ASHBURTON ALOE FESTIVAl PROGRAMME 2020
Talks
A Conversation with
Dr David Johnson
'Questions about Aloes'
Aloes have a fascinating evolutionary history, and a tight relationship with birds. Parallels in other parts of the world are equally intriguing.
A Passion for Snakes
Pieter Potgieter
'Snakes Lives Matter, Too'
South African snakes are seldom welcome in our back yards, or our homes! Gain a unique insight into a snakes catchers passion.
FreeMe Rehabilitator
Kelsey O'Connor
'The early worm gets the bird'
An interesting glimpse into the parasites that affect birds, wildlife and reptiles...sparked Kelsey's interest in the world of Parasitology.
Treating Snake Bites with Vitamin C
Anne-Louise Evans
For many years Anne-Louise Evans has been researching the use of alternative medicines and has a particular interest in helping animals.
Researching the floral and fruit morphology of Scadoxus and how these traits mediate are mediated by pollinator/disperser behaviour.
'Talking about
The Worldwide Web'
Nick May
Nick May brings his insights from the world of mineralogy to talk about the idea of 'conciliation' and how we could envision a project that teaches about our 'Worldwide Web'.
David Johnson
Dr David Johnson is a renouned ornithologist and ecologist with a special interest in the evolutionary history of plants and trees and their relationships with birds and other species. David's conversation with LMVC host, Pandora Long is titled, "Questions about Aloes."
David Johnson is Welsh-born and schooled in Plymouth, UK. At the age of twenty five, he took up biology and achieved his PhD in 1978 after undertaking two years fieldwork in Nigeria.
In 1978, David emigrated to South Africa to lecture at Wits University and between 1981 and 2001 he worked as an ornithologist for the Natal Parks Board (now Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife). Currently David free-lances as an environmental consultant, public lecturer, tour guide and writer.
David is married to his best friend, Sally, and has co-authored several books with Sally, including 'Gardening with Indigenous Trees and Shrubs', now a collector's item.
Dr David Johnson can be contacted on +27 120 0477 or
email davidjohnson@amberridgekzn.co.za.
Pieter Potgieter
Pieter Potgieter is a snake catcher in the Pietermaritzburg and surrounding areas of Kwazulu-Natal. Pieter will be presenting the talk, "Snakes Lives Matter, Too."
Pieter has always had a keen interest and passion for all forms of wildlife, since a very young age growing up in rural Namibia. After many years in the corporate world, he made a conscious decision to get back into something he enjoys. He had the privilege of obtaining employment at Butterflies for Africa in Pietermaritzburg for eleven years, where he gained much knowledge on various animals, insects and plants before sadly they had to close down. Within that time, as an extra skill, he did various snake handling courses.
Sadly, a prominent snake catcher and a very good friend, Zane Barnard, passed away recently. Pieter and his wife, Cheryl, then took it upon themselves to continue assisting the community.
"Our aim is to contribute towards conservation and education."
Pieter Potgieter can be contacted on +27 71 5722 614 or bushbuddy07@bmail.com
Facebook: Snakes of Pietermaritzburg and Surrounding Areas
Kelsey O'Conner
Kelsey O’Connor is a Senior Rehabilitator at FreeMe Wildlife who is currently working towards completing her bachelor’s degree in Zoology. Kelsey will be presenting the talk 'Parasitology: The Early Worm Get's the Bird'.
Starting life with a love for animals, this progressed into
passion for sick and orphaned wildlife. Kelsey has worked at FreeMe Wildlife
for four years and has become proficient at peforming necropsies which has
sparked the interest in the various types of parasites found in mammals, birds,
and reptiles…many of which are not common knowledge.
Through this talk, Kelsey share's FreeMe's message, "At FreeMe Wildlife our goal is to not just
rehabilitate and release injured, orphaned and sick wildlife but to also share
our passion and knowledge with other permitted rehabilitation centres, veterinarians
and members of the public to further our goal in conserving our natural world."
For more information on FreeMe Wildlife, please visit their website
at www.freemekzn.co.za
or our Facebook page at www.facebook.com/KZNFreeMe
or follow them on Instagram @freemewildlife.
