Pleistocene Park August 2021 Update (Patreon)

Dear Friends

I think it is time to make a new update about what is happening in the Pleistocene Park this summer.

Will start with the update on how the animals we brought this spring are doing, then go to infrastructure and then for desert will update you on our current expedition. So for those who doesn’t want to read a lot, just scroll downJ

Recently introduced animals in the Park

Both goats and camels seem to do good so far. In the summer big problem for animals are mosquitoes which are super annoying and sometime can even cause animal death. In case of our new animals problem was that shortly after we released animals from the containers, they lost all their fur, and for couple of weeks were totally bold (such things happen when we bring animals from the region with very hot summers. Normally following year, animals do not do such mistakesJ ). Over the course of June and first part of July animals mostly hanged out around the basecamp where we have a colony of martlets. Those birds are preying on mosquitoes and there is less of them around the basecamp. In addition we decided to treat animals with anti-mosquitoes repellent. Which in my experience works so-so but still better than nothing. Anyway worst mosquitoes period animals passed well.

Goats in my opinion are supposed to be the main weed eater which consume all sort of non-palatable plants, allowing grasses to take over. At least so far, my plan is not too successful. Goats are roaming along the fence in the oldest fenced area. They have the same route which they take every day and they are eating the grass along this route. Since animals are new and just adapting to the new place I do not put much pressure on them at the moment. When they will start reproducing we will already test different areas for them. Camels do not seem like the most migrating animals also. We keep them in 100 hectare fenced area. Originally we also had cows on this territory, but about a month ago we moved cows into the biggest fenced area to leave untouched pastures for some new animals coming later this autumn (more info on that below). From the very start camels showed correct (from my point of view) food strategies. They browsed on tall willow shrub. Even though they are still young they are quiet tall and they reached upper branches of willow shrub. All of them showed quiet good appetite and now the canopy cover of shrubs around basecamp is much less dense. In the beggining camels did not like wet places and hanged out in the drier areas which never get flooded. However in the last few weeks they changed their behavior. I think willow leaves are less tasty than they used to be in the middle of the summer, and camels are now grazing along the shores of our partially drained lake where there is very good grasses growing and they hang out in the rather muddy and wet areas most of the day. Doesn’t seem like they have much problem with that. Anyway now there is less mosquietoes, forage is abundant and they need to fill their humps with fat.  Also just a general remark camels are such an awesome animals. First of all they are the only animals in the park which come close to people and they like when you scratch their neck and pet them. They have a new fur growing, and touching it, I think they will not have much troubles dealing with cold. Anyway, both camels and goats will be under strong supervision this winter and they will have shelters and sufficient extra forage.

Update on infrastructure and winter preparations.

Firstly our biggest deal this year is the construction/improvement of our biggest fence. This fence was built in 2005-2006 and is consisting of metal net we bought from Canada, for big game animals. It is 1.5 meter tall, and it is connected to wooden logs installed into the permafrost with distance between logs of 10 meters. In the following year we improved this fence a bit by adding a metal wire above the net (not to let animals jump over the fence) and also digged one more log into the ground in between of logs installed into the permafrost. Over the years, some of the logs rot and broke and some got pushed out of the permafrost (this is a permafrost phenomenon). Mostly fence is still good, but it doesn’t guarantee to keep animals in or out. Our improvement plan is to add one more log between already existing logs, with all of them installed down to 2.2 meters into the permafrost and add second layer of net. This time net is going to be 2.5 meter tall. This according to our experience should be plenty to keep even biggest animals inside. We already bought 20,000 meters of net and it is already packed into two 40-feet containers and is now on the big ship going to Cherskii along the Arctic Ocean. Expecting it to arrive in September. Simultaneously we have a team working on installation of poles for the fence. This part is taking longer than I anticipated. We have all the logs prepared and delivered along the fence but creation of wells in the permafrost to 2.2 meter depth is taking longer than we expected. In the beginning of the summer we were doing around 10 poles a day only, while expected to do 40-50.  So the end of the reconstruction will likely be moved to next year.

On this map with green, is shown our biggest fence from 2006; with orange, part of the fence which we already installed all new logs; and with yellow, part where we plan to install new poles before the beginning of the winter. After that we will connected second layer of net along entire big fence and in the next year we will add remaining poles to it.

Our second activity this year is the operation of mulcher in the park. We are planning to work on the old shrublands and tussocks. This endeavor also take longer than we expect. And mulcher was finally put together and transported to the Park only 2 days ago. In the next few days we will start working with it. Probably be able to tell more in the end of the season.

And of course big deal and investement for us every year, is the transportation of extra forage to the Park to make sure animals are good in the winter. It consists of two part. First one is the transportation of hay along the Kolyma river. Right now the barge with sufficient supply is already packed and ready to depart from Seimchan. However there is a minor issue. The summer is dry and water level in the Kolyma is low, so the barge is stuck in Seimchan. They are waiting either for rains, or for water dams upper stream to flush the water. So far both events seem to be not very likely. There is still time, but if situation will not change “minor issue” may become a “big issue”. 

Second part of the “forage security” is transportation of oats and concentrated forage to the Park from Archangelsk along the Arctic Ocean. Here situation is better. We already have 15 tons going with net, and another 30 are going to depart in the next few days-week.

