On the Expedition
Help monitor Madagascar’s mysterious predator, the fossa, and protect its fragile island habitat.
Up before the sun, you’ll experience the forests of Madagascar to reach the research areas, often hiking more than 20 kilometers a day. Throughout your expedition, you’ll rotate among a variety of tasks essential to the project’s success. You'll learn how to set fossa traps and use radio-tracking transmitters and receivers, be trained to check trap lines in the early morning and late afternoon, and help measure trapped and sedated carnivores. You’ll have a chance to spot Madagascar’s many lemur species. Midday is often free for informal lectures or hikes through the fossa's forest home. Your evenings may be spent at local village festivities or sharing stories with members of the nearby women's cooperative.
An Earthwatch Teen Team Facilitator will provide additional supervision and guidance for each Teen Team, from the rendezvous to the end of the expedition. Facilitators build good team dynamics and organize recreational and cultural activities designed for Teen Teams. Facilitators are available throughout the expedition to troubleshoot any concerns teens may have. All Facilitators have experience teaching and leading teen groups. Teen Teams may also feature volunteer tasks slightly altered or adapted to suit teen groups; please see the Teen Team Briefing for this expedition for more information.
Meals and Accommodations
You’ll stay at a tented research station with showers and toilets in Ankarafantsika National Park, Mahajanga Province, in the northwest part of Madagascar’s main island. You’ll sleep in two furnished bungalows less than half a kilometer from the nearest fossa trap. Staff cooks will prepare local fare, based on rice and beans, topped off occasionally with exquisite, locally produced chocolates.
About the Research Area
You’ll be based at Ampijoroa Research Station in Ankarafantsika, Mahajanga Province. The Station serves the 333,592-acre Ankarafantsika Protected Areas Complex, one of the last and largest tracts of dry deciduous forest in Madagascar. The area has more than 20 kilometers of well-marked trails that traverse through tall baobob trees, stands of precious woods such as palisandre, and many species of terrestrial and epiphytic orchids. Ankarafantsika boasts seven lemur species, including the acrobatic conquerel’s sifaka, the rare mongoose lemur, and the nocturnal woolly, sportive, and mouse lemurs. A variety of bird, reptile and amphibian species also inhabit the area.