Week 4 - Hluhluwe Camp

This week has been more of the same – trying to find the dogs and looking out for other opportunistic sightings of species of interest.  We had a treat on Wednesday evening when we came across a female and adolescent cheetah – probably the same pair we’ve been seeing over the last 4 days.  They caused of bit of a traffic jam on the road, but we waited for all the other vehicles to leave and were able to see them attempt to hunt a young zebra – amazing, but we don’t know if they got the kill or not as the chase moved into the bush out of sight.  I have also taken on a personal pet project – a poo identification book.  Sometimes the only way you know an animal has been in the area is because of the poo they leave, and each animal has a different shape, size, color and consistency.  So…what better way to pull it all together than with a poo book – who knows, maybe I’ll be able to publish it J.

Our monitor, Marumo, left on Thursday for her 10 days off.  She and I had so much fun and laughed a lot together, it was sad to see her go and she will be dearly missed L.  On Friday we had an afternoon braie with the iMfolozi camp volunteers – it was nice to see Angela again (my roommate for the first 2 weeks) and find out how camp life is like in the south side of the park.  I found out that my schedule has changed slightly and I will be at Hluhluwe camp until August 3^rd and then I leave on the 4^th to drive to iMfolozi camp until August 12^th.  After that I head to Tembe, Mkuze and then finish off my time at Thanda.

Saturday was the annual park bike race event to raise money for wild dog and black rhino research.  We were supposed to assist in manning a table for wild dogs, but apparently they didn’t need us and we spent a lovely afternoon with folks from other parks in the area.  We watched the bike racers come in (the guy I bet on won J), watched a rugby game (Go Sharks!), drank beer, ate great food, danced and had an overall fun time with lots of laughter.  One of the guys I met is the ecologist at Mkuze, so it will be cool to work with him more once I get to that park in a few weeks.  We also had a great sighting of an uncollared wild dog pack – they were only ¼ mile from the race area and walked right down the road for all the event visitors to see, what a great opportunity for people donating to wild dog research to actually see the critter they are there to support.  It was an overall great success for the conservation of these 2 endangered species.

We did find out that 4 wild dogs from iMfolozi got out of the park boundary fence and 2 of them have found their way back into the park on the Hluhluwe side.  We spent Sunday afternoon trying to find them so staff can know which 2 are still outside of the park.  We found their collar signal, but wasn’t able to get a sighting on them.  We have also had some interesting elephant encounters this week in the camp area.  The camp is surrounded by a fence with electric lines to keep elephants out, however one section of the fence went down for a couple of days and in that window of time 4 bull elephants made their way into camp!  One of them apparently knows how to turn on the water spigot where we wash the vehicles.  It was wicked cool to watch him use the tip of his trunk to perform such a delicate task – now if they only knew how to turn off the water when they are done with it J.  We kept our distance while he made his way around camp, munching on the various trees, and eventually park staff was able to maneuver him out of the camp.  You never know what will happen in the bush!

Love to you all and talk to you again next week (nagidsm@gmail.com)! 

Adolescent cheetah seen nearby - it was chirping for its mom when we saw it.

We had a ton of giraffe sightings this week - one of the better looking of them :-).

Birds were everywhere these last 2 weeks.  This is a spectacled weaver - so colorful and curious.

Baby zebra - I love the fuzz on his back.

Three of the four dogs in the uncollared wild dog pack seen near the bike race event site.  

They came right up to the road, trotted down it for a bit and then laid down under the shade of a tree for the afternoon.

Bull elephant that made it's way into camp when the electric fence went down for a brief period of time.  Notice he is using his trunk to turn on the water spigot so he can drink.

Drinking water from the water spigot.

Munching on branches from a tree near our vehicle.  We couldn't leave camp for about an hour until he decided to move out of camp.  Luckily, the electric fence was able to be repaired this same afternoon so our camp is now elephant-free.

Week 3 - Hluhuwe Camp

Three new volunteers arrived last Monday, Allyse (21, Texas), Annemiek (19, Netherlands) and Claire (20, France).  Twice this week we got to have a treat by going on foot out into the bush to search for cheetah scented trees.  We were of course accompanied by an armed ranger.  We did this in the location where we previously saw the cheetah cub from week 1 and in the place we saw 2 subadult cheetahs hunting this week – they didn’t catch their prey, but it was really amazing to see them running across the hill in pursuit of a red duiker.  We found no scented trees in the area of the cub sighting, but we did have to avoid an elephant.  We also didn’t find any scented trees in the area of the 2 hunters, but we did see cheetah tracks and trees that would be suitable for them, which we GPSed so we can come back and install a game camera on.  I also had a lot of fun trying to identify the different poo we came across – I think I’m going to make a poo ID book when I get home J.

