Freezing our #@!#’s off in the Gobi

Well, the big thing is that it’s cold! as in really cold. Or maybe not really cold, but it feels really cold cause I’ve gotten used to the heat. Two days ago, I wore a short sleeved shirt and was sweating badly, today, I have long-johns and a down jacket to keep from shivering. The thermometer claim that it’s 6 degrees C outside, though I’m not convinced cause a couple of hours ago, a pair of polar bears walked past camp, heading south.

The camp is superb, it really is. Though there is a slight mistake in the planning. It is great for summer temperatures, but we only have one stove (which would be OK, we could heat up one ger and stay there) but there is no firewood, dung or coal to burn in the stove (this could off course be solved if we had a vehicle but that left for UB five days ago)). That car was returned to Snow Leopard Enterprise, a local NGO, who needed it back. The plan is that as soon as SLT has wired money to buy a new car the staff in UB will do so and send it here. We are kind of hoping that it will happen fairly soon cause we are running low on water and Midget heard on the radio that it’s going to snow tomorrow, so just a little bit of heat would be kind of neat.

I know that 6 degrees isn’t really cold, but it gets kind of cold when it’s the same temperature inside and you never get warm. And as I wrote, my body has probably just adjusted to the heat in the Gobi so it feels
colder than it is.

The rain has probably clogged up our snares so our hopes to catch a cat tonight aren’t very high, lessens the motivation to hike up signal mountain a bit… Well, I have looked at the trap camera pictures, done some calculations and are now fairly sure that we will catch our next snow leopard on the 2nd of September. Plus – minus one day.

Old Mr Dog (also known as Chico) died yesterday. I knew that it would happen quite soon and when I said goodbye before I left for Mongolia, I wasn’t sure that I would see him again. Still it feels really sad. He was a god dog and we had some great hunts together. I still remember when we got him, a summer day 11 years ago my step dad asked if I wanted to go for a trip to southern Sweden. I tagged along and all of a sudden we were at a kennel and half an hour later as a puppy was sleeping in the car and we were headed home my step dad said “it’s your job to introduce it to your mom cause she won’t be as upset at you as she would be with me”. Funniest thing with the dog was that he loved to retrieve stuff and if he got bored or excited, he tried to steal your socks or shoes and hopefully something fun would come out of it. I remember a couple of years ago when I packed for a trip to Zimbabwe, Chico got really excited when he saw me pack and decided to take my sandals and bury them in the snow. It wasn’t exactly love I felt when I realized that the sandals were gone, well, I found them in spring  (a bit molded). I will miss Chico, he was a good dog.

Have to sign out, Namshur is doing the evening check inside the ger and one of the traps is set, got to put on some clothes and check it out. If its a leopard it will be interesting to dart it in this wind.

—

Back again, the trap was tripped but nothing in it. Damn it.

Snow leopards 2 (maybe 3) – Researchers 1

Yesterday morning. Kim woke me up saying ” one of the snares have changed pulse”. “Really” I replied, a bit newly awake. “Yup” she replied and left the ger. As I tried to get out of the sleeping bag and find my clothes, I heard Kim saying “one more?”, obviously addressing Namshur who was checking the traps that we can hear from camp. I had put on my pants and was just about to grab the deodorant (a quick farmers-shower) when I heard Kim saying “three?”
To hell with the deodorant, I ain’t here to be pretty or smell good, just threw on some clothes and went outside in time to see Namshur start ascending the mountain to check the signals from the traps that we can’t hear from camp. It takes at least 15 minutes to get to the saddle where we check the traps so I grabbed a sandwich and a cup of tea and went to check the capture kit. After a while, Namshur called in on the radio saying “five snares are fast”. Kim asked him to repeat, no, we heard right, five traps have been tripped. Kim and I look at each other saying, “are we being invaded by snow leopards”?

I was a bit  stressed when I realized that I hadn’t packed the capture kit for multiple captures, sure enough, there would not be a snow leopard in all of the snares but there might be a few Ibex or a female with kittens so I had to supplement the pack with syringes and other stuff.

You might find it a bit too relaxed to have breakfast before we left but the thing is that our vehicle left with Tom and the others so we were going to have to hike to all our snares on foot (about 12 km) so I figured that I would need some energy.

