Waxi the Hero and Fluffy, the White-winged flufftail South Africa’s rarest bird, take a curtain call at their first full house ( 65 kids and parents ) puppet show performance. The show was held at a little children’s theater at the back of a toy shop in Johannesburg. Photo Eelco Meyjes
Photo : Left to Right.Dr. Hanneline Smit-Robinson from BirdLife South Africa, holding Fluffy the White winged Flufftail ( In real life this bird is Critically Endangered with only 50 left in South Africa and 250 left in the world.) Alastair Findlay, the master puppet maker, holding Wandi the dopey and very funny Wattled crane ( In real life the Wattled Crane is listed as Critically Endangered in South Africa ) Right Eelco Meyjes, from the Rare Finch Conservation Group, holding Waxi, Africa’s smallest finch. The little Orange-breasted Waxbill now needs conservation help.All the birds in the show are wetland birds and Waxi the Hero rallies them all together to help find Fluffy. The reward for finding Fluffy is chocolate eggs and in the end the children find Fluffy so they receive the chocolate eggs.
For 2017 our target is to raise R 300,000.Every donation no matter how big or small will be greatly appreciated.The money will be used to 1 ) Finance a MSc bursary student to take our research work to a level two stage 2 ) Raise awareness for the Orange-breasted Waxbill , Africa’s smallest finch, by using the Waxi the Hero puppet show concept.Successful pilot shows were recently completed in Johannesburg.
BirdLife South Africa has invited the Rare Finch Conservation Group to participate with the puppet show at the Flufftail Festival, which will be held at the Moponya Mall in Soweto, from 30 January to 6 February 2017. In addition to this negotiations are currently taking place, with a leading non-profit environmental facility, to run the shows on a daily basis as part of a schools environmental education program. This particular facility attracts 10,000 to 12,000 children a year.
Listen to the 702 radio podcast below that was recently broadcast on what we are doing to try and help raise this substantial amount of money.
https://soundcloud.com/primediabroadcasting/eelco-meyjes-will-attempt-to-do-an-unsupported-3600-km-solo-cycle-ride-from-cape-town-to-namibia ( If need be please copy and paste on google )
If you would like to support the important conservation work that the Rare Finch Conservation Group is doing then please use the very easy to use Givengain donation facility https://www.givengain.com/cause/4593/campaigns/14722/
The small is BIG conservation project is a proud collaboration between BirdLife South Africa and the Rare Finch Conservation Group.
The Rare Finch Conservation Group is registered in South Africa as a non-profit organisation and is totally dependent on donors and sponsors to carry out its conservation work on finches
SEE – CONSERVE – ENJOY
eelcomeyjes
rarefinch
finch conservation | ornithology | aviculture 
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