Category Archives: Tanzania

Ruaha- wild dog morning

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This particular morning we were up and at the safari vehicle with our camera kit at 6h00. It was sunrise around 6h45 but we wanted to get going in the early morning light before sunrise. At this time it was cool and fresh, and a time when the latent heat change which releases perfumes from the tree’s flowers and grasses. It is a time when you feeling refreshed alive and excited to start the day’s adventures. there is always great expectations about what we could see.

“We have a genetic kinship with all of life on earth, an atomic kinship to all matter in the cosmos. So when I look at the universe, I feel large, because I remind myself that not only are we living in this universe, the universe is living within us.”~Neil DeGrasse Tyson

We had scarcely left the camp and were just across the Mwagusi river when Justin, our guide, who was a wonderful character with good humour, in depth knowledge of the bush and excellent eyesight, saw a flash of colour in the long grass on the left side of the road. Soon the flash of colour revealed itself, we had come across a pack of wild dogs which had just killed an impala. The sun had still not risen so the light was low. With a pack of dogs we also needed depth of field so it was a challenging scene on which to work photographically.

It is indescribably exciting to come across such a rare find in the bush. The Endangered Wildlife Trust estimates that between 3 000 and 5 000 individual wild dogs are left in Africa and these dogs are extinct in 23 African countries. Wild dogs are Africa’s most endangered mammal species.

Wild dogs are members of the dog family. Some think Hyaena are a species of dog but hyaenas are not members of the dog or cat families but have their own family, Hyaenidae. Male and female wild dogs are similar sizes. The wild dog has romantically been called the painted wolf because of its blotchy white, black, ochre and tan colouring. Its blotching pattern is unique for every animal making identification easier than for carnivores such as lions.

“Our quest, our earth walk, is to look within, to know who we are, to see that we are connected to all things, that there is no separation, only in the mid.”~Lakota

Wild dogs, like hyaenas, do not have retractable claws so cannot lock onto their prey with their claws and suffocate their prey like the big cats such as lions and leopards. They can only hang onto it with their mouths, so tend to attack on mass and start eating their prey when it is still alive.

Wild dogs eat their prey very quickly to reduce the losses from lion, leopard and hyaenas. The pack usually makes excited chirping sounds around a kill but on this occasion they were noticeably quiet. This was probably because they knew there were lions and hyaenas in the area and it was still early so these predators were possibly still on the move.

Wild dogs are cooperative hunters and feeders but there is an alpha pair which dominates the pack. Wild dogs are endurance hunters and are able as a pack to run down small prey ranging from baboons to impala and have been known to even take down adult wildebeest and zebras, though this is not common. The pack literally runs down its prey to exhaustion.

” We are all visitors to this time, to this place. We are just passing through. Our purpose here is to observe, learn, grow, love and then we return home.”~ Aboriginal proverb

While the rest of the pack is feeding there is always one member keeping guard so the pack is not surprised by a lion, leopard or hyaena.

This alpha male had already eaten judging from the blood on his throat and front legs, and while on guard picked up the scent or sight of something which caught his interest. It turned out to be a hyaena.

The hyaena came barreling into the kill scene to steal what was left of the impala carcass. The light was too low to get decent images of the intense scuffle which lasted a few seconds. The dogs tried vainly to nip the haunches of the hyaena but know only to well they do not want to get bitten by a hyaena. The hyaena prevailed and ran off with the remains of the carcass.

The wild dogs did not pursue the hyaena as they has mostly finished the part of the carcass they could eat easily. The hyaena was last seen crossing the sand river bed with the remains, probably to go and quietly munch on the bones in a secluded spot.

After the hyaena incident, the dogs relaxed on the sand bank and started to play among themselves. Wild dogs are highly social animals staying close together, playing often and will aggressively defend each other from external threats.

