Latest News Archive

Please select Category, Year, and then Month to display items
Categories
UFS News Media Release Research
Years
2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024
Months
January February March April May June July August September October November December
Previous Archive
17 January 2020 | Story Leonie Bolleurs | Photo Leonie Bolleurs
Prof Aliza le Roux and Dr Mpho Romoejane
Prof Aliza le Roux and Dr Mpho Ramoejane (camera-trap expert) at a wetland area in the Golden Gate National Park, searching for the rare white-winged flufftail.

The White-winged Flufftail, a highly endangered bird species, was spotted less than 70 km from the UFS Qwaqwa Campus, home of the Afromontane Research Unit (ARU). In collaboration with BirdLife South Africa, the ARU is conducting a study to find out if this species also made its home in the Golden Gate Highlands National Park.

This rare species has so far only been found at three sites in South Africa.


Study to benefit local community

One of the ARU’s goals is to undertake research that will benefit the local communities, including SANParks. Should it be confirmed that these rare birds are also found in the area, the status of the Golden Gate Highlands National Park in the Important Birding Area (IBA) directory is likely to increase.

Prof Aliza le Roux, Associate Professor in the Department of Zoology and Entomology on the Qwaqwa Campus of the University of the Free State (UFS) and affiliated to the ARU, is conducting the study. She is also involved in other wetland studies.

According to Prof Le Roux, it is very difficult to find the bird. In a study, Prof Le Roux, Dr Sandy-Lynn Steenhuisen (botanist in the Department of Plant Sciences), and Dr Ralph Clark (ARU Director) have been deploying song meters in a rolling grid in the wetland areas, recording all bird noises around dawn and dusk. This is a non-invasive method to record bird sounds and helps to maintain the health of wetlands.

With these song meters they are trying to create a soundscape of the wetlands, recording all the sounds of the area by changing the location of the song meters every two weeks to cover the entire 2 km-long wetland area. Soundscape ecology is a fairly new technique and could be an effective way of measuring wetland health in high-altitude settings.

“In contrast with camera traps, song meters do not need a direct line of sight to record the presence of a specific bird – it can pick up songs from 150 m away in all directions. Camera traps may, however, be useful for adding visual confirmation of any bird’s presence, which is useful for a species that has only been heard a few times. In fact, no recording of the White-winged Flufftail’s call is currently in the public domain,” says Dr Le Roux.


Collaboration with Japanese university

Using these recordings from the soundscape, the team identifies the different bird, frog, and insect sounds recorded. According to Prof Le Roux, they are fairly new to the process and she would like to learn more, specifically about the analysis of the song diversity. She is visiting researchers at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) in Japan in early December to investigate the variety of tools available to effectively analyse terabytes of acoustic data. Researchers at OIST have done similar studies on soundscapes in Okinawa along an urban gradient, and their expertise as well as access to a supercomputer could boost this research significantly.

The Qwaqwa area is on the border of the White-winged Flufftail’s expected distribution range.

“Because they and their habitat are threatened,
we are not sure if they are in the area;
and whether they may only be here to breed.”
—Prof Aliza Le Roux,
Associate Professor, UFS.


“If we find that they did make the park their home, they will be more protected, as the park is a conservation area.”


Grasslands

Prof Aliza le Roux and Dr Mpho Ramoejane (camera-trap expert) at a wetland area in the Golden Gate National Park. The wetlands often get trampled, affecting the condition of the area. Interestingly, trampling improves conditions for flufftails, as the cattle open up spaces between the reeds.

Photo: Leonie Bolleurs

News Archive

UFS breakthrough on SRC
2005-06-10

The Council of the University of the Free State (UFS) today unanimously approved the establishment of a Central Student Representative Council (CSRC)  to ensure the democratic participation of students at its three campuses in the governance of the university.

In a major breakthrough and transformation step for student governance, the Central SRC will include representatives of the main campus in Bloemfontein, the Vista campus and the Qwaqwa campus of the UFS.

The establishment of the Central SRC follows the incorporation of the Qwaqwa campus into the UFS in January 2003 and the incorporation of the Vista campus in Bloemfontein into the UFS in January 2004.

According to Dr Ezekiel Moraka, Vice-Rector: Student Affairs, today’s decision of Council is the result of a lengthy, negotiated agreement between the three campuses. Independent experts facilitated part of the process.

With the establishment of a Central SRC, the UFS has adopted a federal student governance model whereby the CSRC is the highest representative student body on matters of common concern for all students.

However, the three campuses of the UFS will retain autonomous SRC structures for each campus with powers and responsibilities for matters affecting the particular campus.

This arrangement will be reviewed after a year to make allowance for the phasing out of students at the Vista campus, as was agreed in the negotiations preceding the incorporation of that campus into the UFS.

The central SRC will have a maximum of 12 members made up of members of the campus SRCs, including the presidents of these three SRCs. In total, the main campus will have 5 representatives, the Qwaqwa campus will have 4 representatives and the Vista campus will have 3 representatives.

From these 12 members a central SRC president will be chosen on a quarterly basis to represent the general student body at Executive Management, Senate and Council.

In another key decision and significant step forward affecting student governance, the Council also approved amendments the constitution of the Student Representative Council (SRC) of the main campus.  These amendments were the results of deliberations of student organizations, the SRC and the Student Parliament of the UFS main campus.

The amendments to the constitution of the main campus SRC determines that nine of the 18 SRC members must be elected by means of proportional representation and nine on the basis of an individual, first-past-the-post election.

This decision comes in the wake of calls by certain student organizations on main campus for proportional representation to be included as a means of electing student representatives.

The following portfolios of the main campus SRC will be contested by individual candidates on the basis of first past the post:

  • president
  • secretary
  • academic affairs
  • legal and constitutional affairs
  • student development
  • arts and culture
  • men’s internal liaison
  • ladies internal liaison
  • media, marketing and liaison

The following nine portfolios will be contested by affiliated organizations on a proportional representation basis.

  • two vice-presidents
  • treasurerdialogue and associations
  • transformation
  • campus affairs and recreation
  • sport
  • international affairs
  • community service

It also is a breakthrough to have all constitutional changes processed and approved at the June meeting of the Council, with all relevant student organizations having been part of the process and accepting the outcome of the process.

According to the chairperson of the UFS Council, Judge Faan Hancke, today’s unanimous decisions on student governance are an indication of how all UFS stakeholders represented in Council are committed to finding win-win solutions in the interest of the university.

“Once again the UFS has reached another milestone in its transformation and has shown the rest of the country that we are pioneers in the field of reaching intelligent solutions to complex situations,” Judge Hancke said.

According to Dr Moraka, the central SRC constitution will come into effect from the start of the second semester this year.

 MEDIA RELEASE

Issued by: Lacea Loader
    Media Representative
    Tel:  (051) 401-2584
    Cell:  083 645 2454
     E-mail:  loaderl.stg@mail.uovs.ac.za

10 June 2005
 

We use cookies to make interactions with our websites and services easy and meaningful. To better understand how they are used, read more about the UFS cookie policy. By continuing to use this site you are giving us your consent to do this.

Accept