Among nature’s great events, ‘the migration’ – as the annual pilgrimage of vast herds of wildebeest and zebra through the Serengeti-Mara ecosystem is known – must surely rate in the top three of most people’s ‘to do before I die’ list. Despite travelling the world with my wife Angie in search of spectacular wildlife photographs, I have yet to see anything that can compare with the migration for drama. It is the sheer scale of this epic journey that is so awe inspiring – hundreds of thousands of animals on the move in their ancient quest to find food and water, traversing back and forth according to the season between the Serengeti in Tanzania and Masai Mara in Kenya. The stunning setting is quintessential Africa, the kind of landscape that first prompted me to leave my home in England and travel overland in search of a life among wild animals 35 years ago.

While the western and northern sections of the Serengeti National Park are defined by their long grasses and acacia woodlands, it’s the 10,000 square kilometres of short-grass plains in the south of the park, an area that merges with the Ngorongoro Conservation Area to the southeast, that is the ancestral home of the wildebeest. During the rainy season, from November to May, the grazing masses can find grass and water here. It’s also where the wildebeest cows bed down in the open to give birth to their calves. In the space of a few weeks between January and March, nearly 500,000 of these gawky, buff-coloured youngsters stumble to their feet within minutes of birth to begin their endless wandering. This is the wonder of nature renewed.

The origins of the Serengeti’s short-grass plains hold the key to the secret of the migration. They are derived from volcanic ash blown on easterly winds from the Ngorongoro highlands. For millions of years outpourings from the volcanoes helped nourish the grasslands by creating a rich alkaline soil, while the almost-impenetrable underlying calcium carbonate hardpan prevented trees from taking root. The resulting lack of shade allowed the grasses to flourish unhindered.

Today, still drawing high levels of calcium, magnesium and phosphorus from the unique soil, the grasses provide vital elements for pregnant wildebeest and their newborn young. It’s the need for these nutrients, particularly phosphorus, that draw the wandering herds south from Kenya when the Serengeti rains commence in earnest.

Angie and I live in Nairobi and consider the Masai Mara our second home. Whenever possible we pack up our safari vehicles and head down the dusty, pock-marked tarmac road leading to the Mara, a five- or six-hour drive away from Kenya’s capital city. We could fly, and many visitors do – a simple 45-minute schedule flight links Nairobi with the Mara – as it’s a lot less taxing, but we still love to connect to the land and to see the transitions unfolding before us as we head for Narok. Two hours west of that dusty township, having driven past vast areas of wheat fields and stands of ripening maize, where large herds of wildebeest and zebras used to wander, the blue knife-edge of the Siria Escarpment emerges ahead of us, marking the western boundary of the reserve.

The arrival of the migration in the Mara in June and July never fails to draw us back, and even when we’re travelling overseas we always try and keep track of what is happening and pinpoint its current location. No two years are the same. The journey of the wildebeest and zebras reflects the vagaries of the weather and each year the herds create a different imprint on the plains and among the woodlands, with individual animals wandering some three thousand kilometres during their circuitous annual pilgrimage. But the Serengeti National Park and the Masai Mara Reserve are only half the story – there are no fences surrounding either of them, allowing the herds to spill over into the surrounding landscape, an entire ecosystem encompassing a vast area of 25,000 square kilometres.

People have pondered the future of the migration since the early part of the 20th century. Over the years both the Serengeti and the Mara have faced their fair share of poaching – and the excesses of trophy hunters in the past – and there was a time when predators such as lions and wild dogs were considered little more than vermin by hunters and game wardens alike. But in time both areas received formal protection from their respective governments. One of the turning points in the history of conservation in East Africa was the new, enlightened approach taken by men such as John Owen, the Director of Tanzania’s National Parks, and German zoologist Bernhard Grzimek and his son Michael. The Grzimeks came to the Serengeti in the late 1950s to try and determine the route taken by the migration and estimate the number of animals involved. At the time the colonial government were intent on changing the boundaries of the Serengeti, partly to appease the Maasai’s demands for greater access to seasonal water holes and grazing. Tragically, Michael Grzimek and his companion were killed in 1959 when his aeroplane collided with a griffon vulture, causing them to plummet to earth over the Salei Plains west of the Ngorongoro highlands. But the Grzimeks’ pioneering work to protect the migration by securing the park boundaries proved pivotal, and the publication of their book Serengeti Shall Not Die and the release of the film of the same name helped focus the public’s imagination on the wonder of the Serengeti. For his part, John Owen encouraged the development of the Serengeti Research Institute, which blossomed during the 1960s and 70s, and to this day scientists continue to monitor the health of the ecosystem with long-term initiatives such as the Serengeti Lion Project.