The first two traps, both of them in a canyon called Wind tunnel, were tripped by a snow leopard. Downside was, there were no snow leopard in either of the traps, just some hair… I will take the blame for it, I cleaned these traps after the rain and the only explanation is that I didn’t do a good enough job with getting all the debris off from the cable, with the result that the cable ran too slow and the leopard was able to pull it’s paw out of the snare before it closed. Feels really bad but I learned that lesson and it won’t happen again. Only good thing about it is that we know that the traps are placed good since he/she stepped in both of them…

Well, we still had three to go, off to the North Canyon.

No leopard here either. Actually, what happened was that the string from the trap to the transmitter was pulled out, most likely, an ibex had tripped on it.

Oh well, there were still two traps left, off to Pujii’s canyon.

This trap was released and the snare was closed tight but no leopard. And no hair. Something had stepped into the trap but we don’t know what, maybe a smaller animal (fox or a leopard kitten) or the snare was also too slow and the leopard got away, though we couldn’t find any hair on this snare. We did find fresh pug marks in the sand a few hundred meters from the snare but apart from that, nothing.

Well, the last trap had to contain a leopard, right?

No.
Actually, nothing had happened to this trap, it probably malfunctioned cause when we came there, the radio pulse was normal. We got afraid that we had mixed up the frequencies and since we had already checked most of the snares, we hiked to the remaining four to check them too.

All this was accomplished in less than four hours with the only result being that we were quite tired when we got back to camp. We had walked as fast as we could considering there might be an animal trapped and it was getting hot rapidly.

So much for yesterday, today we downloaded pictures from a trap camera and found a new leopard (as in one that we haven’t identified before), we have at least five different leopards visiting the area where the traps are (within 3 km from camp). We also built a new trap at a saddle where we have photographed three different individuals.

Oyuna left the camp together with Benji yesterday. Benji is going to Dalandzadgad for another semester at the boarding school and Oyuna wanted to accompany her so we are cooking our own food for a couple of days. Quite interesting since at least I am unfamiliar with many of the ingredients in camp. It’s quite empty without Oyuna, she does her best to take care of us. If any of us takes of on their own she becomes very worried and she was quite upset with Tom when he let Kim go check some cameras on her own and didn’t come back until the afternoon. Apparently, Oyuna is worried that I don’t eat enough too, especially that I don’t eat enough meat. She insists that I must eat more sheep fat, otherwise I will not survive the winter. Last time we went to Gurvantes she wanted me to shave so she could introduce me to some nice Mongolian girls, I explained that my beard will soon be very long and that the girls would not like me, it’s quite funny, I just hope that there will be no serious attempts to find a girl for me. Could be a bit awkward to get out of that situation.

We hope that our new car will come in a week, together with my motorbike, for the moment (ha, there was a spider crawling on my index finger, that have never happened when I’ve been typing before…) we are stranded in camp with no means to get water or food. I might have forgot to write that there is a well about 4 km away where we get our water. I really need to find me some camels. They would be great for getting water, hauling equipment into the mountains and for leisure trips on days off.

Tomorrow, the score will be evened out to: Snow leopards 2- researchers 1, or possibly 3-1.

Heavy rain in the Gobi desert

Considering that we are at the border to the Gobi desert I must say that it rained quite heavily the night after we caught Aztai so yesterday, we had to check all our traps to make sure that the cloth that covers the hole and the trigger for the trap hadn’t sunken in. Apparently, the dirt that covers the cloth and the snare (a metal wire) can also “cement together” and slow the snare down thereby enabling the animal to pull it’s foot out of the snare before it closes. Hmm, there’s a whole lot of new terms in this field that I’m not really familiar with. I have never tried to explain trapping in English before. Hope that it is comprehensible.