The Crossroads wild dog pack has been regularly sighted in one particular area for most of the week, but we’ve also heard a lot of hyena calling in the same area and hope the dogs don’t get into any fights with them.  We were able to find all 7 of them last Thursday night and they played in the light of our headlights for a bit before disappearing into the darkness again.  We were also able to find a signal for the other pack, Reno and Panda, but we haven’t been able to spot them yet.  Many of the large herds of elephant seem to have moved to another part of the park.  However, I have seen a few new animals this week including the black-backed jackal (too fast to get a picture), grey duiker, purple-crested turaco, crowned lapwing, brown-headed and giant kingfishers, white stork, black-bellied bustard and a LEOPARD!  I have now seen all of the big 5 in the north end of this park J.

There aren’t many other people in camp, so it’s pretty quiet in the evening, but we had a braie last night and had a good time with the other group of researchers and park staff.  I did find out that I’ll be at this camp until the 29^th and then I go to the camp in the south side of the park (iMfolozi) for 1 week, then back to Hluhluwe for 1 week before leaving this park altogether – at least that is the tentative plan.  I was also able to meet with Simon last Tuesday and came up with a plan for the GIS work – I’m very excited to begin that aspect and really feel like I’m contributing to the project goals.  I’ve already created 2 maps for a leopard study publication and will be working to clean-up their data spreadsheets so they can be spatially displayed on GIS.  There appears to be a lot of data at each camp that needs organized and standardized so it can be used properly on ArcMap.  Lucky for them I am the queen of organization J.  The camp manager I’m working with now is very excited to see a finished product, so that motivates me even more to know that they are really happy I’m here to help.

Thanks to those of you sending me emails – I love hearing from you.  I have been able to get the USB modem to work consistently at camp, so I am able to check email every night before bed.  It’s been wonderful hearing from you and I hope you continue to check in J.

Love and hugs to you all!

Bush treking in the area of the cheetah cub sighting - had such a good time but it was hard walking with lots of rocks, thorny trees and uneven ground.

Ranger, Joseph, and guide, Sabelo, walked with us to look for cheetah scented trees in the area where we saw the 2 subadult cheetah hunting.

Two subadult cheetah hunting on a hill near our camp site.  It was amazing to watch them stalk and run after the red duiker, even though they didn't kill it.

If you look closely in the middle of the picture, you can just make out the spotted rear end of the leopard we saw.  It walked across the road in front of us, but by the time we caught up to it it already disappeared in the thick brush.

Black-shouldered kite - as the sun was coming up one morning we saw this one finishing off a mouse it had just captured.

Black-bellied bustard - a rare sighting of a typically elusive ground bird.

Video of the wild dogs playing in the light of our headlights one night.

Week 2 - Hluhluwe Camp

This week has been better than last week.  I got to talk to Eric from the internet café in town on Monday, so at least every Monday I get to call home when we go to town to go grocery shopping.  The girls and I had a really fun day that day.  After shopping we went to the hotel in the park to have dinner with our monitor, Marumo.  The meal was fantastic and the hotel staff was so fun – dancing and singing.  Marumo even joined in and taught us a local dance back at camp.  It was fun to just chillax (as Angela would say) with the girls and let loose a bit.  The next morning was very cool with amazing sightings of the wild dog pack we are tracking and seeing an adult cheetah walking and resting – warthogs were so close to the cheetah we were hoping for a kill, but it seemed more interested in sleeping J.  The rest of the week was more of the usual and some cool bird sightings – lilac-breasted roller, African harrier hawk, white-backed vultures, red-billed hornbills and a couple of new critters – hyena and kudu (this pic is for you Erin J) - sorry Steve, I have yet to see any kind of reptile.  There was one bad thing that happened at the park this week – 3 white rhinos were poached and the horns taken.  We were able to locate the location of the rhinos, but we never saw them – just smelled the decay and saw the vultures circling overhead.

Friday we had a day off and went to the town of St. Lucia, which is right on the Indian Ocean.  Had a great time visiting a local craft market, taking a 2 hour boat ride on the Mhkuze River, eating locally grown mussels for lunch and then checking out the beach for a bit.  On the boat ride we saw hippos, crocodiles, vervet monkeys and loads of birds.  The yellow sand beach was beautiful and the Indian Ocean has Caribbean blue water.  The ocean was actually pretty warm considering this is the winter season – the Mozambique current flows close and keeps the temperature warmer than other parts of the ocean.  Then…I was putting my feet in the ocean and my phone was in my pants pocket, as I turned around to walk out of the surf, a big wave came and splashed me before I could get back up the beach and got my phone wet!  Argh……my luck with electronics is just not very good these days.  So, back to town today to try to figure out how to get a new phone and USB modem for my laptop.

