Weekend at Park Ranomafana

Hiking in the forest

We spent last weekend hiking in Parc National de Ranomafana, about 60km north of Fianar. Kristen had been out in the field since Wednesday visiting communities around the park where SantéNet is working. When her plans called for her to spend Friday night, and then Monday and Tuesday in Ranomafana, it made more sense for me to come out and spend the weekend with her in Ranomafana than for her to come back into Fianar, only to turn around and go right back two days later.

The road leading to the park is, by Madagascar standards, pretty good. However, with that said, back in April we took this route to attend a conference on wild silk production, held just outside the park, and on the way back to Fianar I had to move up to the front of the mini-bus to avoid upchucking. Potholes and S-curves truly make for some exquisite motion sickness, and I now understand why many Malagasy travelers do a dose of Dramamine before starting any long journey by car. I found driving better than riding: a top speed of 15mph helps.

Bad for setting land-speed records, the slow speed, however, was perfect for taking in the scenery. At one point, there was park property on the left and non-park land to the right, juxtaposing two very different possibilities/realities. I saw people felling and milling eucalyptus trees to my right. To accomplish the latter, the foresters lay the felled tree upon make-shift scaffolding, and then, with one person standing above and another below, they carve planks from the bole with a 6-foot long saw. As I continued the drive I saw more tell-tale piles of amber sawdust dotting the hills and valleys and wondered how many board-feet of lumber comes out of this area in a year. The other side of the road, by contrast, was a dense mat of vegetation—a mixture of trees, ferns, and other greenery—that looked impossible to walk through. Considering Park Ranomafana is only about 10 years old, it looks like the conservation efforts put in place have had some benefit.

Not to be misleading, though, the park itself is far from pristine, as we found out during our hikes. There are still exotic, introduced species in the forest composition, with wild guava being one of the most aggressive. Lemurs and birds that eat the guava fruit and later disperse seeds via their feces hinder eradication efforts of this species, our guides told us. We also encountered zebu cow-pies in the forest (but none of their authors). Some livestock owners leave their cows in the park to their own devices, and only seek their animals when they need to sell or sacrifice one. And, even when we walked in the primary, old-growth forest, we found an occasional cut tree stump indicating the presence of some recent human activity.

In Malagasy, Ranomafana means “hot water.” The hot springs that surround this area are the inspiration for the name. There are baths and a heated swimming pool in town with a two-tiered pricing scheme for locals and strangers. We had read in the guide books that the facilities, on a hygienic level, were not up to code, so we opted not to bathe there. Others, who didn’t share our same standards of cleanliness, took advantage of a warm bath or swim to help ward off the winter chill. The only ranomafana we encountered came from the shower in our bungalow, which was a welcome blessing after our cold and rainy hikes.

Calm before the storm

We hiked both Saturday and Sunday, with Erica, a third-year Peace Corps volunteer who has extended to work with SantéNet in Fianar. Saturday, we signed up for an afternoon and nocturnal hike, the total time out to be around 5 hours. That afternoon we hiked mostly in the secondary forest, which was full of trees, bamboo, ferns, and orchids. We also visited a small waterfall that was booming with water. It began raining about an hour into our hike and very soon we were pushing the limits of our Gore-Tex outerwear.

We didn’t see much wildlife, unless you count the leeches, which found us quite appetizing. Even with our pant-legs tucked into our socks, the leeches managed to infiltrate our defenses. Erica suffered the worst, her ankle-length socks provided little defense against the persistent suckers. However, Kristen won the prize for most prominent leech attachment: her face. The leeches are more a psychological menace than a physical one, although if they are disturbed or forcibly removed after attaching, they secrete an anticoagulant that makes the wound site bleed spectacularly. (Note: Hi, this is Kristen, sneaking into Dan's story. I'd just like to state for the record--especially if my Mom is reading this--that as soon as Dan saw the leech on my cheek, I wanted it off. However, Dan and Erica insisted that if 'we' just left it on for a few moments until it was done feeding, then it would be easy to pluck it off and my cheek wouldn't bleed one bit. The few moments seemed to stretch on forever, and while everyone else was watching the mouse lemurs, I had to keep prodding them to check my face with the flashlight to see if the leech was 'done' yet. My calmness ran out as the time moved towards 10 minutes and I made Erica remove the leech. Judging by all of Erica and Dan's chuckles, the experience was more fun for the observers. Luckily there is no trace on my cheek of my temporary 'friend')

For the nocturnal hike, our guide told us to bring bananas and meat to lure mouse lemurs and civets to a designated feeding spot. We had reservations about engaging in this questionable practice, but ultimately decided to go along with it since these animals are only active during night and usually reclusive. And, sure enough, upon arriving at the designated spot, we found a clearly habituated civet waiting for a morsel of meat. Eventually another showed up to make a pair, but they were to be disappointed this night because we drew the line at hiking with raw meat in our packs. The guide took our bananas, peeled a couple to rub on some trees, and stuck some others on nearby branches. Soon afterwards we saw movements in the shadows and our flashlights revealed a mouse lemur, the world’s smallest primate. It was cute, and the way it flitted about the branches reminded us more of a bird than a mammal. We took pictures and were glad to have seen these animals, but decided ultimately that the whole experience was a bit sad and disturbing. The civets just looked sad and cold and the lemur appeared jumpy and strung-out. Maybe being so close to the civets--who find mouse lemurs tasty--explains the mouse lemur's erratic behavior.

World's smallest primate

Sunday, we hiked in the morning—again in the pouring rain—but this time up into the primary forest. On the way up, we saw a chameleon, a Grey Gentle Lemur, high up in a patch of bamboo plants, but not much else except, of course, more leeches. Kristen had fun playing in the streams and spent some time reliving her childhood looking for crayfish. She flipped over one rock and found a fresh water crab, about the size of a quarter. The highlight for me was seeing so many orchids in their natural setting. Our guide told us the time to see the most orchids in bloom isn’t until the warmer months of November and December, but we did see a miniature species proudly sporting its pink blossoms. I look forward to going back just to hunt for orchids, which me might do Thanksgiving weekend.