“Animals should not require our permission to live on earth. Animals were given the right to be here long before we arrived.”~Anthony Douglas Williams

After a brief play, the alpha male led the pack away from the kill scene probably because the noise and smell would eventually attract other unwelcome visitors. It was still early and the sun had not yet risen. The whole hunt scene lasted around 15 minutes.

Wild dogs are nomadic but tend to remain in one area when the alpha female has pups. As you see with jackals, wild dogs seem to naturally run rather than walk.

The alpha male led pack down onto the dry river bed and began moving downstream.

The dogs were always vigilant. At this time of the day, sunrise, there are still nocturnal predators on the move. Given their size these dogs are no match one-on-one with lion, leopard or hyaenas.

“Not a single creature on earth has more or less right to be here.”~ Anthony Douglas Williams

As the pack was wandering along the Mwagusi river bed, a troop of yellow baboons on the far bank further down river caught their interest. Out in the open sand bed they were easily spotted by the baboons which were foraging on the bank with the option of a quick get away to the trees nearby.

It is not everyday you get to see a alpha male wild dog on a granite boulder in a sand river bed.

“If all the beats were gone, men would die from a great loneliness of spirit, for whatever happens to the beasts also happens to man. All things are connected.”~Chief Seattle SuwAmish Tribe

It was not clear whether this pack was out hunting and whether there was a den with pups close by. Wild dogs are known to den for around three months a year while pups are being nurtured to the point when they can join the pack on a hunt. The alpha female gives birth to anything up to 16 pups at a time.

The pack remained in the sand river bed for about 15 minutes before retracing their steps and heading up a gravel road and off in the bush not to be seen again on our trip.

It is always special to see species which have become endangered.The International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species has evolved to become the world’s most comprehensive information source on the global conservation status of animal, fungi and plant species. The African wild dogs is assessed to be endangered on the IUCN red list.

“The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction.”~ Rachel Carson

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at its inter-connectedness and let it be.

Have fun, Mike

Ruaha feathers

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Africa is home to some 2 341 bird species, 67% or 1 561 of which are endemic to the continent. East Africa offers an incredible variety of non sea birds. Ruaha has 571 recorded species and that number includes migrants. In this post, I show a tiny selection of the birds which you could see in the Ruaha National Park.

“Cherish the natural world because you are part of it and depend on it.”~ Sir David Attenborough

Dawn along the Mwagusi river. A lone Tawny eagle surveys the scene for potential prey.

Too early for thermals, this Tawny has become a perch hunter.

A Little bee-eater came to visit at coffee time on our game drive along the Mwagusi river.

“Uniformity is not nature’s way; diversity is nature’s way.”~ Vandana Shiva

At the Mwagusi bush camp there were several bird baths. One, next to where we were editing our images, attracted several bird species. A frequent and inquisitive visitor was this Collared palm-thrush with its distinctive dark throat collar.

I am used to seeing Glossy starlings, Long tailed starlings and even Superb starlings but this was the first time I had ever seen an Ashy starling.

A male Nubian woodpecker waiting his turn for a drink at the bird bath in front of the dining area at Mwagusi camp. The Nubian looks similar to the Bennett’s woodpecker but has a black streaked ear coverts and a white throat.

The Collared palm-thrush was a daily visitor to the bird bath. Unlike the Grey -headed sparrows, this thrush was quiet. As the name suggests the Palm-thrush prefers palm like vegetation and can often be found rummaging around for insects in the fallen debris of a palm trees.

We found a Red-throated spurfowl searching in the leaf litter for edibles while we were waiting for a leopard cub to come down from the tree next to us.

“The diversity of the phenomena of natures is so great, and the treasures hidden in the heavens so rich, precisely in that order that the human mind shall never be lacking in fresh nourishment.”~Johannes Kepler

A Spur-winged lapwing was happily walking close to two lionesses lying in the sand next to the Great Ruaha river. This lapwing prefers marshes and fresh water habitats.

A juvenile Grey kestrel calling for food. Grey kestrels are able to hover like Black-shouldered kites.

