spirit of the sahara - naturepl.com deeper and more tragic story to tell. fennec foxes are still...
TRANSCRIPT
Images and words by Bruno D’Amicis / naturepl.com
Spirit of the Sahara:My Quest for a Fox
Fennecs are the world’s smallest fox species, living in the world’s largest desert. They are extremely elusive, and their desert habitat is very difficult to explore. Dozens of sto-ries are told by nomadic populations to des-cribe the legendary cunning of this little fox and its ability to literally vanish among the dunes, even when chased by very fast Slou-ghi hounds (north African hunting dogs). Seeing a fennec fox in the wild was a dream from my childhood that took me 25 years to fulfil. I knew it was ambitious to try and pho-tograph them, but I could never have anti-cipated that these tiny, adorable foxes had a much deeper and more tragic story to tell.
Fennec foxes are still very abundant, with a range that covers almost all of north Afri-ca and the Sahara, from Morocco through to Egypt, as far south as northern Niger, and into the Arabian Desert, as far east as Kuwait. They are perfectly adapted to life in the harshest desert environments. Their nocturnal habits help them deal with the searing heat of the desert and they can live
without ever drinking water, sourcing fluid from their food instead. Their distinctive, batlike ears radiate body heat and help keep the foxes cool while their paws are covered in thick fur, which allows them to walk on the hottest sand. With their long claws they can dig burrows to take shelter from the heat during the day, or to escape predators in a matter of minutes.
The minute fennec weighs up to 1.5 kg as an adult and is only as big as your shoe. The long and fluffy tail accounts for nearly 60 per cent of the 30 - 40 cm body length. But the fennec’s most distinctive feature is surely its incredibly large, radar-shaped ears. Massive in proportion to the skull, the 15cm long pinnae are the largest ears in the animal kingdom, relative to body size.As well as dissipating body heat, the huge ears afford fennec foxes a highly developed sense of hearing, essential for locating their prey. In the silence of the desert, they can hear small mammals burrowing under the sand and even a beetle walking on the dunes. Just imagine how hard it is for a human to approach unnoticed! Fennecs can hear the click of a camera shutter from 150m away, so to say that such an animal is extremely diffi-cult to photograph is a giant understatement!
A beetle walks across the faint tracks left by a fennec during the night. The survival of the diminutive foxes is largely de-pendent on the presence and density of invertebrates and other prey species. Their sen-sitive hearing allows them to detect the footsteps of beetles even in the pitch black of the Saharan night.
Fennec foxes can hear the click of a camera shutter from 150 metres away!
The Sahara can be a very unforgiving envi-ronment. The scorching heat of summer days contrasts with the freezing tempera-tures in winter. Scorpions and venomous snakes move at night on the dunes and wind is a constant threat. In just a few hours, a gentle breeze can develop into a fierce gale that blows sand in every direction. During sandstorms, which can be very frequent in spring, fennecs shelter in their burrows and do not move around. And such conditions meant I could not even take my camera out in the open if I didn’t want to damage it. This proved to be a serious logis-tical problem for me while living in the de-sert environment. In fact, I first approached
[Above] The hut I worked from was no more than 12 square met-res, with a rusty metal door and a window. Yet it afforded me, my as-sistants and equipment with pro-tection from sandstorms, as well as constant access to freshwater.
the fennec range on a horse-led cart and carrying a traditional wool-woven nomad tent. It worked well until the first sandstorm. In a few minutes sand was everywhere, and on everything! My assistants and I couldn’t even keep our eyes open! We had to call a 4WD car for rescue and this took hours to arrive. Frustrated, we looked for a different solution. Luck assisted us when we found a small concrete hut in a remote corner of the Great Eastern Erg in southern Tunisia. Built to offer cover to the keeper of a voltaic well, where semi-domestic camels were taken to quench their thirst, I was able to shelter there and finally plan a longer presence in the field, searching for fennecs.
[Left] Sun filtering through sand during a severe sandstorm.
[Below] The Sahara is not an easy place to travel in a vehicle. My car would get stuck in the sand while driving across the dunes.
The unique biodiversity of the Sahara is fa-cing a tremendous crisis due to unmanaged hunting and habitat destruction. In compa-rison to other ecosystems, the endangered fauna and flora of the desert doesn’t seem to make the news or draw much attention.
[Left] Desert monitor (Varanus griseus) mo-ving across sand dunes in the Sahara. Active during the day, desert monitors range over large distances, usually between 5-6km, re-turning to their burrow before sunset.
[Top Left] A Rhim or Slender-horned gazelle (Gazella leptoceros loderi) on sand dunes, Great Erg Oriental, Tunisia. This endangered species has suffered through habitat loss and warfare. It is hunted for meat and its horns are sold as ornaments.
[Above] A brown-necked raven (Corvus ruficollis) sits atop a dune in the early mor-ning. Dawn in the Sahara is magical, and I was often greeted with scenes like this when I set out each day to look for fennecs.