Anne-Louise Evans
For the last sixteen years, Anne-Louise Evans has had an interest in the use of vitamins, minerals and natural medicines for the treatment of illness and physical and emotional issues. Recently, she was able to see first-hand the efficacy of treating snake bites naturally with vitamin C.
Hannah Butler
Hannah is a PhD student in Botany at the University of Kwazulu-Natal in the Pollination Research Lab in the Centre for Functional Biodiversity, at the School of Life Sciences. Hannah shares her presentation titled, 'Butterfly and Bird Pollination in the Paintbrush Lilly'.
Hannah's special interest in flowers started from a young age and she counts herself lucky that she now gets to call it her career! Hannah's research focuses on floral and fruit morphology and the mechanisms by which these traits mediate and are mediated by pollinator and disperser behaviour. This is based on plant reproductive characters as well as breeding systems and assesses the evolutionary consequences this has on plant-pollinator and disperser interactions and ultimately reproductive output. Hannah's primary focus in on the African Amaryllidaeceae. Thus far she has worked on breeding systems in the genus Cyrtanthus. For her PhD in botany, supervised by Professor Stephen D Johnson, Hannah is exploring the pollination, breeding and seed dispersal systems of select species in the sister genera Scadoxus and Haemanthus.
Hannah is passionate about bringing her knowledge and enthusiasm to undergraduates and others who will listen and is looking forward to pursuing a career in academia. She is currently a post-graduate representative for the School of Life Sciences and the current curator of the pollination lab's blog. Hannah is also reigning School of Life Sciences best brownie baker (until someone is brave enough to take up the challenge!)
Hannah can be contacted on 215048231@stu.ukzn.ac.za
https://pollinationresearch.wordpress.com/
Nick May
Nick talks about 'conciliation', the ability to put all knowledge together into a form of 'world map' that explains how 'the world works'. To do this we need to approach education in an interdisciplinary way, combining the sciences into one project and that links to the social sciences as well.
Only in this way will be able to understand the way everything is connected, how we are impacting on Earth systems and to act on the knowledge that each one of us has a finite amount of resources that we can utilize and that each one of us is responsible for at least 4 acres of land (1.6 hectares) of land that needs to be conserved for eco-agriculture, biodiversity or fresh water resources.
We need to stop pointing fingers and blaming others and come up with a plan to fix our Earth. This will require choices regarding what we consume and what we put back, how our money is made and invested as well as rethinking the nature of corporate entities, so that we can balance our lifestyles and production and bring about ecological sustainability.
Nick May is originally from Devonshire and Somerset Farming areas in South West England (often referred to as "The West Country"). Nick was around eleven when his family moved to South Africa and he spent his childhood living in the bush and growing up picking up fossils, crystals and minerals.
Nick says that his keen interest in mineralogy began when he was around six when he started mining the school walls and dug all the crystals out, for which he was in big trouble.
Over the past thirty years mineralogy has kept him very busy going to places all over the world including, Madagascar, Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Congo. Besides looking at rocks, the beautiful formations, nature, the people and situation are all facets of learning about these places that Nick developed.
Nick established his company, TopRock Gemstones & Minerals when he was twenty-one and over the last thirty years has lived in many places including Midrand, Pretoria, Hermanus, Pheonix Arizona and Madgascar. When asked how he settled in the Lower Mpushini Valley, Nick says that in his travels he is always looking for beautiful places and ended up here because it is both natural and beautiful. Nick takes up the story: “The Valley is as natural as it’s supposed to be, which is a very rare thing now days, but that hasn’t come easily. We are continuously fighting development, poaching, pollution, quarries, more quarries, more trucks, more litter, more pollution, it doesn’t ever stop.”
“Actually the Conciliation that I am talking about is putting the known knowledge together into one manual, and that by understanding 'how the world works' we will be able to start understanding the impact that each one of us is having and make choices that lead to an ecologically sustainable Earth.
Contact Nick on 082 569 5338 or email nick@toprocks.com
The Lower Mpushini Valley Conservancy would like to thank our speakers for their contribution towards raising funds for anti-poaching and conservation.