A little bit of Murphy’s Law with my research, please

Back where it belongs!

Kayaking through the lost world, deep-sea fishing, and learning how to increase the amount of carrion available, all took a backseat to the real problem this research trip: we lost the car keys.

I say ‘we’ loosely here, because it was one of my volunteers that misplaced the keys, but my fault for not keeping a closer eye on them. 

Once we got back from our hike and crossed the river, we realized we didn’t have the keys. My volunteers decide to go back and check on the other side of the beach. But after they were gone for about 2 hours, I knew that they must have gone back up to the viewpoints (a 3 hour round-trip hike). These boys did not have shoes, water, or any form of communication with me. Can you tell I was nervous? When they finally appear kayaking in the sunset, I was ecstatic! But we were still up the creek without a paddle….

We had to walk back about two hours in the dark to the accommodation on the reserve. We see one car. After much excitement, the gentleman in the car says he can’t give us a lift. It is only 3 km.

Ok, now how do we get the spare keys to us? We can mail them, but there are no safe places for the keys to stay overnight. Hmm, anyone want to drive down for a mini holiday? One of the technicians in the Botany department decided to jump on this opportunity. As he is driving past our house at the reserve, I get a phone call from the other side of the river. THEY FOUND THE KEYS! 

Imagine telling the technician, who just drove 4 hours that we found the keys! A worker picking up trash on the beach found the keys, and a woman at the campsite recognized the university logo and phoned my supervisor, because everyone in the world knows my supervisor! The next day we pick up the keys from her, giving the man who found them a small reward. Turns out she worked for two years on vultures with the man who used to collect data on this colony! A great contact is made. 

 And although the problems did not end there, every time I see the colony, those troubles disappear. Imaging observing about 100 birds circling in a thermal while another 100 are incubating eggs. May they continue to watch over everything, as well as reporting any missing keys.

Cape Vulture Gyps coprotheres