Early every morning, I searched for the tracks left by fennec foxes. The faint pug marks are easily erased by the first gust of wind, so I couldn’t waste any time. I hoped to find a track that would eventually lead to a fennec burrow. It was the famous needle in a haystack, easier said than done.Over many days, we followed tracks that wandered for kilometres. Some led us to trash cans, camel dung or latrines. Others looped back on themselves, taking us back to our hut, where we’d left some food remains. More often, they would linger around rodent holes or bird nests. It was very frustrating. But luck finally smiled on us and we found a track that led us straight to our first den site.
It took me three weeks to find the first den. One spring evening, a female emerged from her burrow and nursed her young pups, something that has maybe never been pho-tographed before. I can’t describe my exci-tement. If seeing a fennec fox was my child-hood dream, observing a whole family and the adorable pups at play was surely the best reward for all the intense effort.
I knew how lucky I was to find my little “holy grail” and I was determined to protect the site, by keeping it a closely guarded secret. I was extremely careful to avoid leading other people or predators to the den with my tracks and approached the site always in the middle of the day, when the foxes were asleep, so that I wouldn’t disturb them.Despite this great breakthrough, capturing
fennec behaviour on camera proved to be super hard. The secrecy of the adult female and the unpredictable weather afforded me just a handful of successful sessions with the foxes from all the many attempts I made. One time, a sandstorm kept me inside for 10 days, and when I was finally able to emerge, I discovered that the fennecs had moved their den and I had to track them again.
Although you can sometimes see fennec foxes resting and playing on the warm sand during the day, they are primarily noctur-nal animals. They have good night vision, but perceive their dark environment mostly through a highly developed sense of smell and, above all, hearing. With the ability to filter sounds through many centimetres of sand, fennecs dig for small rodents, lizards, birds, eggs, and insects. They also feed on fruit, leaves and roots, which provide nearly all of their liquid intake.Despite being social animals, fennecs prefer to hunt alone and may roam large distances to locate their prey in the dark silence of the Sahara.
Fennec foxes can navigate the desert at night much more easily than people can! To pho-tograph their nocturnal habits, I had to use camera trap set-ups, equipped with strobe lights. It took me weeks just to figure out the foxes’ routines and choose the right spots to place my equipment, but the results were hugely rewarding. The fox above took a self-portrait when it crossed the invisible infrared beam of a camera trap placed along a trail I discovered through the desert dunes. The image on the left was taken next to an
invertebrate burrow in the desert, at the border between Tunisia and Algeria. After several nights of leaving the camera trap in place, a fox eventually tripped the infrared beam. I later discovered that only one of the two strobes had fired, because gerbils had gnawed the cables connecting the second one! Together with political unrest, sand storms and poachers, this was just one of the many challenges I faced while working with the extremely elusive fennec, in one of the planet’s most unrelenting environments.
Vixens give birth only once each year, usual-ly to a relatively small litter of 2-4 pups. The pups are born blind and helpless, and the mother attends them continuously for the first two weeks. At four weeks, the pups be-gin to play within the den, and at five weeks, play extends to the area just outside the den entrance.
At the age of two months, fennec pups can already be seen digging in the sand for prey. Although fully weaned at about 60-70 days, fennec offspring require parental care for a much longer period. They are not fully inde-pendent until they reach 6-9 months of age.
Little is known about predator - prey relation-ships in fennecs. They are thought to be preyed upon by monitor lizards [left], eagle owls [below] and jackals. Meanwhile, they are known to catch and feed on vipers [right]
[Above and Right] These pups near the en-trance of their den were only a few months old. At this age, the pups are especially vulne-rable to predators. Their sand-coloured fur helps them blend in with their environment, and their burrows are designed for quick escape, often connecting to extensive tunnel systems with multiple exits. Adult fennecs dig their burrows in concealed corners of the desert, in the firm sand underneath bushes. The roots of the plants help hold the sand together and provide additional support for the tunnel walls. Although it is unclear which animals prey on fennecs, their greatest enemy is undoubtedly humans. Being such an adaptable and intel-ligent animal, I was surprised by the wari-ness they showed, even in the remote parts of the desert, far away from people and sett-lements. They seemed not to tolerate human presence. I was about to discover why.
We only have anecdotal information about the biology and behaviour of fennecs, and most of that comes from scientific research carried out on captive foxes. Despite knowing so little about them, the fennec’s charismatic cuteness makes it a Saharan icon - as well as a favorite victim of the illegal pet trade across its whole range. It is also threatened by habi-
[Above] Fennecs get their name from the Arabic word fanak, meaning ‘fox’, written here alongside fennec tracks in the sand.
[Left] A cartoon fennec fox known as ‘Labib’ was created under the regime of Ben Ali as a symbol for nature protection in Tunisia.
[Below] Considered a lucky charm, the tail of a fennec fox hangs from a Tunisian car’s mirror. The fur is prized by the people of north Africa.
tat destruction (such as the burning of shrubs to make charcoal, reducing the root systems fennecs need to dig their burrows), as well as poaching. Fennec fur is prized by the people of the Sahara - and the foxes are sometimes hunted and trapped by desert communities that consider them pests, though they rarely pose a threat to people or domestic animals.
