I spent my day with the elephant herds.
At dawn a horrible nippy wind came breezing in and had the cheek to stay all day. Some silly cold front coming from the south. Those South Africans always send us this stuff, but never rain. Well very seldom.
It’s a tough time for the elephant. And it’s not going to get any easier until the rains come in November. They’re eating what little green leaf matter is left and the rest is bark. And when they can still find it, the odd tuft of dry grass.
So all that weight they put on in the 4 months of summer now has to see them through till the rains. Tough times!
Some of them were lucky today to find a few Strychnos fruits but these were hard for the cows to get to. But of course the bulls barged in and took over. No change there!
I remember eating these fruits when growing up in the Kruger National Park. We had them growing in our garden. They have a hard outer shell but inside, is a sweet sticky sort of glue with large pips which you suck. Pretty good stuff. But they must be brown and ripe to be edible. Otherwise they still have strychnine in them. So I discovered many years later. I hadn’t eaten one for years and travelling through what was then Rhodesia I found some on the side of the road. But they were green. I kept them a few days and as they started to turn brown I ate them. Well that was far too early and I was violently ill.
Obviously these fruit have no affect on the elephant.
Late in the afternoon when the light was still good, luckily, the herds moved on to drink at Simbiri. I’ve been waiting for this for the last couple of years as they normally drink here only after dark.
I just love this little dam. Such a wonderful setting and sitting on the rocks filming them I’m in my own world of freedom.
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