Unfortunately the first 3 days at Olako were an exercise in frustration. The lodge manager could not seem to organize a boat to take me out on the lagoon and just kept putting me off. The boat drivers were unwilling to talk to me until I finally called the owner, who I had originally made my arrangements with. The staff at this lodge is only used to dealing with tourists, not researchers, so I don’t think they knew what to do with me, but it still shouldn’t have been as difficult as it was. Fortunately the owner was able to remedy the situation immediately by assigning a driver to me. In the meantime I had plenty of time to catch up on other writing, but that’s not what I came here to do.
Finally on Tuesday afternoon we got out on the lagoon. We headed to the southwest corner where there were no villages. As we cruised around the coves I was surprised to find that even at the furthest reaches we would see logging roads cutting through the forest to the lagoon. The habitat was good for manatees but we didn’t see any.
Boat traffic going by in front of the lodge. Fernan Vaz definitely has the most barge traffic of any lagoon in Gabon.
logging road at the end of a quiet cove
For the next week I surveyed different parts of the lagoon and it was evident there is a larger human population, because there are only small patches of forest or savannah between each group of houses or village. We did go up several beautiful rivers that had no human inhabitants or signs of fishing, and there we saw more wildlife, including the relatively rare African Finfoot (the male pictured below as well as a female and chicks) and a turtle. I was happily surprised that these animals didn’t flee at the site of our boat as they do almost everywhere in Gabon, and I was told later by a local guide that almost no one goes up these rivers so the animals are more tame. He also said both manatees and hippos are reported in these places. Unfortunately I didn’t see any the day I was there. Male African Finfoot, Podica senegalensis
West African Black turtle, Pelusios niger, resting on a log
I was able to interview several fishermen and local guides in Ombooue who told me that they see manatees here throughout the year, but only at night. Fishermen see them feeding along the grassy areas as they set nets, and one man said he sometimes sees a couple at a time, but they always flee. He told me there are no specialist manatee hunters here because there aren’t many manatees, but that occasionally one will get caught in a fishing net and then it is eaten. A local guide told me he had seen 3 manatees rolling with tails flapping at the surface of the water (he described it as playing, but it was likely mating behavior) in the Rembo N’komi, the river at the south east corner of the lagoon. Of everyone I spoke to, only one person had a recent sighting (several months ago) of a manatee in the lagoon during the day, all other sightings reports were at night and in rivers.
On a survey up the Rembo N’komi I visited the small town of Ndougou, which really only exists as a place where roads lead into the interior so barges unload trucks and equipment for logging and oil companies, and smaller boats are loaded with bananas from nearby plantations headed to market in Gabon’s bigger cities. In just the 2 hours I was there, five big barges came to unload. All are coming from Pt. Gentil and traversing the length of Fernan Vaz Lagoon to the river, then going upriver to Ndougou. The river is deep, I recorded 11m and 10.6m in several places, but with the amount of boat traffic I would imagine manatees stay away from the village. The smaller boats have 6 engines on the back, which as I know all too well from Florida, could be very lethal to a manatee, but there are no reports of manatees being hit by boats and I suspect they avoid the area because of the noise. The good news is the barges and most other boats all follow the same course through the lagoon. The river had several smaller quiet branches with no villages and the mouth at the lagoon was a broad shallow area with miles of papyrus plants, so some habitat was good.
Another logging road. You can see the size of the logs (huge!) in comparison to the children playing at the river's edge.
Another day we went up the lagoon to its mouth at the ocean. There is a huge area of mangrove habitat and some human presence, but the owner of Olako Lodge told me this was where he most frequently has seen manatees. I was also happy to see no evidence from the oil spill that happened here a year ago.
mouth of the lagoon to the sea
At the end of my two weeks we had several days of non-stop torrential rain, making visibility very poor. Rainy season is kicking into high gear again after the annual shorter, drier period here known as the Petite Seche (little dry season). So unfortunately I will leave here without seeing a manatee, but from all my interviews I am sure they are here, although I suspect in lesser numbers than the N’gowe and N’dogo Lagoons south of here. 
