Saola Tracks #6: CEPF Grant, Welcome Brooke, Farewell Do Tuoc
Dear friends of Saola,
The Saola Foundation for Annamite Mountains Conservation is preparing to launch one of the most intensive and important searches of our time for a wild animal – for the last Saolas in the Annamite forests of Lao PDR. Toward this end, we are delighted to announce that we will be the recipient of a $237,000 grant from the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund (https://www.cepf.net/). In their recent call for proposals, focused on the Indochina region, CEPF received 96 pre-proposal Letters of Interest. Of these, only 16 projects, including the Saola Foundation’s, were selected for final consideration. We are deeply grateful to CEPF for their faith in us, and in Saola conservation.
We will use the funds to prepare the technical tools and methods (such as rapid DNA field test kits) for the Saola search. CEPF is generously contributing nearly their maximum cap for a single grant ($250,000), and we are seeking an additional $130,000 in co-funding to complete preparations for the cutting edge Saola search. Please contact us if you or your organization would like to be involved in this epic endeavor.
We recently shared CEPF’s good news with the Lao government, via a Covid-era Zoom meeting with the acting Director General of the Lao Department of Forestry, Mr Bounphone Sengthong, and his senior staff. Mr. Sengthong expressed enthusiasm for the project, and pledged the Department of Forestry’s partnership and support.
What are the various tools we will apply to the search, and how will we use them to find Saola so that the species can be saved? The topic was covered earlier this month in a webinar by the Saola Foundation’s technical team of Rob Timmins and Olay Phommachanh. If you missed their fascinating and inspirational program, you can watch a recording of it here
Welcome to a new member of the Saola Foundation team
The Saola Foundation’s two initial priorities are to help raise the financial resources needed to save Saola through the IUCN One Plan Approach, and to apply some of these resources to the first essential step of finding Saola in the wild. Toward this first objective, we are delighted to announce the addition of Brooke Truesdale to the Saola Foundation’s Advisory Council. Brooke is a development and fund-raising professional based in San Diego, California, who, as she says, is “equally passionate about wildlife conservation and philanthropy”. She is Director of Development for the Reef Check Foundation, is a Certified Fundraising Executive (CFRE), sits on the board of the San Diego Chapter of the Association of Fundraising Professionals, and formerly worked on raising major gifts for the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, for more than 150 conservation projects around the world.
This is a significant moment for Saola conservation: Brooke is the first development professional to apply her talent to help recruit the substantial resources needed to save Saola from extinction. We are thrilled, and hope you will join us in welcoming her to the Saola Foundation team. And please do answer the phone if she calls… (-;
Farewell to a friend
Even as we welcome Brooke, we must say goodbye to a key player in the remarkable Saola story, the Vietnamese mammologist Dr. Do Tuoc, who recently passed away. Do Tuoc was part of the team that made the scientific discovery of Saola in 1992 in Vietnam – in fact it was Do Tuoc who found the first Saola skulls and horns in a remote village, and recognized them as something new. The Saola Foundation’s Technical Director, Rob Timmins, knew Do Tuoc well, and shares this reminiscence of him:
Do Tuoc was someone after my own heart, in his love of natural history, and in particular large mammals. I only once had the opportunity to spend time in the field with him (in central Vietnam in 1998), but every trip I made to Vietnam afterwards, at least while Tuoc’s health was good, we’d spend time together. He was a genuinely nice person all around, and we’d talk about his recent surveys, what he’d found, and we’d look over the specimens he’d collected. We were both very interested in muntjacs, and almost every field trip he made he’d come back with some really interesting samples. He was unfailingly generous with his information and help.
Tuoc was short in stature, wore glasses (often taped together!), but was very tough and loved going to the field (he always dressed in field clothes – whether in the forest or not!). He was a very genuine person, and his motivation was clear – a simple joy of being in nature. Rain or shine, however long and tough the journey, he’d be smiling. He also loved being with local people, talking with them about animals, and joking with them (usually over plenty of rice wine…). Tuoc was very generous, didn’t aspire to be rich, and gave much to the local communities he worked with.
Tuoc’s deep love of nature and his generous spirit are, I believe, what made him the most interesting and knowledgeable Vietnamese mammologist of his generation. His contributions were many, and many will deeply miss him, including me. –Rob Timmins, June 2021
Finally, we are deeply grateful to all of our donors and supporters, and in particular to the following for their recent, significant donations:
Beauval Nature ($12,000)
Eleanor Briggs ($1000)
Kristine Karnos ($2500)
Maue Kay Foundation ($2500)
Zoo Boise ($5000)