Anyway, Namshur and I went to check some of the traps and Tom and Chris did the others. Nothing much happened except that we got a bit lost trying to take a short-cut through a pass. I was a little weak after my illness but not too bad. The mountains are quite challenging physically (dough as Homer Simpson would have said). I shouldn’t say that we have been carrying an enormous weight up the mountains, I think that my pack has averaged 15 kg or so and most traps are situated in canyons or valleys (though the way to the canyons aren’t exactly flat). It’s rather a combination of the altitude and my physical shape, the camp is situated at about 2200 meters above sea level. Might not sound like much but it sure feels when one is trying to grasp for air going uphill, or climbing. I have no excuses for my shape, other than that I wanted to give my knee plenty of time to heal and maybe that I was stuck behind the desk for six months. The knee is fine, it doesn’t hurt at all except if I’m kneeling and I might as well sit instead.

Kim, Pujii and Pursee have been away for a couple of days to finish the last site-occupancy surveys (they walk line transects searching for snow leopard signs such as scrapes, scats, pug marks). Pujii’ will use this data for her Master’s thesis when she gets back to U.S. Compared to the first week, the past days have been quite slow, I have gone through all equipment in the camp to see what we have, checked the medical kit together with Chris and re-arranged and added some things to the capture kit. Among other, it now contains a flashlight and a leatherman tool kit. I usually carry my multi-tool but it’s hard to remember everything in the mornings and considering my physical situation in the last capture it seems as if I can’t choose when we catch the cats and I figure that next time I will be in the shower or something and turn up in underwear with no equipment at all.  Speaking of the shower, I just had one and I can’t praise it enough. I have promised Namshur a gold medal in shower building (a little Olympic influenced). We have a solar heated shower that contains 9l of water, if left outside for five hours, the water is hot and the bag contains enough for two people to get thoroughly clean. I have my doubts about the shower in winter, there is an apparent risk that my feet might freeze to the rocks. Well, that will be a later problem.

Tom, Pujii, Pursee, Chris and Biamba left the camp this morning. It feels a bit empty; besides Midget and Oyuna, it’s just Kim, Namshur and me here. I don’t know if there’s anyone who knows more about snow leopards than Tom, and Chris has been the best teacher in immobilization and medics. I have really learned a whole lot the last weeks. All this feels good but the downside is that it’s like losing a dictionary when they leave, besides that I liked their company. Well Kim and Namshur will still be here for a few more weeks and both of them are very competent so we will be fine. In a way it feels good that the staff gradually leaves cause this way we will be a team to solve the problems as they appear and I feel far from ready to run the fieldwork and take care of all practical things in camp on my own. But if you think of it, how long would it take before a person would feel: it’s OK guys you can go home now, I feel confident that I can take care of this snow leopard study and research camp in the middle of nowhere even though I don’t speak the language??

I reckon that if ever, it would take quite a while to feel that. When Kim and Namshur leave I will just have to dive in head first and do my best.

First snow leopard capture!

First things first they say but I will not follow that rule today but rather tell the most recent news first.

We caught our first snow leopard today!

He is a 36 kg male, about three years old and his name is Aztai which means lucky in Mongolian. Can’t say that he was too lucky considering that he stepped in the trap but we were really lucky considering which trap he stepped in.

The particular trap is situated at the base of a cliff about 300 meters from camp on the other side of the valley; you can actually see the spot from our camp. I set it a few days ago after Tom had taken a walk and noticed that there were scrape marks there. We were figuring that the leopards would come down a ridge on our side of the valley (where there were also scrape marks), cross the valley, and head for the cliff. Since the valley is quite wide and open it was hard to figure out exactly which way the leopard would travel, especially since the snare is only about 20 cm in diameter and the leopard has to step in it. Anyway, I set the snare between two scrapes, just next to the cliff, hoping that the leopard would hug the cliff as he walked between the scrapes. Honestly, I didn’t like the trap a whole lot. The main reason for setting it was that it was a model that I hadn’t used before and I wanted to practice, we had some hours left in the afternoon, and it would at least have a better chance to catch a leopard if it’s set than if it’s lying in camp. I remember that when I came back I told Tom and Kim that we can pull it out in case we run out of traps cause it ain’t really good. Yesterday morning I attached a trap-transmitter to it that we had to modify a bit. It works fine but there is a rather great risk for false alarms. Yesterday afternoon my stomach started cramping and I got a bit sick, couldn’t even drink water so I headed for bed and stayed there. I woke up this morning hearing that Namshur, who had checked the transmitters from the mountain, had heard that one alarm was on. Apparently, it was the one across the valley. I felt quite weak and was trying to decide whether I could get up or not so to be honest, I was kind of hoping that it would be a false alarm. Pursee and Pujii, our two Mongolian biologists went over to check the trap and after a while I heard Tom shouting “they are running” and a little later “Irbis”, which is Mongolian for snow leopard. I crawled out of bed, mind set that I will try, but maybe let Tom or Chris run the capture in case I felt too weak. (Chris later told me that there was no chance that I was staying in bed and that he would have carried me to the trap if necessary).