This juvenile’s parents were close by but were not feeding it along the Mwagusi river. It seemed like it was time for a little independence.

A Jameson’s firefinch at the camp’s bird bath. It was very hot around midday so the birds came down to drink and bath. In Tanzania, there is a wonderful variety of firefinches, twinspots, pytilias, crimsonwings, cordon bleaus, silverbills, mannikins and waxbills which come in a dazzling array of colours.

A male Green winged pytilia came down for a drink at the bird bath in front of the dining area at the Mwagusi camp. The female Green-winged pytilia also came down to drink by they never drank together.

He looks like a Blue waxbill but for the red marking on its cheek. This is a male Red-cheeked cordon-bleu. The female does not have red cheeks.

It was hot around midday and it was the end of the dry season so there was little water around. The bird bath was a saving grace for many of the birds around the camp.

“Order without diversity can result in monotony and boredom, diversity without order can lead to chaos.”~ Francis D.K Ching

Down along the Great Ruaha river, we watched a Giant kingfisher hunting from a strategic perch with an excellent view of a stretch of water below it. We did not wait long enough to see him catch anything. From this angle it was difficult to tell whether it was a male or female but it looks like a male given the slight chestnut brown marking below his throat. The male has a broad chestnut brown breast band while the female has chestnut brown belly.

Along the Great Ruaha river not far from the Giant kingfisher we saw an adult Goliath heron tangling with a Fish eagle. We were too far away but presumed the Goliath had caught a fish which the Fish eagle stole.

“Burning a rain forest for economic gain… is like burning a Renaissance painting to cook a meal.”~ E.O Wilson

A hungry juvenile Verreaux eagle owl calling for food in the early morning light

An Ashy starling is only found in central Tanzania. It is a brownish grey colour with a distinctive pale creamy coloured eye.

The bird bath was a magnet for the red-necked spurfowl in the area.

The Red-throated spurfowl look quite similar to the Grey-breasted spurfowl but the former has a completely red bill, and redskin around its eyes. Its throat is same red skin colour as are its legs. The Grey-breasted spurfowl has grey legs and its bill is red but with a black tip and its belly feathers have chestnut brown streaks among the white and black streaked feathers. The Grey-breasted spurfowl are usually found in the western corridor of the Serengeti.

A male Yellow-throated sandgrouse searching for seeds in the sand close to a herd of buffalo. There were lots of tsetse flies around which loved the buffalo but they did not seem to bother the sandgrouse. We did not see large flocks of Yellow-throated sandgrouse like we have seen in the Serengeti, only one or two pairs at a time.

I am not too sure about this nightjar but I think it is a Eurasian nightjar by the markings on its wings. I managed to get off the game vehicle without disturbing the nightjar and got close enough to get a reasonable image lit by the vehicle’s headlights. I used a wide open aperture to get as much light as possible but it affected my depth of field.

“Look closely at nature. Every species is a masterpiece, exquisitely adapted to the particular environment in which it has survived. Who are we to destroy or even diminish biodiversity.”~E O Wilson

White headed buffalo weaver. It has a distinctive white head, breast and belly and an unmistakable orange-red rump and shoulders. You will find red-billed and white headed buffalo weavers in Ruaha. They both make untidy nests for a weaver and they build their nests on the west side of a tree.

Two different pairs of Oxpeckers grooming a Maasai Giraffe. The Yellow-billed oxpeckers have a bulbous bright red tip to their bill and the base is yellow, and they have a creamy-buff coloured rump and belly. By contrast the Red-billed oxpeckers have a pure red bill and a yellow eye ring around their red eyes. These two types of oxpecker feed differently, the Red-billed oxpecker combs or scissors through the host’s hair while the Yellow- billed oxpecker tends to peck at open wounds and insects on the animal such as ticks.

A Long crested eagle on a perfect perch in the late afternoon.

