Signpost to BB community forest

The Bimbia-Bonadikombo community forest (BBCF), covering 3735 hectares, is the last remnant of lowland forest on the foothills of Mt. Cameroon that lies between the urban centres of Limbe and Douala. Forest survey carried out in this region in the 1990s by Royal Botanic Gardens (RBG) Kew shows that it is an area of high botanical conservation value. Wildlife surveys in this same period indicated that the forest area had lost all of its large mammals. However since community forest management commenced in 2002, there are signs the forest may be recovering its large mammal population. In 2005 and 2006 during patrols on one of the steeper hills in this forest, signs of the presence of large mammals were observed in the form of newly built Chimpanzee huts. However no research programme has been put together to firmly ascertain the return or not of Chimps to this forest.

Elephant River in BB community forest.

The monitoring programme that this project seeks to establish will address the Chimpanzee question, which would in turn provide leads as to the ecological health of this forest. The monitoring programme this project seeks to establish would contribute to ensuring that this forest doesn’t disappear. The project will be carried out in partnership with the Bimbia-Bonadikombo Natural Resources Management Council (BBNRMC) set up in 1998 to manage the community forest on behalf of the local community. The community forest has 9 compartments, the research team for this project will carry out ecological and socio-economic surveys of each compartment using the line transect method.

The survey will document:

i. Land use type and update farmer registration details

ii. Plant type – recording all trees above 10cm dbh along line transect

iii. Wildlife – with a focus on the compartment where Chimp signs were observed