Chris and I mixed the drugs, went over to take a look at the leopard, and loaded a dart. Chris then approached it and I walked around it to get a shot at the thigh. As the dart hit, we walked away to let the leopard fall asleep and as I looked up to the camp I realized that the entire staff was sitting outside the gers, drinking tea and watching us in binoculars. Maybe not the way I had pictured a snow leopard capture but it sure was a nice way.

Well the rest of the marking was more or less standard and everything went good. We gave Aztai the antidote and walked away a bit so he wouldn’t be stressed. As he got up and started moving around I decided that I will stop looking for snow leopards in the mountains. Even with binoculars it was almost impossible to see him. Snow leopards are truly magnificent animals and it was a stunning moment to be so close to one. At the same time, I felt bad for him, being stuck in the trap.

As we got back to camp, I sorted out the samples we had collected and then passed out in bed. This afternoon, Chris taught Kim and me how to suture in case any of the staff, or a leopard, gets injured. We used a hamster that was caught in a mouse trap in the office ger last night as a patient but despite our greatest efforts, we where not able to revive the poor fellow.

So, that’s what happened today, lets go back to the beginning.

We have had some very busy days, hiking and climbing to check for good trap sites and setting the last traps. At the moment, we have 17 traps armed and ready. Chris, the Austrian vet came two days ago and we have rehearsed capture procedures, drug dosages etc. I must say that I have learned so much from Tom, Chris and Kim the last week. I am really glad that Tom and Kim are here and it feels great to have them leading this project. Two days ago the alarm on a trap was released for the first time and we were all excited as we were sitting in the van, heading for the trap. Yesterday morning we had our second false alarm, both these times it seems as if a rodent have tripped the wire to the transmitter. Even though everyone was disappointed that there was no snow leopard in the traps, both occasions served as good rehearsals at the same time as they took the edge of the first “panic” when the alarm went.

I can’t think of what more to write, nothing seems important compared to the capture, though I have missed to write some things.

First I think that I have forgot to acknowledge that it is Guillaume Chapron who has designed this page and that it is he who shall have credit for it.

Second, it might be useful with a short presentation of the people working here so I will start from the beginning.

Tom McCarthy and Kim Berger are the two American scientists from Snow Leopard Trust, I think that I introduced in an earlier post (since I can’t read the blog myself, I might repeat stuff or leave important things out, my apologies for this).

The Mongolian staff consists of (we use short versions of their names cause the originals are quite long)

Pursee is a field biologist about my age. He works as a teacher in Ulaanbaatar when he is not here.

Pujii is a Master student working on occupancy estimates. She studies in Minnesota and will go back to U.S. in early September.

Namshur, our Mongolian vet and handyman. He has built a super-nice shower and some very impressive shoehorns of ibex horn

Biamba is our driver

Together with Koustubh, and Indian researcher, and Juan, a student from Argentina; Pursee and Pujii have fixed the camp this summer and conducted the camera and site occupancy studies.

Our Mongolian family consists of:
Midget, who is the caretaker

Oyuna, who is the cook

Benji, their daughter who will leave for school in Dalandzadgad in a little while.

Last person is Chris Waltzer, an Austrian vet, who arrived here a couple of days ago. Chris works in Austria, with cheetah in Iran and with wild ass, wild camels and Przewalskis horse in Mongolia. He is a very competent and calm vet and I have learned a lot from him the last days.

Tom and Chris just came back from the mountain-transmitter-check and no alarms are on tonight.

