Hellooo,

Sorry it has been a while since I last updated you all. Has been quite busy here and January has flown by!

So since I last posted, I have been helping Valou do her last habitat analysis plots (she left today, sad times!) and Danica returned from Canada, so it was nice to have her back.

We've had quite a few visitors this month also, including someone you may know. The first lot were a Swiss family who own a zoo and just wanted to check out the place. It was good having new people here to show around, but they stayed for 4 nights so it was a bit of a challenge to entertain them for so long with little for them to do. They seemed to enjoy themselves and even tipped us all which went towards a big BBQ!

On the animal front, my project is same old. Still no captures of lorises or tarsiers, but have seen 4 lorises since December, just too high to get! Ben doesn't seem worried though, just tells me to keep on walking! This month has also had a lot to do with crocodiles. It started off one day while I was sat on the steps of main building and Budin, one of the staff, said "Alice, come and measure a crocodile". Don't worry, it wasn't alive, unfortunately it had been entangled in a fishing net. We think it had been dead for about 3/4 days as it was really bloated and the smell was disgusting! When we had to roll it, the sounds it made I actually thought it might explode! Was so interesting to see it up close though. We've, well the guys, have buried it at the jetty and in a couple of months are going to dig it up to be left with the skeleton!

Then the other day, we captured a live crocodile in the trap! It just so happened that Sophie and Rachel were arriving the next day which was good timing on their behalf! So they got to see the satellite tagging of the crocodile. We had all placed bets on how long it would be and the winner would get some dairy milk, treasured out here! My guess was 3.9 m, but it was 3.6! Budin was the closest with 3.68... think he may have cheated somehow... Was so cool to see though, quite scary at times, like when they opened the trap door to get it out. It was tied by rope, but its jaw was still able to snap! But it all went to plan (apart from Valou getting swiped and knocked over by the tail - she was fine!). Ben, my boss did however seem to enjoy getting a semen sample from the crocodile a little too much... Never thought I'd see that... Sophie also got a great video of the crocodile being released back in to the water.... The video shows the crocodile still attached to ropes and then as soon as it is released the video is of the ground because she is running away. Very funny.

Was so nice to have Sophs and Rachel here, although a little weird! It did rain most of the time, but we did manage to go on a walk and a couple of night walks, but unfortunately no orangutans!! They also just missed the elephants! I just did a primate survey along the river and they're only a couple of kilometers away! Hopefully by tomorrow they will be at DG!

xxx