New Animals

I think I already mentioned in the previous updates that we had a plan to bring more bison to the Pleistocene Park. In the beginning of the year we had some ideas to bring European bison (wisents) from France, but then I decided to cancel or postpone the plan to following year. Too complicated and unreliable to get them in. Instead I decided to settle to the animals which we brought earlier – American bison from Denmark. Those are considered as farm animals according to Russian laws – unlike European bison who is considered to be endangered and it is much more simple to get permissions. Plus bison in the park showed that they are really good fit. This winter they stayed entirely on their own (no supplements from us in any way) and in the spring two calves were born.

Main difference of 2021 expedition is the route. Instead of driving trucks through entire Russia we decided to use alternative route. But will start from the beginning.

In the spring I contacted Niels Ove from the Ditlevsdal Bison Farm in Denmark. Who confirmed he could sell me the bison. Then we got permission from the veterinary services of Russia  to import bison. In the middle of June bison were put on the quarantine. At the same time near Moscow we bought a 40-feet container and prepared it for the animal transport. Originally I had a plan to go with the bison myself. But closer to the point of expedition, I realized that it will take too long and there is too much going on on the station and in the Park for me to be in this expedition. So I asked Yaroslav to go into this expedition. For those who doesn’t know, Yaroslav is the guy from Novosibirsk, who been on the goat/camel expedition with me earlier this year. Anyway me and him met in Novosibirsk in the middle of July and flew to Moscow. Rented a big truck, took my dads car, loaded the container and drove to the Russian border near Smolensk. 

There arrived bison from Niels. We hired the same truck company as last time to take bison from Denmark to Russia. They have a big experience and in my opinion more or less fair prices.  Close to the border there is a specialized farm where we planned to move animals from one truck to another. There was one problem-  in 2019 bison from Denmark came in a truck where they were separated into 3 rooms (4 bison each) and this time we prepared in our container 3 rooms expecting to release bison from each separate room in European truck to separate room in our truck. But from Denmark animals arrived in one stack, so in order to fit animals into separate rooms as we wanted we had to separate them somehow. Truck drivers, and all people working in the farm did not express desire to walk into the truck to separate 12 wild animals. So me and Yaroslav took two sheets of plywood and used it as a portable fence/shield for releasing animals in the groups of 4. We had partial success. Finally animals appeared in our container separated intro groups of 3, 4 and 5. We decided to leave it like that, since it is too much of a risk to try to take one bison from one room to another. All animals were under 1 year old and even in the room where we had 5 animals it is not too dense.

After loading finished. We sat on the truck and drove past Moscow to the north, until we reached sea port of Archangelsk in the White Sea. Road trip took us 3 days including loading at the border. There we unloaded container with bison in one logistics company base. Got them supply of hay and concentrated forage. 

Originally we expected the bison to be put on the ship on July 30, but there was some delays with ships in the seaport and finally animals spent more than two weeks waiting to be loaded. At this point I left Yaroslav alone and flew back home. And continued to take care of animals, and waiting for the ship. Finally on August 14th, bison were taken to the Port and loaded on the ship. In addition was loaded supply of forage enough for roughly 20 days. And on August 15 ship left the port. 

Since that moment there was only one time Yaroslav had cell connection on the way and he reported that everything is good and bison are doing well. I am following location of the ship through the app “ship info”, checking windy.com for the map of winds/storms on the ocean plus checking where are the floating ice on the ocean right now. At the moment ship (name STK-1026) is anchored by the island past the Cheluskin cape, which is the most northern point of the Eurasia, and I think they are waiting for wind to setlle. They covered around 60% of the distance and we hope to see animals arriving around early September. For us it is a new way of animal transport, and we are of course very worried how well the animals will do. Overall if not for the delays in the port, ocean trip is faster than the truck, and several times cheaper. So if this route will work out, we might use it frequently in the future. If you will subscribe to our Instagram of Facebook accounts, you can get more frequent updates of the bison expedition (but updates here are more detailed).

Future plans and summary

There is still a slight chance that we might have musk ox this year. World largest diamond company Alrosa is considering to support us, and if they will consider quick there might be an expedition to catch 25 musk ox in the north west of Yakutia. It is a very complicated and expensive expedition and we would never afford it ourselves. But the problem that time is running really fast and afraid we might not have enough time to arrange the expedition this season. Starting September in the place where animals are planned to be catched start serious fogs, and helicopters might not fly because of the weather conditions.

And just a general note in the end. In 2020 was a horrible year. Of what we planned nothing really worked out, everything got cancelled and best that year would be just not to do anything. In 2021 situation is better. So far everything we are planning is happening, and I think this year is the year we developed the Park the most. But somehow it is all takes much longer, take more efforts than we expected and cost more money than planned. Pretty much all the activities I am describing is such a pain:) I am not making any big plans for 2022 right now, since I think we will have to recover (at least financially) from all the activities which are happening right now. But if musk ox will indeed arrive, then I think we will start to prepare for the next step of park development – construction of the fence around our entire territory (144km2) and getting this place filled with animals and establishment of grazing ecosystem.

Thanks to all of you for your support. All those things would not happen without your help. Or at least my reports would be much shorter.

Best regards

Nikita