Tarzan and Jane on the Outreach

Photo 1: Fig tree

Photo 2: Olivier cutting off a tree sample

Photo 3: Pressing the leaves of a Natal Mahogany

Photo 4: Bar-coding... Any ape can do it.

Photo 5: Michelle & Olivier pressing samples

Photo 6: Outreach, voorwaarts, mars!

Tarzan and Jane on the Outreach

They are the tree people. I love the tree people. Because a tree is a treasure to a dog. But those three people are only two.

They are Professor Michelle van der Bank from the University of Johannesburg and Olivier Maurin from Ferney-Voltaire in France. They also treasure trees. So much so that they are in the process of DNA bar-coding 20 000 plus species of trees in Africa.

This means that they are identifying the unique short DNA sequence used to identify species. The purpose for that is to set up a data base which custom officials can use to control the illegal trade of trees across borders. They can even identify plants (normally used for medicinal purposes) in a crushed powder form.

All DNA material is housed in a DNA bank at UJ where it is available for research around the world. Since the start of the Outreach Michelle and Olivier have added over a 100 new unique species to the data bank. They hope to at least double that before the end of the 2009 Toyota Outreach.

Another advantage of having been on the Outreach is that they managed to set up formal collaboration at Cape Maclear with Malawi Parks and Wildlife who will send two staff members next year to UJ for training in DNA bar-coding.

Finding and bar-coding trees in the wild African bush are not the easiest thing in the world. Today they worked in a sweltering 40ºC with any member of the Big Five always somewhere close by. Michelle has been challenged by black mambas, charged by buffalo and rhino. In which case she always managed to get leaves right from the top of the nearest tree for DNA bar-coding.

Today I had the privilege of helping the tree people doing a DNA bar-coding on a Natal Mahogany. They worked on the leaves, while I marked the trunk.

Merci beaucoup de m’avoir accepté dans l’equipe Outreach des “barcodeurs” des arbres d’Afrique. For those not in the know, Olivier has just empowered me with my fifth language. That means: Thanks very much to have been accepted in the Outreach Bar-coding team of the trees of Africa.

Au revoir

Buddy