West Africans eat Baobab leaves by the truckload
“I always wondered what the fuss was about dried baobab leaves in West Africa,” says Dr Sarah Venter. “In Southern and East Africa baobab leaves are known to be eaten but it is not very common. In West Africa however, stories abound of smuggling and theft of truckloads of baobab leaves from one country to another, one would have thought […] Continue Reading
Baobab health assessment training in Zim
Dr Sarah Venter recently trained a group of ecologists on doing tree health assessments in Zimbabwe. “We were looking at various aspects of baobab health that include the impact of elephants on baobab trees, bark harvesting and diseases. This work took us all around Zimbabwe including the Hwange National Park, where the assessment team measured over 900 baobabs” she says. […] Continue Reading
17 years of Bao fruit counts behind us
For seventeen years in a row now, we set off to our research area in the Limpopo River valley to count baobab fruit. These are from forty permanent trees in different locations that we started to monitor since April 2005. The method entails circling each tree and counting the Small – golf ball sized plus, Medium – tennis ball sized […] Continue Reading
Are all Baobabs created equal?
In August last year Dr Sarah Venter visited Ghana to see if there are any significant variations between the North-West African baobabs versus our Southern African Baobabs. “The journey took me from Accra, the capital on the Atlantic coast of West Africa about 800 km right up to the northern-most part of the country. Here Baobab trees are scattered throughout the […] Continue Reading
Kuduland’s Bao Mama gets a data check!
“I often get asked to assess large baobab trees, either for their size or their health,” says Dr Sarah Venter, founder of the Baobab Foundation. “This Greater Kuduland Reserve Baobab is one of the biggest ones I have ever measured”. With a circumference of 25 m, height of 12 m and crown diameter of 24 m this amazing Bao Mama […] Continue Reading