There was no chance of us going out last night and so I spent more time in the field during the day yesterday and all day today.
I was out in the rain yesterday morning searching for Manyari, but somehow they managed to give me the slip. I had stopped to check for her signal when to the west of the airstrip the baboons were barking frantically. They had to be shouting at either a lion or leopard.
I drove off road to get to them. Big mistake and I was soon stuck. Not too happy with myself I decided to leave the vehicle and follow up on foot to see what all the commotion was about. They all appeared to be staring into one of the many dongas/gullies in the area. A little nervously I patrolled the dongas with no sign of any tracks in the freshly rained on sand. But just as I came out the top of a donga I was suddenly faced by a lioness. She had been lying down feeding on a baby baboon she’d killed. I wasn’t too alarmed to see her and was amazingly calm about the whole situation. I watched her a while, looked around for any others and then decided to walk casually towards her. Her nerve broke and she took off.
Thankfully it didn’t take me long to get unstuck and on the road again.
It rained all night and at dawn a gentle drizzle was still falling. I woke the girls and by the time we’d got going the rain had stopped.
The air was beautifully fresh and cool and the animals remained their elusive selves in this cloudy cool weather. All over the sandy roads the red velvet mites had come out to seek mates and forage before heading back underground to await the next rains.
The impala were loving the new flush of grass that was now just starting to peak through. I was amazed though to find the very young lambs, not even a week old, had already mastered the art of allogrooming. That is grooming each other for mutual benefit. Did they learn this from their parents or was it instinctive?
We had to keep to the roads all over the property as any off road travel would surely have us stuck.
Down on the Chiredzi we surprised this Black Rhino bull as he lay up in a wallow. In typical black rhino behaviour, he took off a short distance, spun round to challenge his opponent, us, charged briefly and then took off into the underground. Exhilarating stuff!
Recent Comments