Sparkey

Sparkey: Bull. Collared on 25 Jan 2001 in Goubounga Bai, Dzanga National Park, Central African Republic.

Goubounga Bai is one of the most beautiful places in the Dzanga-Sangha Landscape. On the sunny morning he was collared, Sparkey was drinking mineral laden water in the sparkling river running through the centre of the bai. The collaring operation went very smoothly, and from the time he was immobilised until he stood and calmly walked away was just over 30 minutes.

It is an exciting moment to see a newly collared elephant move off into the undergrowth and disappear. Where will he go, will the collar work properly, will we ever see him again, and what intimate secrets of his life will he reveal (see article for more information). As it turned out, that evening we were walking past Goubounga Bai and low and behold, there was Sparkey in exactly the same water hole in which he had been darted a few hours earlier, drinking contentedly, seemingly oblivious to his shiny new collar. This One of our worries is that the collaring in some way affects the animal or make it uncomfortable, but apparently Sparkey was none the worse for wear, and to date, 22 collars later, we have never seen ill effects of the collaring operation.

Sparkey remained in the area for just a couple of days, after which he up and left, moving southeast rapidly, crossing the international border into Congo, and then traversing the entire Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park in just three days, before settling on the edge of the vast Likouala swamps outside of t he protected areas system. Unfortunately we only received data for 9 months, so w e have no ideas whether he moved further south deep into the swamps or returned to the park. But to our excitement, gorilla researchers back at Goubounga Bai, have seen him back in the bai now and again – but minus his collar. We hope our landscape scale conservation efforts in Congo and Central African Republic will help Sparkey and elephants like him continue their long and mysterious voyages through the trees.

To see Sparkey's ranging behavior click on the following link:  Sparkey's map