Morning Drive 9/17

Friday, 9/18:

It was a beautiful morning:

Jeanetta was away, so Mark joined us for the Ivory Drive. Even though he is a volunteer who has only been at Mashatu for a few months, he clearly had enthusiasm for the elephants of Mashatu, answered all our questions, and enjoyed all the other sightings along the way just as much as we did. Mark had originally wanted to show us Agatha, a collared female who is the matriarch of one of the Mashatu herds, but she was not to be found.  Here, Mark was trying to track the collar's signal...but evidently Agatha was between or behind some hills, and well hidden:

We did, however, find Hestelle's herd...She is a beautiful big elephant who leads a good-sized family herd, and often walks behind them as they move from place to place is if to make sure no-one is left behind. Her second-in-command is Gemma, who will probably become the matriarch of the herd when Stella has passed on.

Elvis got us very close to the elephants as they moved along, just an amazing experience! He explained that following the herd or driving into the midst of a field where a herd is resting can be intrusive, and is a very bad idea. Instead, he carefully moved to a place where the elephants seemed to be heading. The elephants could see us there, sitting quietly and no danger to them, and Hestelle made the choice to allow the herd to come quite close to us.

At one point, part of the herd was under a big tree. There were baboons up in the tree, tossing down edible fruit or seeds to the elephants and impalas below. One three-year-old youngster was so interested in mock-charging the impalas and eating that he didn't notice when the herd slowly moved off without him.

Elvis said quietly, “Someone is going to be very unhappy soon...” and he was right. In about ten minutes, the youngster suddenly realized that Mom was gone,

and he took off screaming and running as fast as he could, heading toward some rumbling that even we could hear. Very soon, he caught up with the herd, and placed himself right in the middle, where he felt safe and secure again.

Another highlight of the morning drive was finding a handsome young leopard lying comfortably on a low branch of a Mashatu tree.

We watched for a while, and suddenly Elvis looked off to our left and quietly said, “Here comes trouble.” A big male baboon was across the clearing , making threatening noises and looking directly at the leopard, who watched him calmly. The baboon strutted across to the tree, climbing a long branch leaning on the trunk halfway to the branch where the leopard was resting, and made some very loud calls and several threatening gestures.

Elvis said that leopards have been known to kill and eat baboons (usually females and/or young) and that baboons don't want them anywhere in baboon territory. He said that the big baboon was calling in reinforcements, and that with their very long canine teeth and sharp claws, baboons could kill a leopard. He felt that this young leopard was experienced enough to handle the situation, though. 

When other male baboons began to show up, the leopard slowly and calmly moved out of the tree and walked off to some brush about a hundred yards away that looked like a very defendable position. The bushes were so thick there that the baboons couldn't get to the leopard, who seemed to know exactly where he was going. The baboons seemed to accept his strategy, and eventually wandered away. Amazing to watch!  The original baboon seemed a little cross about the whole thing, but finally gave up and followed the others away:

We also saw a lot of kudu, both females and males,

a gorgeous lilac-breasted roller, a saddle-billed stork, natal francolins,  a pair of bat-eared foxes,

a pair of African hawk eagles circling high in the sky, a pair of Wahlberg's Eagles who apparently nest in the same area every year and and weren't terribly happy to have us too close to their territory. We also saw a pair of hyenas. Elvis told us that a good way to tell mals and female hyenas apart is the waistline, which is much more slender in the males.

Back at Main Camp, Susan and I got some good pictures of a rock monitor  looking for lunch right below the windows in our room.

17 Sept 09

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