West African Black turtle, Pelusios niger, resting on a logThe rivers were much more peaceful than the lagoon
I was able to interview several fishermen and local guides in Ombooue who told me that they see manatees here throughout the year, but only at night. Fishermen see them feeding along the grassy areas as they set nets, and one man said he sometimes sees a couple at a time, but they always flee. He told me there are no specialist manatee hunters here because there aren’t many manatees, but that occasionally one will get caught in a fishing net and then it is eaten. A local guide told me he had seen 3 manatees rolling with tails flapping at the surface of the water (he described it as playing, but it was likely mating behavior) in the Rembo N’komi, the river at the south east corner of the lagoon. Of everyone I spoke to, only one person had a recent sighting (several months ago) of a manatee in the lagoon during the day, all other sightings reports were at night and in rivers.On a survey up the Rembo N’komi I visited the small town of Ndougou, which really only exists as a place where roads lead into the interior so barges unload trucks and equipment for logging and oil companies, and smaller boats are loaded with bananas from nearby plantations headed to market in Gabon’s bigger cities. In just the 2 hours I was there, five big barges came to unload. All are coming from Pt. Gentil and traversing the length of Fernan Vaz Lagoon to the river, then going upriver to Ndougou. The river is deep, I recorded 11m and 10.6m in several places, but with the amount of boat traffic I would imagine manatees stay away from the village. The smaller boats have 6 engines on the back, which as I know all too well from Florida, could be very lethal to a manatee, but there are no reports of manatees being hit by boats and I suspect they avoid the area because of the noise. The good news is the barges and most other boats all follow the same course through the lagoon. The river had several smaller quiet branches with no villages and the mouth at the lagoon was a broad shallow area with miles of papyrus plants, so some habitat was good.
Another day we went up the lagoon to its mouth at the ocean. There is a huge area of mangrove habitat and some human presence, but the owner of Olako Lodge told me this was where he most frequently has seen manatees. I was also happy to see no evidence from the oil spill that happened here a year ago. mouth of the lagoon to the sea At the end of my two weeks we had several days of non-stop torrential rain, making visibility very poor. Rainy season is kicking into high gear again after the annual shorter, drier period here known as the Petite Seche (little dry season). So unfortunately I will leave here without seeing a manatee, but from all my interviews I am sure they are here, although I suspect in lesser numbers than the N’gowe and N’dogo Lagoons south of here. 
The view across the water from this park was all logs as far as the eye could see
Despite the boat traffic passing through, it seems to me that manatees could easily live in these here, there are so many small channels winding back into the mangroves off the main rivers and other areas of flooded forests where the rivers have overflowed their banks. And there are almost no permanent human residents. As we zipped along we saw a water monitor lizard and also a large Nile crocodile! This was the first live Nile croc I’ve ever seen in Gabon, they’re usually very shy and not seen during the day. It jumped off a log into the water as our boat came around a corner, so I only saw its head, but judging by that (the head was about 2 feet long!) it was a pretty big one! Even the boat driver was excited, so I think it was a lucky sighting. 
After a 3 hour boat trip we arrived at Fernan Vaz Lagoon. On the far shore I saw radio towers and some houses, gas flares and a couple helicopters. The oil business is much more obvious here than at other lagoons (although we also see lots of helicopters shuttling workers to oil fields at Sette Cama as well). After crossing the lagoon for another half hour we arrived at Olako Lodge, which is situated on the water in Ombooue, halfway down the lagoon.
Open gas flare on the lagoon
The centerpiece of the lodge is a beautiful restaurant that sits over the water.
The main lodge
The boat house
I settled into a room at the annex, which is about 200 meters down the road from the main lodge and had a large kitchen and living room. 
Fernan Vaz is Gabon's biggest lagoon at approximately 65km long. It also has the largest human population of any of Gabon's lagoons, it's the only lagoon in the country that has no protected area adjacent to it and many people tell me not to expect to find many manatees there. But I've also had other reports that lots of manatees are regularly seen in the rivers that connect to it, and a paper by Nishiwaki et al written in 1982 reports that in their interviews in Port Gentil they were told manatees were quite common in Fernan Vaz. I think reality will be somewhere in between...
