20 Sept 09- Pete's Pond Part 2

I left off with the vervets last time and I am going to start with them now as well.

Vervet monkeys are one of the first things we were warned about as far as wildlife is concerned, because they are curious and check into everything and are also clever and can open doors and so on.

Something had one of the vervet at the pond VERY curious!

We suspected that it might be a nest, but we didn't find out for sure. Whatever it was, a pair of birds did NOT like him getting anywhere near!

It was incredible to watch the two small birds puffing themselves up and chasing off the monkey for fifteen or twenty minutes.

The birds won.


We saw a mongoose over in that area too, but he didn't go over by where the monkey was fighting the birds.

We got a very good sight of a jackal. We had seen them before, but never quite so well as at the pond.

We saw a water monitor on one of the game drives at Mashatu, but I never actually SAW the thing- our tracker Aaron had to take pictures for me because I couldn't see it. At the pond I actually took the pictures myself...

Wildebeest made an appearance at the waterhole, though unfortunately for me, only on the side of the pond with a somewhat restricted view. Not being one to care if I can only get part of a shot in frame, I took pictures anyway.

Glad I did too-

Those are the only shots I have of wildebeest sparring, and they came out fairly well, considering.

And then I come to what is for some reason one of my favorite animals: Warthogs!


I never was aware of any particular fondness for warthogs, although I mustadmit to a fondness for any food item from pigs... But upon seeing the warthogs, I just thought they were very cool. Sort of living tanks with tusks!

I am not yet done with my Pete's Pond Pictures- next time: Birds.