It’s every early-career conservationist’s dream to meet the great minds, movers and shakers in the conservation world. Not long ago, I was honored to meet the authority of the African mammals.  His famous for his book “A Field Guide to African Mammals”. Yes you guessed right, I am talking about Jonathan Kingdon. Jonathan was at ITFC (with his wife, Laura) visiting Doug and Miriam during the Easter weekend.

Following years of experience working in Africa, Jonathan has amassed an amazing knowledge on African mammals and their habitats (the tropical rainforests). Jonathan’s knowledge spans from being able to tell the sex of the smallest forest antelope to the health condition of the smallest squirrel.  It’s so amazing how much he knows about almost of everything. For example, not only did he correct my wrongly identified camera trap images for rats, mice, shrews and squirrels, he also showed me how camera trap images can be used to tell the sex, health condition, age, etc. of several forest animals. These were camera trap images from our TEAM terrestrial vertebrate monitoring activity.  My interaction with him was like being in a biology class room, lots of information! Unfortunately, his visit last for only two days.