Although it makes up a small proportion of the total land area covered in the annual migration, the Masai Mara plays a vital role. Recently two issues concerning the future of the Mara have made headline news, both internationally and here in East Africa. A few months ago a scientific report landed with a thump on newspaper editors’ desks. The study, analysed by researchers at the Nairobi-based International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), and led and funded by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), is based on monthly monitoring of seven ungulate or hoofed species between 1989 and 2003. It shows that a total of six species – giraffe, hartebeest, impala, warthog, topis and waterbuck – have undergone a marked and persistent decline throughout the Masai Mara Reserve. While people had long known that certain developments outside the reserve were having a negative impact on wildlife, not many people had foreseen this as being a problem within the reserve, which is protected from all forms of development besides wildlife management and tourism.

But why should this be so surprising? The animals have free passage in and out of the reserve, and, for as long as I can remember, when the grass grows long within the Mara during the rainy season some of the herbivores move out into the dispersal area – private land owned by the Maasai – where livestock helps to keep the grass short and nutritious, and where it is easier for the wild animals to spot predators. And of course certain forms of development outside the reserve are bound to affect wildlife numbers in the long term.
 

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I visited the Mara early this August, staying at Governor’s Camp. The plains were dry and dusty and at night there was the eerie sight of torches flickering in the darkness as Maasai herdsmen moved into the reserve with their cattle. Some, it was said, had travelled hundreds of kilometres to escape the parched landscape further east in Kajiado. Kenya is facing one of its worst droughts in living memory, with millions of its people at risk of food shortages as crops have failed and cattle are dying. There are those who maintain that wildlife and man cannot ultimately survive together, while the Maasai would argue that for centuries they have existed in relative harmony with wildlife, relying on their cattle for all their needs, neither killing wild animals for food or sport (bar the occasional ritual killing of a fine-maned lion to prove their courage), and it is because of them that so many wild animals still survive. And they are right.

Many of Kenya and Tanzania’s great parks and wildlife reserves are to be found in Maasailand, and the Maasai herdsmen feel that it is only fair that when times are tough that they should be allowed to share the remaining pastures with wildlife. After all, they say, wildlife moves seasonally on to their land, devouring the grasses that they themselves need to keep their cattle healthy.

This ‘live and let live’ attitude worked well enough in the olden days before the Mara was given formal protection, a time when there were fewer Maasai and less livestock, and the herdsmen lived a more traditional nomadic existence, moving according to the seasons and never staying too long in any one area – just like the wild herds. Now the number of permanent dwelling places has mushroomed around the reserve (as has the number of tourist facilities) along with the number of livestock, and of course the Maasai are increasingly reliant on agricultural produce to nourish them. Little wonder then that wildlife numbers are showing signs of decline – there simply isn’t enough land to satisfy everyone’s hunger.

There is reason for hope though. The Masai Mara is held in trust by the government on behalf of the Maasai people, and some of the revenue collected from tourism is ploughed back into local development. Beyond the reserve to the north and east, collective ownership of land known as ‘group ranches’ is being replaced by individual ownership, albeit parcels of land of 20 to 40ha. Having title to land empowers people, but if the land is then developed for agriculture, and plots are fenced off, then wildlife will be unable to persist in these areas. Realising this, some landowners have formed wildlife conservancies such as the Olare Orock Conservancy (OOC), which provide the Maasai with a source of income through revenue generated from tourism on their land, while at the same time helping to protect wildlife. But tourism is a fickle business, and like the weather, is prone to highs and lows. To try and counter this eventuality, the OOC guarantees land owners an annual income based on a lease agreement. One thing is certain – wildlife is going to have to pay its way on private land if it is to survive.

