Enonkishu Conservancy—
A Holistic Approach to Land Conservancy BY ANN ADAMS
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Enonkishu management to care for their herds in exchange for land lease fees. Additionally, Enonkishu hires herders, night guards, maintenance workers and a herd manager to provide the management of the livestock herd so that the holistic grazing plan can be implemented. Recent monitoring has shown that the grazing plan areas are averaging a
Enonkishu consists of manager Rebekah Karimi, Forage Assessment Manager Musa Kiseer, and Albert Cheruiyot, a ranger dedicated to the management of data generated quarterly. The leadership team is all ably assisted by numerous staff, herders, rangers, and volunteers. Rebekah first visited the Maasai Mara as part of a study abroad program with Michigan State University.
n the northern edge of the Maasai Mara-Serengeti ecosystem sits the 6,000-acre Enonkishu Conservancy. The name for the conservancy was developed from the local Maa language and translates to “Place of Healthy Cattle.” The habitat of this area includes wooded acacia savannah with open plains on flat plateaus, riverine acacia forest and rocky hills which provide a diverse habitat for browsing and grazing ungulates and predators. The conservancy was first developed in 2009 by Tarquin and Lippa Wood who are also the founders of the Mara Training Centre and the inspiration behind all the enterprises that help fund Enonkishu. The land had been Wildlife and livestock both benefit from Holistic Management in Enonkishu Conservancy. under intensive crop production and overgrazed by livestock and the forest and wildlife habitat 14% increase in productivity and land health as She had studied conservation biology and was that remained was under threat of being cleared compared to the control areas. looking for job in Kenya because she was a for more cultivation. Through various fundraising Kenyan citizen and wanted to make a larger efforts, Tarquin and Lippa and the resident Developing Management and contribution to conservation than what she could Maasai community created the Enonkishu Monitoring Protocols find in the USA. She returned to Kenya in June conservancy. They wanted to use livestock as Besides the Woods, the leadership team for 2017 to begin managing Enonkishu as she a way to improve the health of the land and the wildlife habitat. They had heard about Holistic Management from numerous sources and they reached out to the Savory Institute for help. The Savory Institute provided the initial training through Holistic Management educator Richard Hatfield. With support from WWF they managed to raise funding to train the community in Sustainable Rangeland Management on a regular basis over a two-year period. Enonkishu partners with the Mara Training Centre, which is now a Savory Hub, to help train other conservancy communities in better livestock and rangeland management using Holistic Management. There are 32 conservancy members from the local Maasai community, 12 of whom Plant density measured as percentage of quadrat covered in plants throughout the duration of the own livestock and have an agreement with biomonitoring shows higher plant densities in the grazing areas versus the control areas. 4 IN PRACTICE
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March / April 2019
