ARC is fortunate to partner with numerous professionals who have dedicated their careers to researching and protecting Tanzania’s diverse flora and fauna (in case you missed it, be sure to check out our Incredibly Unique Animals posts that explore the endemic animals of Tanzania). Every Tuesday for the next eight weeks, this blog series will take you behind the scenes to give you a candid portrayal of the lives of a diverse group of conservationists – you’ll learn about their current research, favorite species, and what inspires them to do their work. To kick things off, we introduce you to Dr. Katarzyna Nowak.

Dr. Katarzyna Nowak been conducting field studies on primates and elephants in tropical forests for a decade. She studied red colobus monkeys in unprotected coral rag and mangrove forests on Zanzibar Island as part of her doctorate research in Biological Anthropology at the University of Cambridge. She currently divides her time between serving as Co-Director of the Udzungwa Elephant Project in Tanzania and lecturing in the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department at Princeton University.

Did you always know you wanted to be a conservation biologist? What has your journey been like becoming one?
Since a very early age, I have had an awe and respect for non-human animals. My aunt is a veterinarian and I have vivid memories of visiting her practice, which was nearby to where I lived. I grew up in Poland where my childhood companions were a big white mountain dog and an energetic pointer. I was determined to become a vet. When the time came to choose between a pre-vet and animal behavior program of study, I felt adventurous enough to choose the latter. It was at Bucknell University where I first observed Hamadryas baboons, ring-tailed lemurs, and squirrel monkeys (in captivity) and had hopes of one day seeing primates in the wild. And then I spent a semester abroad in Tanzania – and I did just that. I wrote my independent project on the leafy diet of the island endemic Zanzibar red colobus. I went back to Zanzibar several years later to conduct a longer-term study on the behavioral flexibility of these monkeys, which eat charcoal, groom cows, climb mangrove prop roots, travel along sandy beaches and browse the leaves of spiny cycads! It was one of the most exciting and rewarding times of my life.

What research are you currently working on?
After my doctorate, and a short stint on Bioko Island, Equatorial Guinea, I went to the Udzungwa Mountains of Tanzania to see the Udzungwa red colobus, the sister species of the Zanzibar red colobus. I wanted to do a comparative study of the two species. Around this time, elephant visits into farms and signs of them at the national park edges were becoming more frequent and conspicuous. A study on elephants, their population and movements, was needed so I “jumped taxa” and have spent the last 2+ years counting dung and working on mitigating conflict between farmers and the elephants which eat and trample their crops. Our team is currently working out the relationship between elephant crop raids and loss of landscape connectivity. That is, if elephant movement is confined, are they more likely to linger in and raid farms? Can we mitigate conflict in the long-term if we restore critical corridors?

What is the longest time you’ve spent researching one species?
Well, my interest in red colobus has never ceased and it’s been over 10 years since I first studied them.

What has been your favorite research site(s) you’ve worked on?
Uzi Island, a small island south of Zanzibar Island, is a very special place. It is where I habituated and studied three groups of mangrove-dwelling red colobus monkeys. Following them through this habitat was a unique experience as together we navigated mud, sand, prop roots and water. I’ll never forget standing chest-deep in the Indian Ocean with the open water on one side and red colobus eating mangrove leaves in fringe mangroves on the other. How many primatologists have observed monkeys while swimming?

If you could tell people one thing about species extinction, what would it be?
We are by no means divorced from nature. On the contrary. And we have learned, and continue to learn, so much about ourselves through our observations of other species. We must unite to secure the future of other species to maintain this connectedness and to ensure a biodiverse, functional, and more interesting world.

What inspires you to do this kind of work?
The moments of utter inner peace I feel when walking in a forest or the exuberance I sense when reaching the top of a peak with 360-degree views – with the knowledge that there are wild creatures all around me.

When not in the field what do you enjoy doing in your free time?
I always have an extended movie marathon when not in the field as I’m very passionate about cinema. One of the best places I’ve seen a film was the Old Fort in Stone Town during the Zanzibar Film Festival; the film was a fantastic short called Black Sushi about a Japanese man teaching a South African man, whose comrades are pushing him into a life of crime, the art of making sushi. If I could raise the funds (I hope to apply to Sundance!), I’d restore the old cinema in Iringa Town, Tanzania!

What websites or blogs do you frequently visit?
I try to minimize my computer screen time, so I don’t. I’m not on Facebook, for example, as I maintain that there are other ways of staying in touch with people and networking. Face-to-face is my preferred mode of contact, and I hate feeling as if I’m elsewhere (even virtually) when I’m someplace catching up with people I have not seen for a while.

What was the last book you read?
I tend to read two books at once, and these currently are Beast and Man by philosopher Mary Midgley and Elephant Days and Nights by Indian elephant biologist Raman Sukumar.

What is currently playing on your iPod?
Staff Benda Bilili. Their music would make anyone dance.

Learn more about Katarzyna’s work with the Udzungwa Elephant Project

Browse Katarzyna’s publications