Wildcast

Having left the lions on the move late yesterday, it seems they kept on trekking south all night.

When I eventually did find them this morning they were holed up right in the south east near the Goto triangle, and still not having hunted successfully.
And again they were on the move at dusk moving boldly east, still without their pride male, Nduna.

The Quelea are back in force. The flocks that started breeding about a month ago all abandoned their nests soon after the chicks hatched due to the intense predation pressure of about a thousand Lesser-Spotted Eagles.
But now the Quelea are back in even bigger numbers and seem to be nest building all over the reserve. When driving around there is not a second in time when one doesn’t have a Quelea visible. They’re just everywhere!
And maybe they’ll nest successfully this time as many of the eagles might have already started their migration north.

On my way too look for the lions I stopped to film a francolin in a tree when I heard some beast wallowing in a pan close by. Armed with my camera I found this lone buffalo wallowing. He was oblivious to my approach but just as I got to the edge of the pan he suddenly saw me and bolted. Luckily the other way.

Over the last couple of weeks, in my absence, the rains had been really good so that now the grass stands 4 to 5 ft high and even white rhino are hard to see. (So following wild dogs is going to be interesting if I do find them.)

Although looking at these impala on this anthill you wouldn’t say there had been much rain. But anthills are always the first areas to be heavily grazed by animals. Because the termites bring nutrient rich soils to the surface, the grasses on anthills tend to be that much sweeter and so more heavily grazed.