Lions & Elephants & Poop, OH MY!

I'M IN ZIMBABWE!!!

I've been here about two and a half weeks and, so far, it has been even more amazing than I ever imagined. For those of you who don't already know, I'm working with a lion conservation and breeding program in the midlands of Zimbabwe just outside of a town called Gweru. I live and work at a place called Antelope Park with the programs African Impact (a volunteer organization) and ALERT (African Lion and Environmental Research Trust) with the goal of repopulating Africa with lions.

The lion population has has been decimated over the last 30 years. Literally. 90% of the lions who were here 30 years ago, are gone. And what is Africa without the lion? Not anything I want to see.

Anyway, although our goals are lofty, my job is rather humble (I AM still a volunteer, after all), but it's still very important to the program and freaking awesome, besides! My daily hours are from 6:30AM to around 7:00PM with breaks for meals. It's a long haul and some icky and back-breaking work, but not all of it!

Seeing as how there are animals of all shapes and sizes here at the park, you can perhaps imagine the myriad of poop that these animals leave for us to clean up. Lion poop is gross. They are big and they are meat eaters. We also get to clean up the halves of cows that are left behind after a feeding! Hooray! . . . Gross. There are horses here as well, so those of you who have ever been to a stable can sympathize with the amount of shoveling involved in the care of close to 30 horses. We also have elephants! If you're like me, you'd probably guess that these would be the worst to clean up after, but, like me, you'd be wrong! This is one of the easiest jobs at the park. They eat grass. It's big, but it's mostly in one place, and it's nowhere NEAR as stinky.

Still have your attention?

Didn't think so.

Anyway, for those of you who either made it through the poop paragraph or just skipped over it (smart cookies, you are), now to the good stuff. The REALLY good stuff.

I walk with lions.

Seriously.

At least once, if not twice a day, I join a small group of lion handlers and other volunteers, open an enclosure, and take cubs from 3-18 months out for a stroll in the bush. No fences. No weapons. Just us, the lions, and our humble sticks. The sticks are not there for our protection. They instead serve as an extension of our arm. That way, if cubbie wants to play, which is often far too rough for human's super sensitive skin, we can offer them our stick and it's just as if they were lovingly chewing on our paws. We take them on these walks to help prepare them for the next stage of the program. Lions who grow up in enclosures in captivity have no hope at being wild lions someday. So, we introduce them to the bush on a daily basis and sit back and watch their instincts take over. These cubs, having never seen their mothers hunt, do just that: they hunt. It might be each other, it might be a butterfly, but it might be something real, like a zebra or a giraffe. They know exactly what to do (although some are far better than others). It's amazing. I've seen the 10-month-old cubs chase after a full grown giraffe! (To put that into perspective, that would be a lion about the size of a Labrador taking off after, well, a GIRAFFE.)

We also get to connect with the cubs. Now that they are more familiar with me (and like me), I can kneel down next to them and scratch their back and neck and, if they REALLY trust me, their belly and chin! This is really only with the younger ones. The older cubs are over us humans, and that's what we want. In the next stage of the program, human contact is cut off, so it's more than ok if they don't want a snuggle!

Anyway, I'm running out of time here, but I'll try to post again some time soon. I'm leaving for a 5-day trip to Victoria Falls tomorrow, so that'll be fantastic.

If you have any questions you want me to answer, just post them in the comments section and I'll be happy to answer! Missing you all!