[Top of page] An adult fennec fox peers over a sand dune. Fennecs are elusive, fast, and wary of humans, making them extremely difficult to track.
Fennecs are somehow cursed by their own cuteness. Across their whole range in nor-thern Africa, these animals get caught or trapped, be be sold as pets for as little as $70, or used as tourist attractions. Beside the unacceptable conditions in which these cap-tive foxes are very often kept (underfed and neglected), they do not belong in an urban environment. It is desperately sad to think of an animal with such sensitive hearing being placed into a busy market, full of people, ani-mals, motorcycles and cars.
On the last day of my very first trip to Tuni-sia, I was approached by a boy who tried to sell me a fennec pup (see p.1). His worn-out slippers and ragged appearance made me immediately aware of the difficult conditions he was living in. After talking to the boy, I discovered that he’d caught the pup himself, by digging it out of its burrow in the desert. He was completely unaware of the harm he had caused to the pup. I firmly refused his offer and tried instead to make the boy aware of the serious consequences of his act.
I photographed this fennec, named ‘Sultan’, in the market of Douz, a desert town in Tuni-sia. He was kept on a leash and offered up as a photo opportunity for tourists, who were asked to either pay for taking their pictures, or buy something from the shop. Although Sultan was caught in the wild as a pup, the owners of the shop told tourists that he was ‘domestic’.
Difficult socio-economic conditions, lack of education, and the turbulent political situa-tion in the Sahara region (particularly fol-lowing the recent Arab Spring uprisings), have increased the illegal trade in fennec foxes and other Saharan species.Sometimes, traders or naïve tourists who have purchased a fennec fox pup try to smuggle them across borders. If the pups are discovered, they are confiscated and of-ten euthanized. A few still make it across to reach the black market and are sold as exotic pets in Europe, Asia and North America.By covering not only the natural history
This wild-caught pup was dug out of its den, along with its siblings. A young man and a camel driver (above) were showing the pups off at a camel trekking site, where they hoped to sell them or at least get paid for pictures.
of fennec foxes but also the threats to their conservation, I wanted to bring peoples’ at-tention to this unique species and the chal-lenging human environment that makes wildlife conservation in the Sahara such a difficult task. The political situation meant that I frequent-ly encountered roadblocks and was subjected to regular police checks on my camera equip-ment. For me, photojournalism is above all about documenting reality and raising awa-reness. As disturbing as they might be, I hope my images will make people aware of the ongoing crisis affecting Saharan wildlife.
The tail of a fennec fox dangles from the neck of a dromedary camel in Tunisia. The tails are used as good luck charms.
Where there was once law enforcement against environmental crimes in many north African countries, they are all too often over-looked in today’s political landscape. Unrest and extreme poverty have blocked all envi-ronmental policies and education. Other rare Saharan species such as gazelles and houbara bustards are also suffering as a result. If crucial measures aren’t taken soon, including education of desert villagers, the fragile and truly unique fauna of the Saha-ra - especially in Tunisia, Algeria and Lybia, might be lost. Tourists must also share in this responsibility, by not paying to pose with fennec pups, or to watch a snake charmer, for instance.
This fennec was captured as an adult, and kept in a busy Tunisian market (souk). For an animal whose senses are finely tuned to the silence of the desert, the chaos of an urban environment is torture. The animal showed clear signs of distress. It had patches of fur missing and spent most of its time hiding behind carpets and other items. It died a few days after these pictures were taken.
In a small village in the Tunisian Sahara, I came across this fennec that had been kept for a year on a leash, tied to a wheel hub in a small sheep pen. With barely any room to move, it was too weak to walk by itself, but it often tried to burrow into the sand floor, both to escape people and the animals sharing the pen with it. I found out that it had been caught in the wild as a pup by some desert nomads and then given to a kid, who kept
it illegally. Although the young owner truly loved his pet, the animal was very stressed and underfed.I photographed it on two separate occasions and only for very brief periods of time, so as to not to add more stress to its situation. I resolutely refused to pay a fee to take these pictures and thereby support this practice and I pleaded with the owner to release it, explaining the cruelty of keeping fennecs as
pets. I asked him to at least provide it with a longer leash and take it outside for walks sometimes. Even though I knew that the ani-mal had spent too much time in captivity and had little chance of surviving in the wild, I was relieved when I heard some time later that the owner had released it. Nobody has seen it since and I like to think that it found its way back to its natural habitat, however remote that possibility may seem.
I wish I never had to witness the sad situa-tions of captive fennecs, and was instead left to treasure the precious moments I had wat-ching them among the silent and ephemeral dunes, but I firmly believe their story is one worth telling in its entirety.We desperately need to raise awareness about the future of Saharan nature and I believe that there is no better ambassador for it than the amazing fennec fox.
Buno D’Amicis has a background in animal ecology and specialises in photographing wild animals in their natural habitat. He worked exten-sively in southern Tuni-
sia to document the natural history of the fennec fox, as well as the threats they face through trade and exploitation. ‘The image of a fennec I found in a book when I was just a boy shaped my future,’ he says, ‘I promised myself that one day I would search for that special fox among the dunes of the Sahara.’
