June: School Program, Edible Ants

Research assistant Alex helping pupils in our Importance of Trees and Forests school program

Dear All,

Welcome back, and I hope this finds your July off to a good start. June has been a lively month for fieldwork here in Imvepi. We continue to hold weekly community meetings to share research findings in refugee and host villages across the settlement, and we keep up with weeding and managing our 3-acre agroforestry experimental sites, which are flourishing thanks to recent rains.

White Ants

Speaking of rains let me begin with the ants. White ants (termites) are a local delicacy this time of year, when rains flood their anthills and they emerge at night to look for food. Last year I described the harvesting process, but just to refresh: 1) between 11pm-1pm folks congregate around anthills with flashlights or grass set on fire, 2) they hold the light source over a shallow pit dug next to the anthill, and 3) ants fly towards the light and fall in the pit, where they are scooped into a bucket and brought home for processing. The ants are wildly popular and either sold raw, toasted into a salty snack, or mashed and cooked with onions and spices into a cake called "ombagulu" in Lugbara (think meatloaf). They are also wildly nutritious! One cup of ants has 13g of protein, 9.5g of fat, and tons of beneficial minerals and fiber.

Anthill with pit, sorting ants, and vigorously rubbing them to remove the wings

Last week we were visiting one of our field trial sites and found the landowner's wife with a giant pot of ants collected the previous night, picking off their wings and bits of mud. I got involved while Alex and Robilert went and did some garden work. When we were preparing to leave later in the evening, the landowner's daughter presented us with a big bag of dry roasted, salted ants. We were really hungry and started munching on the ants right away. Wow, they were delicious! We split them three ways, and I even shared some with my neighbors here at basecamp who made ombagulu.

Sorting ants, my neighbors sampling Ombagulu

School Program

This month we started a new project: a pilot school curriculum focused on the importance of trees and forests with refugee and host pupils (here they use the British "pupils" instead of students, as I have been corrected many times!) in one of Imvepi's primary schools. Last year's research revealed a drop-off in plant knowledge between older participants and younger participants, especially among refugees. One factor, among many, is formal school attendance, with children and youth spending less time in the bush with their parents or grandparents collecting firewood or herding cattle. Since school attendance is vital for many reasons, our intention is to bring local ecological knowledge into the school setting to encourage knowledge transmission, but also to sensitize the next generation of refugees and hosts on the importance of sustainable forest use and tree conservation.

Torit Primary School in Imvepi

We began by meeting with the headmaster, deputy headmaster, and science teachers at Torit Primary School in Imvepi's Zone 2. They were enthusiastic and supportive from the beginning, and identified 30 refugee and host pupils to participate across three grade levels (I believe the equivalent of 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade in the US). We also are engaging two community plant experts in the program: David, a host landowner and former school teacher, and Lilly, a refugee agroforestry facilitator. We convened a meeting with the pupils' parents to explain the purpose of the program and gain consent for their child to participate.

Together with the teachers and community experts we developed a four session curriculum focused on the importance of trees and plants, emphasizing forest foods, medicines, and fibers:

• Day One: After an introduction and lecture, we handed out last year's photo cards depicting tree benefits to small groups, encouraging pupils to identify their preferred card and share back with the class.

  
  

Pupils selecting their preferred tree benefits and sharing with the class. We left the photo cards with the science instructor (at right) so he can reuse them with other classes

• Day Two: The focus was food and medicine, with Lilly and David speaking about their own use of plant/tree foods and medicines. David and Lilly were so interactive with the pupils, encouraging them to holler out plant uses or names in Kakwa (refugees) or Lugbara (hosts). We gave pupils stickers to place on their favorite foods and medicines. The favorite food by far: edible ants, considered a forest food because anthills are typically under trees. Then we distributed small workbooks we designed for pupils to record important medicines, foods, and fibers, and sketch pictures.

  
  

Community expert David speaking to the class, students selecting favorite medicinal plants, and writing about them in their workbooks

• Days 3 and 4: Coming in the next blog!

We provide a snack at the end of the session (5pm), when students are hungry and tired after the long school day, and take a few minutes to debrief with the instructors. The program has been wonderful so far. Students seem to be having fun and are well-engaged with the speakers and the activities. Even the school instructors are enjoying it and say it is a great refresher on plants they had forgotten about. Robilert, Alex and I are also having a lot of fun. The three of us are all smiles after Wednesday afternoon school programs as we ride our motorcycle back home.

Lilly speaking to pupils, favorite foods (see the anthill upper left!) and the headmaster learning plant names with David

A pupil writes about the importance of shea trees ("kumuro"):

• It is a source of food

• Their seeds are used to make oil

• It is a source of medicine

• It provides shade

• It makes soil fertile when the leaves fall down

That is all from me today! Looking forward to sharing more soon.

In the meantime, please stay well.

Sarah