First field note from the J. Tserendeleg Snow Leopard Research Center

[posted by Chappen]

As we checked in at the airport it turned out that together, the four of us (me, Tom, Kim and Namshur our Mongolian veterinarian) had about 65 kg of overweight. Part of this was due to all scientific equipment and part was because Nadja misunderstood Tom when he asked her to buy some uncut cheese, as in, not sliced cheese.  She bought a whole cheese, as in, not cut at all. Well, at least we will not run out of cheese in a while. And there was really not much of a problem, besides us, it was just three more people on the plane.

In Dalandzadgad we were picked up by Biamba, a Mongolian who has worked as driver for the crew who stayed in the camp during summer. We loaded all luggage in the Russian van (which was already full of all the stuff we sent down by truck two days earlier and headed to the market to but vegetables, bread and some other stuff. Before we could leave the Mongolians were really keen on lunch (I have understood that eating is very important to them).

Unfortunately, the power had been out for three days so it took a while to find a restaurant that was open. With our stomachs full and our minds set on a long drive we took off. I knew that the roads would be bad but I hadn’t expected them to be that bad. Took us a bit more than 10 hours to get to camp with just two short stops. I checked the speed a few times and according to the meter we were doing between 70 and 90 km/h, I agree with the meter cause both we and some of the luggage were flying around in the van a couple of times. Eventually we got to camp, and what a camp!

A lot has happened since the picture below of the camp was taken [note from Chappen: Orjan has not the possibility to email pictures – these ones were taken some months ago].

The sleeping ger contains five bunk beds and some shelves. The Kitchen is really nice with a gas stove and a little table with chairs. There’s sausages and dried sheep meat hanging from the ceiling and all around the walls there are food stashed up. The office has a U-shaped desk with computers, electronic gadgets and boxes with equipment piled up wherever there is room. Everyone have told me that the food in Mongolia is horrible but our cook is fantastic. Considering where we are and what supplies she has, she cooks delicious food.  The cook and the caretaker (the Mongolian couple) lives in a ger about 30 meters behind the camp.
Around the camp there are small stone walls (very small) which make it really cosy. We have a great toilet (a little house built over a hole in the ground) and a shower is under construction. Together with the surrounding this must be if not the best place, than at least top three that I have lived in.  The camp is situated at the mouth of a canyon going into a valley, hard to describe but it means that we see mountains on all sides.  And what mountains. The summits are realy pointy and dramatic. We have seen ibex, owls, falcons lammergeier and lots of other birds from camp.

We spent the first day here unpacking all the gear and I filled up the capture backpack with all the stuff we will need. In the afternoon we went for a short hike o check some trap cameras (hidden cameras with motion sensors) The cameras have been out for two months partly to fascilitate finding good trap sites. There are scrape markings (the snow leopards pee on a cliff and scratch together some pebbles for a visual mark) all over these mountains, there is actually one 200 meters from camp. We found some good places. Man, the mountains are so beautiful and the feeling that there are so many leopards around is thrilling.
Setting a trap takes a few hours, I think that I will describe it in detail when I can upload some pictures but in short, first you nail the trap mechanism to the ground and dig a hole for the trigger. Then you cover the hole with a cloth and lay your snare on the cloth. Then you put dirt on the cloth and sharp stones around it so the leopard will step in the snare. To make sure that the leopard can’t get away you need to attach the snare to a rock (with a spring coil between so the snare will have some resistance instead of being totally numb). Last thing we do is attaching a transmitter that will send a radio signal in case something gets caught in the trap. In case there are no rock around to tie the snare to, you will need a weight of some kind. So day two, we went to Gurvantes, the village nearby to get some scrap metal. As we’re driving around Tom yells out “thats what we want”! In a yard, there’s all sorts of yunk lying around, we negotiate a price and load the van full of transmission parts, generator, wheel rims etc.

For the past days, we have been carrying tools, snares, wire, trap mechanisms and really heavy metal parts up the mountains and setting snares. Today, we have ten traps set.

I could write so much more but it is my time to climb one of the mountains to listen if any of the transmitters has changed signal, in that case, we will be busy tonight. We climb the mountain every morning at five and every evening at eight.

