ON SAFARI - DAY 2

Welcome back to the Blue Lion Blog for the next installment of my “Safari Series” which details my visit to the Ngala Safari Lodge in South Africa in July, 2013.

This entry focuses on the animals I photographed on day two of my visit. After being lucky enough to see a Verreaux’s Eagle Owl the previous afternoon, I was again lucky to see another at a distance in the dawn light. It made a nice silhouette against the rosy-fingered African dawn.  

As the sun rose, we encountered a breeding herd of giraffes. The young seemed odd to me as they obviously had yet to grow their necks to the wonderfully ridiculous length we are all used to. The second image here features a bird known as an oxpecker working to remove small insects and ticks from the hide of this adult giraffe. 

   

From one of the largest of the African animals, we drove on to discover the smallest of Africa’s carnivores – the Dwarf Mongoose. These adorable little fellas live in matriarchal colonies centered on abandoned termite mounds that they use for shelter and as lookout posts. 

This next sighting was a great thrill for me as it was my very first wild cheetah sighting of my three safaris! This female was moving from termite mound to termite mound in hopes of scanning the surrounding area for potential prey. Since it was getting later in the morning, she was not having much luck. However, it did provide the chance for her to pose for me as if she was a feline supermodel! 

  

To make the day complete, during our afternoon drive, we came across a pride of four lions – an adult lioness and her three young offspring (two females and a male) as they were stalking a herd of impala. The images of this pride show how well these tawny colored lions can be camouflaged against the winter grasses in South Africa. Despite their best efforts, the impala were able to spot them before the lions could sneak close enough to launch an attack. While the lions have a great deal of stealth, they are unsuccessful in the vast majority (approx. 80%) of their hunting attempts. 

The day concluded with a brilliant sunset and a ride back to the lodge in the dark using a bright spotlight to alter us to the presence of nocturnal animals. We were lucky to catch brief glimpses of more mongooses, some bush babies, and a small nocturnal cat called a serval. 

A delicious meal in the boma followed by local tribal singing and dancing rounded out the evening before bed called my name as the African morning comes awfully early at 5:00 am the next morning!  

On Safari!- Part 1

Earlier this month, I had the great pleasure to spend two weeks in South Africa on a dual purpose trip. The first half was spent in Johannesburg exploring my long time interest in the anthropology of early pre-humans with Professor Lee R. Berger and his team at the University of the Witwatersrand This is the group that discovered and is describing the species Australopithecus sediba.  

The Karabo Skull - Australopithecus sediba

Holding the Taung Child skull - A dream come true! 

The second half of the trip was spent on the unfenced western edge of Kruger National Park at the Ngala Safari Lodge. The five nights spent there were truly magical, and I will be sharing the images and videos of that experience here on the Blue Lion Blog.

Steenbok (Raphicerus campestris)

If you've never been on safari, your day starts early when you awakened for the morning game drive at 5:15 am.  You get dressed warmly (July in South Africa is winter) and meet your ranger & tracker for a quick cup of coffee/tea and a biscuit (cookie) before you load up the Land Cruiser by 5:45 am. You spend the next four hours tracking whatever game may be available as your ranger and tracker follow up on clues on the dirt tracks or information shared on radio by other members of the ranger team in their vehicles. 

The afternoon game drive is similar and starts at 3:00 pm. You drive for 4 hours with the last hour being in the dark as you use a red spotlight to pick up the eye reflections of nocturnal animals for observation. The daylight animals (diurnal) were not spotlighted to keep them from the temporary blindness caused by a bright light in the dark.

I arrived in the afternoon so this first post reflects an afternoon drive. Our first sighting was a welcome sight for me as it is my favorite bird in the world! It was a Lilac Breasted Roller (Coracias caudatus), which perches on visible branches to hunt for its prey of large insects and small lizards and mammals. Its stunning colors are a wonder to me as a North American, but the “LBRs” are quite common in South Africa. They are also the national bird of neighboring Botswana.



 
The second sighting was a breeding herd of Cape Buffalo (Syncerus caffer) as they gathered close to the sandy riverbed of the Timbavati River. These members of Africa’s “Big Five” (The five most dangerous animals to hunt on foot as determined by early European hunters -- Buffalo, Lion, Rhino, Leopard, and Elephant) are impressive, but have no sense of humor as they always seem to look at you as if you owe them money! I guess I’d have that disposition if I were being hunted regularly!

Another common bird resident is the Yellow Billed Hornbill (Tockus leucomelas). Like the LBRs I mentioned before, these birds have a truly exotic feel for me as a North American.



The highlight of our first game drive developed as we headed to follow up on some African Wild Dog (Lycaon pictus) tracks – I was aware that Wild Dogs were the second most endangered African carnivore after the Ethiopian Wolf, but I confess I did not have a great innate appreciation of them. However getting to see them in person changed that! Their teamwork and unique personalities were a revelation to me. Before encountering the dogs, we came across a single Spotted Hyena (Crocuta crocuta) resting under a tree.


After leaving the Hyena, we were alerted by the sound of the wild dogs in full voice about 15 minutes later and discovered they had killed an impala, but then lost it to four hyenas (including the one above). After they chased the hyenas away, they were able to savor the final scraps of their original kill. My next blog post will feature my video of this encounter.



After we left the wild dogs and headed back toward camp and dinner, we  drove in the dry Timbavati River bed for a bit and discovered the largest Owl in Africa – the Verreaux’s Eagle Owl (Bubo lacteus) in a tree above the dry river waiting on a meal to wander by.



Overall, I could not have asked for a better first game drive back in South Africa. Throughout my trip, my game ranger, Fin Lawlor and tracker Jimmy proved themselves supremely adept at finding every animal I hoped to see – given that Ngala is not fenced in, there is no certainty that you will see any particular animal as they may move back and forth to neighboring properties.