We’ve also had some fun social stuff with the other researchers here at camp.  Saturday night the Spanish researchers made everyone arroz con pollo and sangria – so delicious, but made it a little hard to get up at 5am the next day J.  Also, on Sunday night we pulled our meat together and had a BBQ (called a ‘brie’ here) – also a really fun time and good way to say goodbye to the girls.  Sarah, Marion and Anglea left this morning.  I get to stay in Hluhluwe for 2 more weeks to get all the data setup on my laptop so I can start my GIS work and then I move to the next camp at the end of the month.  Unfortunately, the next camp is not as nice as this one (power and water are limited) and I won’t get to keep up with the Olympics, so I’d love to hear from y’all about how the good ole U S of A is doing.

Love you all and talk to you again next Monday!


Adult male cheetah laying in the grass near the road.

 He got up and walked around a bit, marking the grass with urine.

 Hippos seen in the Mhkuze River when we went to St. Lucia on Friday.

Spotted hyena seen one morning - we hear them all the time calling during the night.

Adult female kudu - they don't like to have their picture taken so they are always far away from us and usually running away.

 Adult male nyala - these ungulates are EVERYWHERE.  We've seen more nyala than impala.

 Lilac-breasted roller - one of my favorite African birds.

 African wild dogs - this is the main pack we track every day.  There are 7 of them in the pack and 2 that have collars.  You can see the collar on the one on the left - his name is Bala.

 Sunrise over the hills of Hluhlue-iMfolozi Game Preserve.

 Me on the beach of the Indian Ocean.

 The elusive and rare black rhino - they are endangered here and are protected by armed rangers that patrol the park on foot daily.

Week 1 - Pictures

Some pics to go with the post below...

Female elephant not very happy with us being close to her baby.

Giraffe

Cape buffalo

Wild dogs (found them using telemetry) 

Cheetah cub seen on Friday night 

Week 1

This has been a pretty hard week – mentally and physically.  Physically, I’m pretty jet lagged and it took a bit of time to get used to the schedule and try to work in back exercises – I guess I really am getting old.  Mentally, I’m terribly homesick and am having communication issues, which isn’t helping put my mind at ease, but I was able to make a phone call to Eric today in town.  Here is a little bit of what has been going on during this first week.

I arrived in Richards Bay on July 2^nd at 7:45am.  There were 2 other people waiting with me until 2:00pm when we got picked up to be driven to the camp.  There were a few stops along the way and we picked up a few more people – everyone was divided up into small groups and taken to different camps.  I was taken to Hluhluwe Camp (pronounced ‘shlushlue’) with 3 other girls for the first 2 weeks – Angela (from New Zealand, age 27), Sara (from London, age 19) and Marion (from France, age 22).  Sara seems to have taken a shine to me and I seem to have taken on the role as “mother” – she even asked me to pluck a tick off of her since she was too grossed out by it J.  They are really sweet girls and make me laugh.  The “camp” is a research station, so its setup more like a dorm area with rooms for 2 and a communal kitchen and bathrooms (similar to Archbold in south Florida) – with plenty of hot water!

A typical day involves waking up at 4:30am so we can be out of camp by 5am to telemetry track the wild dog packs (the main focus of this camp).  We usually get back to camp around 10-11am to have lunch and do some administrative stuff (ID photos, enter data, inventory, etc.).  Then we leave camp at 3pm to track the dogs again, arriving back at camp between 6 and 7pm to have dinner and go to bed by 9ish.  If I don’t go to bed by 9:30pm at the latest, then I have a wicked hard time getting up in the morning – y’all know I’m not a morning person :-).

In the beginning of the week we were able to spot 2 dogs from one pack and then on Saturday we finally found all 7 dogs from the second pack we’ve been tracking.  We’ve also seen loads of other critters (as Sara would say) while trying to get a signal and find the dogs.  Lots of encounters with elephants, some of them pretty close and a little scary, but overall very cool!  We also saw a cheetah cub on Friday evening J!  It ran out in the road in front of us – just as surprised by us as we were by it – and then ducked into the grass and started chirping for its mom.  She never did show up, but it stopped chirping and we assumed it probably found her.  We’ve also seen white rhinos, zebra, giraffe, buffalo, nyala, kudu, impala and lots of different birds. 

I’m waiting for the researcher to get back from Spain to explain what he wants me to do with GIS, but in the meantime it’s been fun to see all the animals and work with the telemetry.  Although it’s beautiful and amazing here, I really miss home.  I hope everyone is doing well.  I can receive/send emails on my cell phone daily from camp pretty easily, but the connection is really bad here so I can’t really use the internet that well except when I go to town once a week.  If you want to send me a quick email for a personal response that would be most appreciated (nagidsm@gmail.com).

Love to you all and talk to you again next Monday!  Oh…and did I mention I saw a cheetah cub :-)!