This Long crested eagle watched us for a short while and decided we were cramping his style and flew off to look for a more secluded perch from which to hunt.

There is an incredible variety of bird life in Tanzania and we only scratched the surface. South Africa holds its own in terms of variety of birds and it has a large variety of seabirds. Tanzania does not, but makes up its numbers with a dazzling array of hornbills, woodpeckers, turacos, seedeaters, barbets, bee-eaters, bush-shrikes, tchagras, flycatchers, lovebirds, parrots and list goes on. For anyone interested in birds this is a must, but you need time, a few days’ visit will not do it.

“The more you venture into nature, the more diversity and inter-connectedness you will discover. You will also realise there is complexity which only becomes fathomable with exploration and attention.”~ Mike Haworth

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at its inter-connectedness and let it be.

Have fun, Mike

Traversing the Great Ruaha

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On our third day in Ruaha we decided drive along the Great Ruaha river. From our Mwagusi river camp it took us about 45 minutes to get down to the Great Ruaha river travelling through diverse landscapes.

“Make the rest of your life the best of your life.”~ Unknown

Driving down to the Great Ruaha river along the Mwagusi we found a pair of leopard cubs we had seen two days before. The smallest cub was the most cautious and was still high up in a tree, obviously a busy night before.

“The beauty of Ruaha lies in its vast and unspoilt wilderness. It is natural and wild, the way it should be. It fills your senses so you feel alive. ~ Mike Haworth

First light down near the Great Ruaha river. A female giraffe and her calf were quietly going about their business. They were still very wary of all the sights and sounds around them from the night before, a time when they could lose their advantage.

As you will see in the Maasai Mara and Serengeti, the balloons are busy first thing in the morning. Those wanting to go ballooning needed to get up around 4h30 to get transport to a suitable launch site. The cool temperatures early in the morning provide the perfect temperature differential to get the balloons easily airborne. They normally fly for about an hour and a half before the ground temperatures rise and it gets too hot.

In the early morning it is easy to discern where the balloons are, even if you cannot see them because their burners make a loud roaring sound, unmistakable in the bush! Once they are fired up and the balloon is rising, all is quiet. In the very early morning, the burners create a glow inside the balloon which lights up, creating another worldly sight.

Once down and adventuring along the Great Ruaha river we were looking for a pride of four lionesses which we heard had cubs. When we found them, the lions were out in the open and clearly very hungry. A few impala wandered past on the far sand bank which created some excitement because we thought a hunt was about to begin, but the opportunity evaporated. As soon as lionesses saw their potential prey they went into stealth mode, but the impala never came close enough for a successful attack.

While the lion hunt was unfolding we were visited by a pair of spur-winged lapwings. Red eyes, but wide awake!

This image of one of the four lionesses showed the muscular strength in her legs.

Our wanderings were always eclectic. One minute we were watching lions, the next minute we heard squawks from a nearby tree and there was a juvenile grey kestrel calling for attention and food.

Wildlife seem, better than humans, to understand the need for their offspring to learn to fend for themselves. They progressively wean them off the support, and they teach them all they need to know until they are fully functioning – natural wisdom and respect for the next generation!!!

A panorama of the Great Ruaha river from close to the picnic site at the confluence of the Great Ruaha river and the Mwagusi rivers.

Part of the reason why the three lionesses above the bank were so interested as the small group of impala rams wandered by, was that a female was in the river bed, but could she not see the impala.

One of the aspects about lions which always impresses me is when the opportunity for a hunt is either missed or just disappeared, there never seems to be any recriminations. Instead they reinforce their bonds with each other by head rubbing and licking each other.

By the time we had moved on from the lionesses, it was late morning and starting to get hot and the light was bright with strong contrast. Time to switch gear to high key images. We found a small family herd of Plains zebra on their way down to the river to drink. I liked the baobabs in the background.

“Strip out the colour and see the tones and detail.”~ Mike Haworth

In Ruaha you really get a sense of space – feel you can breathe deeply!