Further east of the Mara, vast tracks of land have long been leased for large-scale production of wheat and maize. This has prompted a sharp decline in the Loita wildebeest population, which 20 to 30 years ago numbered around 150,000 animals – it is now less than 20,000. This ‘local’ migration of wildebeest and zebra traditionally spent the rainy season out on the Loita Plains, moving into the reserve and mingling with the main Serengeti migration during the dry season.

Equally worrying is the ongoing development of tourist facilities in and around the Mara. Since 2005 dozens of new camps and lodges have been built in the greater Mara ecosystem. Thankfully a new management plan, which offers real hope for a more structured and regulated way of managing the reserve on both sides of the Mara River (the reserve is formed of two parts, each under the control of a different county council) is now ready – but has yet to be gazetted. When it is, it will be a huge step forward.

However, the fact that new tourism ventures are still in the pipeline, and that a captive cheetah breeding facility had at one point been sanctioned on the border of the reserve only exacerbates an already worrying state of affairs regarding the long-term future of the Mara. The cheetah project has, I am told, been stopped – and so it should be. As a UK Patron of the Cheetah Conservation Fund, I cannot think of one good reason for this kind of facility, which would be little more than a zoo and an affront to the very meaning of the Mara. It would do absolutely nothing to help conserve the area’s wild cheetah population.

The other major issue that has been gaining a lot of attention in the newspapers is the worrying trend concerning Kenya’s forests and water catchment areas, something that Nobel Laureate Wangari Maathai has continued to protest about on behalf of the whole nation. Recently the focus of her protests has been the fate of the Mau Forest, which is the source of a number of rivers including the Mara River. Large tracts of the forest have been felled for charcoal or cleared for settlement despite that fact that it is a Forest Reserve. When I visited the Mara recently the Mara River – a vital resource shared by Kenya and Tanzania – was as low as I have ever seen it. In fact, you could have driven across it in a 4WD vehicle. For the wildebeest this means an easier passage; instead of hundreds or even thousands of animals being trampled and swept to their death in the churning torrent, they can at present walk across it as they move back and forth in search of grazing. The current drought shows no sign of relinquishing its grip on the country, and some of the crocodiles that annually grow fat on the proceeds of the migration have died or moved away in search of deeper water. But the ultimate control on the migratory herds population is not the number of animals that die in river crossings, it is the availability of food for foraging during the dry season. And for that to be plentiful, the ecosystem must be in good shape, something that requires a healthy Mara River.

For the past twenty years or so the Serengeti wildebeest population has oscillated around 1.2 to 1.5 million, with numbers ebbing and flowing according to the variations in seasonal rainfall. Add to this around a quarter of a million zebra and hundreds of thousands of gazelles, and there are some two million animals on the move. In the past, and still today, many of these animals will sadly fall victim to poaching. There was a time when people talked of 100,000 wildebeest being killed each year in the Serengeti, caught up in the wire snares set by poachers in the woodlands during the dry season. But law enforcement activities have increased, especially in the west of the Serengeti through Grumeti, and poaching has been brought under control in much of the Mara, particularly in the Mara Triangle to the west of the River. In an article published in the Smithsonian magazine in 2006, Tony Sinclair (who co-authored two hugely important books on the complex workings of the Serengeti ecosystem with his colleagues from the Serengeti Wildlife Research Centre) quoted a figure of 20,000 wildebeest poached annually. He cautioned that if poaching was to increase at some point in the future it could lead to a crash in the population, and that if this happened the Serengeti as we know it would be a very different place. The wildebeest are more than just architects of the plains – they pattern the lives of just about every other living being. They are the Serengeti.

What we can be sure of is that pressure around all protected areas throughout the world will steadily increase due to the growing human population crowding around them. In his book Collapse author Jared Diamond takes a steely-eyed look at man’s past and how civilisations over the ages have repeated the same mistakes, clinging to cultural imperatives even when faced with their own ultimate demise, unwilling or unable to adapt and change. Whilst we still remain so ignorant about the working of our world and its ecosystems and the role that man plays in determining their future, we would do well to be less arrogant in our assumptions about their extraordinary complexities. In the meantime we should celebrate the last remaining places of wonder such as Serengeti-Mara and salute them for their richness and diversity, and honour them by affording them the protection they deserve.