Hippo Fence Project

The La Jolla Golden Triangle Rotary Club is providing financial assistance to The Widow's Association of M'fangango Island (located in the Kenya portion of Lake Victoria) to build a fence to keep Hippos an livestock out of their vegetable gardens.  The gardens were established with the assistance of Dean Cummings (from the Newport/Priest River Rotary Club) who set up a pump station for watering of the gardens.  When Steve Brown visited the island, the widows advised that with Deans watering system the gardens were thriving but the hippos were coming in from the lake and eating their vegetables. The gardens provide the primary source of food for the widows and their children.

A Hippo Fence is composed of a hand dug trough in from of the fence posts and wire with brush placed in the fence wires. Since hippos don't jump, the trough creates an initial barrier and with the fence structure immediately behind the trough, the hippos will forage elsewhere for food.  The picture at the bottom is a sample of a Hippo Fence at another location.  The trough in front of it needs to be cleaned out.

This project has been funded in part with a $1,000 grant from the Cottonwood Foundation, with the balance of the funds from the La Jolla Golden Triangle Rotary Club and a generous couple who indicated they always wanted to help build a Hippo Fence.  The total project cost is estimated to be $2,000 with the labor donated.

 

 

   

Sample Hippo Fence Near Lake Victoria

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Last updated 08/01/2010