Later that afternoon we found our lionesses again, few kilometres down river. They were still on the look out for a meal which made us wonder how the cubs were getting on. By this time it must have been at least a day since they last saw the cubs.

“Everyone is willing to eat but few are willing to hunt!”

A portrait of one of the lionesses in the fading light of the afternoon. She was lying on the top of the nearest bank of the Great Ruaha river.

For me I can see the strength and wisdom in her face. She is clearly very hungry but alert, patient and not wasting energy.

The evening skies were darkened by storm clouds. The temperature was still warm, so it was balmy. This is a wonderful time to be in the bush when all your senses are enlivened.

” There are no lines in nature, only areas of colour, one against another.”~ Edouard Manet

For a while we thought we were going to get wet, but the clouds dissipated, casting a mood over the landscape.

“I prefer living in colour.”~ David Hackney

By now it was getting dark and we needed to make our way back to camp which was still some distance away. When you are sitting in the game vehicle you almost have to pinch yourself because your are bathed in the beauty and light in this vast expanse.

When we got back to camp it was dark. After a quick freshen up we all gathered for dinner. This time it was in a different part of the river below the camp. The bonfire was blazing and the paraffin lamps were all around like fairy lights shining on the white river sand. Who said there wasn’t heaven on earth?

“The goal of life is to make your heart beat match the beat of of the universe, to match your nature with nature.”~ Joseph Campbell

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at its inter-connectedness and let it be.

Have fun, Mike

Ruaha in isolated central Tanzania

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It must have been in 2014 that I saw the National Geographic wildlife video called Lion Battle Zone. This documentary focused on several different lion prides in Ruaha National Park in Tanzania. The lion-buffalo and lion-lion interaction caught my imagination. I was fascinated by the landscapes and scenery too. This became one of my want-to-go-to wild places.

” Jobs fill your pockets but adventures fill your soul.”~ Jaime Lyn

I told a number of people of my desire to go to Ruaha and what had spurred my imagination. Finally in 2018, Andrew Beck from Wild Eye put a trip together in November 2018 to spend seven days in Ruaha. This was a place with names like the Mwagusi river, the Great Ruaha river, the Njaa, Bushbuck and Baobab prides which caught my imagination. Reality can be much better than imagination in these situations.

After spending the night in Dar es Salaam (Dar) we took an almost two hour charter flight directly west of ‘Dar’ to Ruaha. This is the second largest National Park in Tanzania. It is much less travelled than Selous or Serengeti. For me this was one of its key attractions.

“Fill your life with adventures not things. Have stories to tell not things to show.”~Unknown

In 2017 there were an estimated just over 20,000 wild lions in 26 countries in Africa and their numbers were reported to be dropping precipitously. According to the Ruaha Carnivore project across the continent, Africa’s large carnivores are facing an uncertain future. Lions, cheetahs and African wild dogs have all disappeared from 80 – 90 percent of their original range. Both the lion and the cheetah are now classified as Vulnerable by the IUCN, with as few as 23,000 and 10,000 individuals remaining in the wild respectively. While the African wild dogg is Endangered, with merely 6,600 estimated adults remaining.

Source: Safariline.net

Tanzania’s Ruaha National Park is a vital stronghold for these keystone species. The park holds over 10 percent of the world’s remaining lions, as well as the third largest population of African wild dogs. It is also home to one of just four large cheetah populations remaining in East Africa.

“Every man’s life ends the same way. It is only the details of how he lived and how he died that distinguish one man from another.” ~Ernest Hemingway

We were fortunate to stay at the Mwagusi river camp. This was an authentic bush camp located on the banks of the Mwagusi river. The setting is idyllic and the camp is the perfect blend of isolated bush camp with superb food and wonderful hospitality. The next image is the view up the Mwagusi river from my banda. Mwagusi Camp’s rooms, known as bandas, are spacious tented rooms with a concrete floor encased within a large reed-and-thatch building – very comfortable way out in the bush.

