2018 Lemur Day Festival in Madagascar

By Marina Blanco, Ph.D., DLC-SAVA Post-Doctoral Project Coordinator

The “Lemur Day Festival” was celebrated on Halloween in the SAVA region of Madagascar this year! DLC-SAVA Conservation, along with NGOs like World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Lemur Conservation Foundation (LCF), Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), and others assisted with the organization and celebrated the day with school students in the town of Andapa. Fusiane, DLC-SAVA’s Environmental Education coordinator, with Vita Modest and Arsene, our EE collaborators, prepared a couple of activities for students to participate in. The day was full of music and interspersed with carnival, a film presentation, and other events. We proposed drawing contests and fun competitions; for example, teams had to name wildlife as quickly (and correctly) as possible. Notebooks and pencils were given as prizes, which were happily accepted as souvenirs! It was great to see so many kids come and have fun, play, and talk about lemurs — with some of them even pretending to be one!