Orjan

Last day in civilisation…

Tom and Kim arrived early yesterday and together with them, I left the hotel and moved into an apartment owned by Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS). We packed all gear at SLT’s office including a huge amount of food that we bought at various markets and loaded it on a truck going to the Gobi. Have hopefully finished the last things now, It’s been two very busy days.  From now on I will send messages to Guillaume Chapron (Chappen) at Grimso research station and he will publish them on the blog.

I got to take out some money and buy some calling cards and then its off for dinner. I have put the adress where you can send letters and SMALL parcels under the “about me and the project” heading

Orjan

Some valuable tips when moving abroad

I realized that I have forgot to write some very important stuff. First, I was on the same plane as the Brazilian soccer team (female), they were actually sitting in the same area as me. But while they were travelling to fame and glory in the Olympics, I was on my way to solitude in what Lonely planet describes as “one of the harshest places on Earth”… Still, it’s pretty cool, eh?

Second, I have come up with three invaluable things to remember when moving abroad, especially if the country has an extreme climate and uses Chyrillic alphabet (making it hard to understand signs):

1. If you pack an extra bag and send it as cargo, meaning it will arrive a couple of days after you, it is wise to fill it with clothes that you will not use immediately (Check, I did that, it’s full of winter clothes). However it is not as wise to fill the extra space in the bag with all your socks and shoes (Check, did that too, Ohh…)

So, I have been walking around in my nice desert boots and the same socks for the past six days. I have washed the socks in the zink but it didn’t help much.

2. Make sure that you obtain your visa before you depart, I guess mine will be ready after I have left for the Gobi. No worries, I’m sure I will be fine anyway.

3. Don’t listen to your friend if he, before you leave home says: “No, you don’t need to buy batteries, it’s a capitol, off course they have batteries”. 

Took me half a day to locate six AAA batteries (not packages, batteries) for my headlamp.

Tom and Kim from the Snow Leopard Trust will arrive early tomorrow,  so soon I will have some more information about the project.

Still in UB

Well, it’s still hot. UB is like all Asian cities, and not. Dowtown is busy, with people everywhere and lots of shops and resturaunts. The traffic is horrible, if you try to cross a street the drivers speed up to make sure you have noticed them. Though, I don’t think that they will stop in case you haven’t noticed them…

The difference is that downtown is very small, you can easily walk around it. It’s easy to tell that the houses downtown were built during the Soviet era. l I think that many of the suburbs consist of Ger tents, but I haven’t been there.

Spent last day at ISLT’s office and on the immigration office, trying to obtain a work permit and long term visa, none of them worked. I’ll head to the national museum now to learn some more about Chingis Khaan and Mongolia in general.

Some info for all people using Google earth (and all other with good maps). We will fly from UB to Dalanzadgad, the regional capitol of Omnogov (south Gobi) province. The flight is about 500 km. From Dalanzadgad, we head west in a Russian van to the Soum (municipality) centre Gurvantes. This trip is about 300 km and takes about 16 hours (without breaks). J. Tserendeleg camp is situated about 45 km north of Gurvantes in the Tost Mountains. I have been told that there is GSM coverage at a hill 800 meters from the camp, if this is true you can text me at my new Mongolian number, send a mail to get the number ( I have no idea how steep the hill is though, it might be 800 meters straight up…). 

Chingis and the Golden horde is waiting, don’t want to keep them waiting…

Arrived in Ulaan Bataar

Well, so far everything has gone almost as planned. I had some trouble getting on the plane since I didn’t have any visa for Mongolia but 25 minutes before departure, the airline personnel decided to let me on. When I arrived in Chingis Khaan airport I found out that there were no visa waiting for me, after 10 nervous minutes Nadia from International Snow Leopard Trust (ISLT) came to the office and helped me out.

I’m staying in a hot hotelroom downtown, has spent the day checking out Ulaan Bataar (UB), visiting  museum with lots of dinosaur fossils and visited Jan Wigsten, a Swede who has spent 28 summers in Mongolia and runs a tourist company called Nomadic journeys (www.nomadicjourneys.com). He is a really nice and experienced guy and I have learned a lot this afternoon.

I might tag along on a two day tour east to see some more of Mongolia before I head out to the desert. Not too much more to report, it’s hot here and it will be even hotter in the Gobi.

Orjan