Community Events

November 2009

Congratulations Lydia Willems on Winning a 2009 Eskom ETA Award

A Rocha's Western Cape Trustee Lydia Willems has won the Women in Industry ESKOM eta Award for 2009 for her innovative energy saving competition in the student halls of residence at Stellenbosch University. For background to Lydia's project, and some of her personal insights, please click here .

October 2009

Conservation and Prayer - A Natural Pair?

A Rocha South Africa's Encountering Christ in Creation Prayer Day on 17 October was attended by 19 people from 8 countries. During a walk in the Hesketh Conservancy participants' interest in the medicinal uses and conservation status of the wild flowers generated many questions, interactive learning and focused discussion about the work of A Rocha in Africa. Participants who will be returning to their home countries this December expressed interest in joining initiatives that may be underway in Zambia and Nigeria under the A Rocha banner. Find more pictures here (application/pdf, 658.7 kB, info)

Greening the Soulscape of the Post Apartheid Urban Generation

Wilderness enthusiasts who canoe down rivers, frequent botanical gardens or hike mountain trails return to wildernesses because wild places often rekindle experiences of early childhood discoveries. Similarly, adults who pick up litter, or plant water-wise gardens usually had childhood experiences of the wilderness. Some parent or teacher believed in the priceless value of creation and modelled green ethics.

In contrast, most South Africans lack wilderness experiences. More than 40% of urban municipalities fail to provide basic household services so that too many South Africans’ experience of the environment is overshadowed by daily struggles to meet basic needs. Whole generations grow up experiencing open green spaces and rivers as refuse dumps. For millions the sight of burning tyres or solid waste outdoors is all in a day’s experience of grim surroundings. The damage caused by these abuses of the environment, particularly to children’s attitudes, is a challenge Pietermaritzburg needs to address to ensure a greener, sustainable future for the next generation. Greening the soulscape of the new generation to encourage green ethics on our landscape is a priority.

A Rocha’s conservation work takes up this challenge. Planting trees in under-resourced schools like Zweliyazuza Primary, Elandskop, where four hundred learners planted forty trees, introduces children to the principles of conservation.  Community events like A Rocha’s Amagoggagogga Adventure this June gave urban children a taste of the wild. John Roff, Noluvuyo Mshumpela and Susan Viljoen facilitated a morning of walks and craft activities along the Umgeni River. Children and adults got hands-on with butterfly nets, magnifying glasses and fishing line in a fun search for creepy crawlies of all descriptions.

John Roff , environmental educationist at Hilton College, endorses A Rocha’s philosophy of education: “Knowing plants or insects’ names is not as important as discovering the amazing ways that they relate to other plants and animals around them.”  So it wasn’t surprising to see lots of activity around the facilitators of Amagoggagogga . Pre-schoolers yanked crabs while older kids caught wasps in honey jars or chipped earthworms and spiders out of rotting logs. Children’s innate curiosity directs environmental education. That’s why learning can’t be more fun than out of doors. It’s just a pity that most children locked into former township areas don’t get this opportunity to discover the wild firsthand. A Rocha is building community partnerships to pioneer environmental education in the Edendale, Imbali and Sobantu schools.

Greening Maritzburg’s Backdrop on Election Day – Allen Goddard –  A Rocha South Africa

After endless hype in this year’s general election 67 Martizburgers braved a cold start to the April 22^nd Election Day bright and early, to plant trees in the Ferncliffe Nature Reserve as part of A Rocha South Africa’s Carbon Banking project. The event included a handful of grandparents, four teachers, 30 boarders from Merchiston Primary School and seven staff members of three conservation organizations around the city. In the last two years A Rocha has donated 640 trees to the Msunduzi Municipal Conservation Division for 50 hectares of degraded areas in the 290 hectare Ferncliffe Reserve. The young trees are planted where invasive shrubs and trees like Lantana, Bugweed, Black Wattle and Guava have been cleared. Plantings take place in A Rocha’s Ultra Green Marathon each November and in once-off events like Election Day in partnership with the Ferncliffe Conservancy.   

The Ferncliffe and World’s View escarpments which rise 290 metres from their base at 850 metres above sea level are our city’s impressive green backdrop and one our least understood natural assets. This panoramic gateway to the Natal Midlands is a mixture of mistbelt grasslands and rainforests and the source of pristine streams which flow into the Duzi catchment. Ferncliffe and World’s View are included in our city’s municipal protected areas because they boast a number of rare and endangered plants and animals, including the elusive Blue Duiker and the famous Hilton Daisy. Ferncliffe is also home to 117 species of birds and 66 species of ferns.

Younger and older Maritzburgers alike get a living link with Ferncliffe by planting a tree

Conservation organizations like A Rocha and local action groups like the Ferncliffe Conservancy champion conservation work in Ferncliffe because of its magnificent range of species. But also to increase local appreciation for the role Ferncliffe plays as a natural carbon bank and climate moderator.  More than 50 species of trees replace increasing amounts of carbon dioxide which Maritzburg produces, with fresh oxygen, cooling our city in summer by mist and precipitation, and warming the climate in winter by absorbing solar rays in its distinctive green bowl. This is why Ferncliffe is the city’s closest carbon banking site, storing carbon for us at a time when global concerns about carbon mitigation are at a peak.

