It’s a very exciting time for EDGE – As part of our re-designed EDGE Fellowship programme, we’re currently running a Conservation Tools training course in Nepal. After some long journeys (it took Ali, who is Kenyan but was flying from the US, four days to make it!), international and national participants have joined a team of ZSL experts at the National Trust for Nature Conservation’s (NTNC’s) Biodiversity Conservation Centre on the edge of Chitwan National Park.
During the four-week course, participants will receive intensive training in the principles of conservation biology, ecological monitoring techniques, social surveying and action planning whilst also getting experience the amazing diversity of flora and fauna in Chitwan National Park and life in the surrounding area of Sauraha.
Grasses are too high and it’s too dangerous to carry out surveys on foot, so we have elephants are in place for some large mammal surveying at the end of this week. We hope to take to the river and carry out some gharial (critically endangered crocodilian species: Gavialis gangeticus) surveying the week after. We, and the trainees, will be sending regular updates on the course activities so stay tuned!