It seemed like there were a million water lilies!
African Jacana, Actophilornis africana
Another striking water bird, the Spur-winged Lapwing (and an unidentified friend!)
Juvenile African Fish Eagle
I saw at least 3 species of water lily that are known manatee food plants (Nymphea lotus, Nymphea maculata and Nymphoides indica) as well as several species of grasses and some new plants I still need to identify. We found one area with fresh manatee feeding sign but the villagers say they mostly see manatees during the rainy season from July-September. I realized at that point that in the places I’d been along the Senegal River everyone told me they saw manatees during the rainy season, but no one seemed to know where they went during the dry season. So I continue to be hopeful that the tagged manatees are going to teach us.
We spent several days in the village and the people there were incredibly welcoming. Each morning I took long walks along the lake edge, enjoying the scenery and the wildlife. We also handed out "Sauvons les Lamantins" (Save the Manatees in French) stickers created for me by Save the Manatee Club in Florida, to help raise awareness about protecting the species in Africa. The day after we gave them out, I noticed them stuck on front doors and window shutters all around the village.
Some other images to give you a sense of the place: a view of the village through the front window of the house I stayed at.
A sailboat on Lac de Guiers
Despite the nearby lake, the land around it is very arid- composed of both salt marsh and savannah.
On our way to and from Lac de Guiers, we passed through the beautiful old colonial town of St. Louis near the mouth of the Senegal River. Just south of town we passed the exact place where Michel Adanson collected the first West African manatee specimen by a European during his travels through Senegal from 1748-1753, and this holotype was later sent to Europe. Unfortunately he didn’t get credit for describing the species, that honor eventually fell to Link in 1795. But don’t feel too sorry for Adanson, there are numerous other species named for him, including the Baobab tree, of which all 6 species worldwide have the genus name Adansonia. The African baobab is Adansonia digitata. 
The group discusses possible options for the Patowel manatees with Senegalese national parks and fisheries staff.
In one area adjacent to Patowel there are at least 4 manatees, and that smaller area will eventually dry up, so this will be the next location for captures, probably in late February. Pablo hopes to get new battery packs so he can deploy the other 2 tags on manatees from this site. Unfortunately I won’t be able to stay in Senegal for this, since I have more work in Gabon. But maybe another year, because the problems of dams are not going away in this area anytime soon. They provide many challenges for the manatees, but also give us a unique opportunity to study this creature that is normally so difficult to find, much less capture and tag. Hopefully these studies will lead to solutions for the Senegal River population. 
Typical village along the road. 
Before I came to Senegal I was told there were at least 15 manatees trapped behind a new dam off the Senegal River. However, I learned after I got here that it is a lot more complicated than that. As the Senegal River floods during the rainy season, it spreads into many small tributaries. People are successively damming these smaller branches to keep the water longer into the dry season and grow crops as the water recedes. It turns out there are manatees trapped in at least three different areas spread out over approximately 35km near the towns of Matam and Kanel. Navel was the most critical location because the water was falling the fastest and would leave the manatees high and dry long before the next rains begin.
After visiting the site, I trained Victor and Pablo how to assemble the satellite tags which we planned to put on several of the manatees to track their movements. Unfortunately we had some difficulties with the lithium battery packs, so we only ended up with enough batteries for 3 tags, rather than the 5 we brought. But any data we get will be important: not much is known about manatee migration patterns in the Senegal River, their habitat requirements or even how many manatees there are. 
In the meantime, back at the capture site, workers cleared a path in the hillside so that we could back a trailer attached to a tractor (generously loaned by SAED, the Fisheries Dept.) down the hill to the water's edge. (photo by P. de Larrinoa, CBD-Habitat)
On the morning of 14 January fishermen from Navel and Matam entered the waterway with nets and captured 3 manatees. It was nerve-wracking because the fishermen just sort of “wing it” and not much is coordinated. As the manatees were brought to shore, literally hundreds of people who had assembled along the shoreline descended upon the manatees, most eager to see them, but some wanting to beat them. We had arranged for police officers for protection, but it felt like nothing compared to the huge crowd pressing in. We were only able to accommodate 2 manatees in the trailer, so the fishermen loaded an adult and a sub-adult, and we left the third manatee with several policemen and biologists to watch it while we drove the first two to the release site several kilometers away. 