Some came for trees and others, for the ride.

Children need to be key partners in conservation work and environmental education in Maritzburg, to build an appreciation in a whole new generation for the priceless value of our city’s forgotten ‘green curtain’. That’s why A Rocha’s Election Day tree planting aimed to give scholars and their families an enjoyable, simple way to discover Ferncliffe for themselves and contribute to its conservation. 100 trees were planted between 8 and 9:30 am of 300 trees donated to A Rocha by Hoheisen Charitable Trust. The remaining trees will be planted by the municipal conservation division before the end of this year’s rainy season in April. A Rocha will commence tree planting again this November, after the start of the 2010 rainy season with the Ultra Green Marathon of 500 runners, cyclists, walkers and ramblers walking, running cycling or skateboarding to Ferncliffe to plant trees with a minimum of carbon emissions.

Extending the Green Footprint of Forests - a challenge for a new generation

Fourth AGM of ARZA at the Strelitzia Room in the KZN National Botanical Garden, 28 March 2009

A Rocha Friends gathered to hear Rob Scott-Shaw's presentation on the current status of KZN's Forest and Grassland biospheres. Rob presented some of the provincial consevation research of Ezemvelo-KZN Wildlife, which shows a marked decline in the extent and health of both vegetation types outside of protected areas in our province. He highlighted the need for greater economic opporunities in rural communities to protect the last fragments of grasslands and forests that remain outside of protected areas in KZN.

After refreshments, a short business meeting gave Friends of A Rocha the opportunity to hear the Director's Review of 2008 and projected Work Plan for 2009. The goals for the coming year include the appointment of A Rocha South Africa's first CEO, the establishment of a Christian Citizenship Education wing, and further expansion of A Rocha's capacity in the Western and Eastern Cape Provinces. Please find a copy of Allen Goddard's A Rocha Review of 2008 here.

Participants at the A Rocha AGM pack Doggie Boxes (unfortunately in polystyrene) to take home, for supper.

SPRING 2008 TREE PLANTING EVENTS 

A Rocha South Africa's membership trees are being planted in schools this spring. Our first tree planting day was held with 700 pupils at the Zweliyazuza Primary School on 27 August 

  54 trees and locally indigenous shrubs and aloes were planted as part of a whole school arbour day celebration

 A new garden for the principal's office was laid out, for further development in future.

Further tree planting days will be reported here soon.

July 2008 Community Events

Gardening with Climate Change Workshop - 26 July 2008

Val-Lea Vista Nursery and Kerry Hulbert Landscapers were hosted by A Rocha to put on this hands on demonstration workshop at St Matthews' Anglican Church, Hayfields. 18 Guests discovered a range of indigenous flowers, shrubs, groundcovers and trees that can be used to create formal little-England-on-the-veld type gardens, or more wildish habitat creating places, with very little water consumption. The workshop turned into a wide ranging discussion where gardeners from different walks of life with a considerable tally of experience all told, shared their own experiences about indigenous gardening.

Venison Potjie Potluck Under the Stars - 19 July 2008

Kevin Penderis hosted 8 guests to a delicious potjiekos meal in Bisley Valley Nature Reserve. A warm apple and caramel sponge pudding was the second course, topped off with hot chocolate and some really wild bushveld tales around the fire.

10 May 2008 - Dawn Chorus Day Breakfast - Cumberland Nature Reserve - Report by Allen Goddard and John Roff

At first light, we were welcomed to Cumberland by the ratchetty sounds of two Natal Francolins. John Roff and Pandora Long welcomed six children and seven adults and then interpreted dawn bird calls in the grasslands and forest and cliff edges of the Umngeni Valley gorge escarpment. John helped us focus our listening by accompanying the calls and deep silences of Cumberland with lofty tunes from a bamboo flute. We spotted scores of Whitenecked Ravens setting out from roosting sites in the valley cliffs for their day's feeding. We heard a Southern Black Tit respond to the flute, nearby, and the klip klip klip alarm calls of a handful of Blackeyed Bulbuls 

On the way to the Gorge we found mole rat holes near Impala middens. Adrian Armstrong and John speculated about why they surfaced near the middens. Gabriel Goddard spotted Selaginella moss which looked parched and dry. John showed us how it quickly absorbs water and turns green. As we waited for the transformation we listened to music like rain, from a traditional African thumb piano, the Kalimba. 

The children found a rock castle to climb near the gorge edge and we descended into grasslands near the forested cliffs. We tried to spot crocodiles from our vantage point above the river, but saw none. Then John interpreted the expanse of the Umngeni's mini canyon, stretching away towards the coast, on his flute. We saw two Trumpeter Hornbills, flying down river, and heard their "unconsolled newborn baby" like cries.

Over breakfast Pandora invited the children on a flower and grass hunt. They enjoyed collecting and sticking their treasures onto cards. She also organized nest building, from collected grass. Jo Roff showed us how to wrap fresh fruit salad into French toast, before cooking it on the skottel.

At the wetland near the entrance to Cumberland on the way home, we stopped for one last moment of solitude in this part of Creation before heading over the hill into Pietermaritzburg's Saturday traffic. Pietermaritzburg's Saturday traffic.