A family of elephants walking through the Mara River in the Mara basin in south-west Kenya. A herder recalled that in the 1990s it was impossible for his cattle to wade through any part of the river because of its depth, but that these days even goats can walk leisurely through the drying river to graze on the other side of its shores. — AFP
ILULA, Kenya: Anyone hearing the loud singing coming from Isaac Chereger's farm would be forgiven for thinking it was a particularly enthusiastic church gathering.
Instead, it was a group of women calling to order a meeting of a local religious charity that teaches villagers how to conserve the forest around their homes in this southwestern Kenya community, to help stop the Mara River from drying. For more than a decade, environmental groups have raised the alarm over the Mara River, warning that population growth, illegal logging and overuse of its waters by communities struggling through drought have caused a dramatic drop in the river's water levels.
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