It's hard to see the manatee in the middle! (photo by C. Schwarz)
I have to say I have never experienced such chaos during manatee captures ever before. People literally ran up to the trailer, grabbing and trying to fling themselves in, caught up in the hysteria of the crowd. People were lined up along the road the entire 3km route and a convoy of trucks and cars followed behind us, all filled to the brim with people yelling. There was absolutely no restraint by the people so I was glad for the 3 police officers in the trailer with us.
Inside the trailer our work space was very confined due to the 2 manatees, our equipment and about 10 people. We mostly had to work while the trailer was moving, because stopping for any length of time meant the crowds descended on us again. This meant that there was alot of data we just could not collect (some basic measurements, blood draw for baseline health information, etc.). We did what we could (I also needed to train the other biologists since most of them had not worked with manatees before) and we got most measurements, genetic samples and determined the sex on all of the manatees over the two days of captures. I also trained the biologists how to attach the tracking gear. 
Veterinary student Prisca gets ready to take a genetic sample.
Demonstrating belt attachment around the manatee's tail. The tag is attached to this by a tether. (photo: T. Diagne)
On their way to the release site, the manatees were transported across the new dam that had trapped them in the first place. Thousands more people were waiting at the release site. We released the first 2 manatees (one with a tag) and headed back for the third. Apparently while we were gone, some of the people had panicked that the manatee was going to die before we returned, so they had tried to load it into a pickup truck. There was nothing wrong with the manatee, it had been kept in the shade and water was poured over it to keep it cool. Unlike dolphins, manatees can comfortably stay out of the water on land for several hours as long as they are monitored and kept cool, because their solid rib bones support their internal organs. But the people watching it did not know this, and in the confusion I had not thought to tell them. We loaded it in the trailer and repeated the trip to the release site. This manatee was also a male and we tagged it as well. 
After that the fishermen decided they would not continue that day. A meeting was called and the Matam fishermen demanded a lot more money to continue helping with the captures. The thing was, we really didn’t need all the huge numbers of people in the water anyway, and the fishermen didn’t realize that the 15 or so biologists present could just as easily catch the manatees without them. So we called their bluff and the next day it was just the biologists and the Navel fishermen back at the capture site. Fewer people turned up to watch as well. This turned out to be so much better, there was less chaos and a lot better communication between everyone, so the whole day was a lot more relaxed. We caught 2 more manatees (a female and a huge adult male) and tagged the female. After that the creek was searched until we were satisfied all the manatees were out. 
There were several film crews there as well- this is Madame Thiam of Senegal National Parks giving an interview. I also gave an interview but fumbled my French halfway through, the next day it was played on national TV and they didn’t edit when I lapsed into English and then said “Oops!”. So that’s my graceful moment on Senegal TV.
Since their release the tagged manatees have been doing some very interesting things. The 2 males made big moves away from the release site, one to the north and one to the south, towards Mali (these sprints are the manatee equivalent of “get me outta here!”). But after several days both stopped and they are likely feeding. There was no natural food at this time of year in the creek where they were trapped, so plants were provided for them, but I’m sure they were very hungry. Luckily none were too thin when we caught them. The female moved slightly to the north but settled down more quickly. 
At the end of the operation we all felt it was a big success. Our great team included biologists from 4 countries. Pictured are (back row): Junior (CBD-Habitat, Guinea-Bissau), Prisca (veterinary student, Senegal), Iris (CBD-Habitat, Guinea-Bissau), Pablo (CBD-Habitat, Spain). In front: Luis Mariano (Spain), Tomas (Oceanium Dakar, Senegal), Lucy (Wildlife Trust, USA) and Cristina (CBD-Habitat, Guinea-Bissau). Not pictured are Paco and Victor from Spain, Luis from CBD-Habitat, Guinea-Bissau and Papis from Senegal. 