Wildcast

Un-forecast rains arrived before dawn and kept on coming and coming until midday, which gave time to catch up with things at camp.

Then I was lucky to pick up the wild dogs close to the Binya road resting up in Mopanie woodland.
The alpha male was on his own, which didn’t seem too strange at first. But when I saw Sash shadowing the alpha female and with a big scar on his neck I realised he had taken on the position as the new alpha male! There must have been quite a skirmish between the 2 males as both have scars on their necks and faces.

But the old alpha male, Punk (he’s the only wild dog to have a ridge of hair standing up on his back), stayed in their vicinity and would slowly approach the new couple but a whimper from Sash had him backing off.
I have always presumed Sash to be a male from the litter of 20 months ago. So it’s interesting that he could have ousted Punk who is a heavily built strong dog. Makes one wonder if the alpha female didn’t have something to do with it.
Over the last few months Sash has been very attentive towards the alpha female, whenever Punk has let him close. But on occasion Punk has put Sash in his place.
That has now changed and Sash rules.

The pack are generally looking to be in good condition and it’s now hard to tell the pups apart from the adults. It’s so great to see last year’s pups successfully making it in the real wild dog world.

One-eye has bad limp with an injury to his front left leg. And Toffee too is limping but only slightly.
Still a head count on the pack only turned up 20 dogs. One missing. I still think it’s Whisky but I’m not a hundred percent sure.

It was fairly tough going following the dogs on the hunt and then when they chased the impala down towards the Chiredzi River I had no chance. The grass in there is 6ft tall. So how the dogs hunt in that stuff is a miracle.