in one of our villages, Botse. This village is very promising, as can be seen by the ingenuity of the tree workers! This can was eventually replaced by a proper watering can.

This is a classic picture that most people take when in Niger. Vehicles are always packed full. This specific Land cruiser is coming on a back road from Nigeria. Loaded with goods, vehicles often take the bumpy back roads across the border in order to pay less tax and bribes.

No, I did not go to Northern Niger and take pictures of rebels, these are hunters. There is definitely not much to hunt in Niger, but is even the possibility of killing an animal for food or income…then it is done. It was such a blessing to see some fellow hunters and to talk about bushmeat. They use homemade guns that are probably more dangerous to those behind the barrel rather than in front. If you look closely you can see charms attached to the stocks of the guns to help the hunters to be protected from the bush and to grant success in their endeavors.

Benin visit

2008-04-20T16:07:00.005-05:00

This was in the small fishing village of Ganvie. People here live on the shore of a Lake/lagoon. Their houses are built on stilts and everything like shopping is done on pirogues. Most of the people were unfriendly towards us, i'm not sure why. But the kids were happy!

This photo is in Ouidah. This monument is called the Point of no return. It is right on the beach of the ocean. There is a route that the slaves walked from the center of town to this place to board the ships that set sail all over the world.

This photo is from my trip to Cotonou, Benin. It is a very fast paced and dirty city. This photo is taken from the bridge crossing the street at the Marche Dantokpa.

A fisherman in the Niger River north of Niamey.

Peul and Land Rovers

2008-04-20T15:47:00.004-05:00

This is a usual Niger picture.

These are some beautiful Fulani women on my way to Niamey.

Parc National du W du Niger

2008-04-13T09:30:00.008-05:00

We did not see any large herds of elephants, but we did see a few bachelour bulls like this one. During our last five minutes in the park we startled this bull who dashed out in front of us on the road, scaring both us and him. We drove down to the river where we assume he was headed and he showed up after a few minutes.

This is a male roan antelope. We came across a herd of about twenty animals. They are tall, powerful animals with thick necks and long muzzles. Even in a place like Parc W they prefer areas in the park where there are less competators (for resources) and few predators. If wounded by a lion or a hunter they have been know to face off and charge. Both males and females carry horns.

At a watering hole in the morning we came across a very wary jackal coming to drink. We were in a viewpoint more than 300 yards away. He knew something was there but he couldn’t pinpoint us.

This is a male Kob, or in French, Cob de Buffon. They are very dependent on water and therefore herds can be found close to the river. They have strong ties with grazing and watering points and will come back each day and year. Fortunatly, Kobs are fairly common within west African parks. They make use of poor-quality food and convert it to meat and grow faster than any other bovid.

catch up

2008-04-11T16:21:00.006-05:00

This is what most of the rivers in Niger look like at the moment. We are in the midst of the dry season when the seasonal rivers are dry. In May/June when it will hopefully, inshallah, start to rain then these will become full of muddy rushing water.

This is the compound in which i live. I actually really despise living on this SIM compound, but there is not a whole lot i can do about that. I think it is better to live like the people who i am here to be with. I prefer the views from outside the gate!

In March we had what we call a nursery course. From each of the different villages we work with they select two reps to come to Maradi for this two day course. We hold the course at Maza Tsaye where we have our demonstration farms. This course covers the practical aspects of raising trees in a nursery. Other things we talk about are grafting, compost, our farming systems with the acacias, indigenous trees, and farmer managed natural regeneration of trees on the farm. This picture is of Ayuba, our maza tsaye farm manager teaching the farmers.

Acacia Foods

2008-02-07T15:22:00.001-06:00

Fanke, Tuwo, Dumbu.

Food Demonstration

2008-02-04T15:46:00.000-06:00

The bottom picture is a picture of the Acacia Colei, one of the several species we promote. I will try to not to bore you with so many pictures of trees on this blog, even though the majority of my work here deals with agroforestry! This tree is flowering and will produce seed for the farmers in the photo. The first photo is from one of our food demonstrations. This is when we go to one of the villages we work with and show them how to incorporate acacia flour into their regular millet flour. It has more protien and minerals than millet flour. While the women cook, Jaho, our main staff teacher talks to the men. Afterwards we get to eat. I wanted to put a picture of the different foods they incorporate the flour into, but the internet is slow right now.

Niamey

2008-01-22T14:06:00.001-06:00

I went to Niamey for the SIM annual conference. It was a lot of fun and in my free time i went out with friends. This is a picture of a pirogue on the River Niger, with the city and the bridge in the background. The other is a picture of me in the Grand Mosque, very beautiful.

Zinder

2008-01-21T14:24:00.000-06:00

I was invited by my new friends Ishtar and Nettus to spend the weekend at their beautiful house in Zinder. I took the bus from Maradi, a three hour trip. We had many wonderful experiences such as riding the horses (Arwen and Sahara), a trip to watch horse races, the market and baobab forest in Mirriah,the list goes on and on. I really need to explore the rest of Niger as time allows.

more faces

2008-01-17T14:34:00.000-06:00

faces of niger

2008-01-17T14:22:00.000-06:00

I am learning that i have to really shrink my pictures and then i can make a post. Enjoy the beauty of people (kids this time). There are so MANY here, the average per mom is about 7!

Woodabe,

2007-11-20T13:39:00.000-06:00

trying to see how uploading images on slow internet is.

Where is Maradi?

2007-11-02T17:30:00.001-05:00

Faces

2007-10-27T16:20:00.000-05:00

This is a beautiful picture of a Burkinabe (a person from Burkina Faso) that i found on the web.