Richard Turere, 13, doesn't like lions. In fact, he hates them. Yet this bright Maasai boy has devised an innovative solution that's helping the survival of these magnificent beasts -- by keeping them away from humans.
Living on the edge of
Nairobi National Park, in Kenya, Turere first became responsible for
herding and safeguarding his family's cattle when he was just nine. But
often, his valuable livestock would be raided by the lions roaming the
park's sweet savannah grasses, leaving him to count the losses.
"I grew up hating lions
very much," says Turere, who is from Kitengela, just south of the
capital Nairobi. "They used to come at night and feed on our cattle when
we were sleeping."
So, at the age of 11,
Turere decided it was time to find a way of protecting his family's
cows, goats and sheep from falling prey to hungry lions.
His light bulb moment came with one small observation.
"One day, when I was walking around," he says, "I discovered that the lions were scared of the moving light."
Turere realized that
lions were afraid of venturing near the farm's stockade when someone was
walking around with a flashlight. He put his young mind to work and a
few weeks later he'd come up with an innovative, simple and low-cost
system to scare the predators away.
He fitted a series of
flashing LED bulbs onto poles around the livestock enclosure, facing
outward. The lights were wired to a box with switches and to an old car
battery powered by a solar panel. They were designed to flicker on and
off intermittently, thus tricking the lions into believing that someone
was moving around carrying a flashlight.
And it worked. Since
Turere rigged up his "Lion Lights," his family has not lost any
livestock to the wild beasts, to the great delight of his father and
astonishment of his neighbors.
What's even more
impressive is that Turere devised and installed the whole system by
himself, without ever receiving any training in electronics or
engineering.
The 13-year-old's remarkable ingenuity has been recognized with an invitation to the TED 2013 conference,
being held this week in California, where he'll share the stage with
some of the world's greatest thinkers, innovators and scientists.
"I did it myself, no one
taught me, I just came up with it," says Turere. "I had to look after
my dad's cows and make sure that they were safe."
Source: bbc
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