In the area along the Mwagusi river close to camp there were groves of baobab trees. This for me was one of the iconic characteristics of Ruaha. In southern Africa we usually only see isolated baobabs, never large groves of them.

Although very dry, the landscapes and biomes were varied ranging from riverine forests, to groves of baobabs, to open grasslands like the Little Serengeti, to wide open rivers such as the Great Ruaha river. The Mwagusi river was lined with Sausage trees, Figtrees, IIala palms and Tamarind trees to name a few.

In our first afternoon in Ruaha we were fortunate to find two leopard cubs. One was very small and very shy and stayed deep in the bush around a small granite outcrop which made decent photography difficult. The second cub crossed the adjacent Mwagusi dry river bed and found a partially eaten bushbuck carcass.

“To my mind, the greatest reward and luxury of travel is to be able to experience everyday things as if for the first time, to be in a position in which almost nothing is so familiar it is taken for granted.”~Bill Bryson

The leopard cub was very wary and looked up at the slightest sound. The cub was feeding in a bed of dry autumnal coloured leaves which provided an interesting background.

We purposefully went to Ruaha in mid November which was the end of the dry season so that we would improve our chances of good predator sightings.

After spending an hour or so with the leopard cubs the light was fading so we made our way back toward camp. Our guide Justin told us that they had heard lions close to the camp the night before so there was a good chance we might find them resting close to camp along the river bed.

We found two adult females and one male in the twilight. The females were very affectionate toward one another. One was in season and the other not, so the male paid close attention to the female in season and rarely left her side.

“You know you are truly alive when you’re living among lions.”~Karen Blixen

This male was using the flehmen grimace where he stretched out his neck, curled back his upper lip exposing his front teeth drew the scent of his female across his Jacobson’s organ which is located above the roof of the mouth via a duct which exits just behind the front teeth.

The colour of the sky in the evening was sublime. In mid-November, the rain clouds were building for the big rains and everything in the bush was holding its breath for the onset of the rains after the dry season.

This was our introduction to Ruaha and our first afternoon in this wild place. So far it had met all my expectations and aligned with all my romantic notions of the the bush. It was going to be a good trip!

“All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds, wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible.” T.E. Lawrence

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at is inter-connectedness and let it be.

Have fun, Mike

Serengeti’s spring rhythms

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This is the last post from my Serengeti trip in September with CNP Safaris travelling around the western corridor in their wonderful specialised photographic vehicle. The Grumeti Tented Camp was absolutely superb and the staff were friendly and very attentive. Rather than give you too many words, I thought I would rather show you some of the rhythm, scenes and beauty we were immersed in for nine days in spring in the Serengeti.

“We go far to fill our senses with the unknown. The Serengeti strikes a primal chord with its rhythm and drama. Up before first light, excited about what the day will bring. Oh, and it is never the same. The story reveals itself through the colour, light and movement. You get immersed in a far bigger story being played out and you are privileged to witness a few scenes.”

~Mike Haworth

A king watching out for his hidden queen.

Early morning, cool, overcast and quiet, watching a herd of elephants unhurriedly making their way across the Nyasiriro plain towards the Grumeti river.

“Your vision, rather than just your seeing, displays a thousand or more possible paintings in the simplest things.”

~Andrew Baker

A Cheetah family below Masira hill. The mother and son resting, while the daughter kept vigil. 

Mother and daughter moving in the late afternoon. The male cub walked in the same direction but some distance away.

“Vision is not enough – it must be combined with venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps, we must step up the stairs.”

~Vaclav Havel

A dramatic sunrise penetrates the hazy early morning atmosphere.

High morning sun in an overcast and hazy sky.

A female Southern Ground Hornbill, not a raptor but a voracious avian hunter gliding over the plains.

Late afternoon and this troop of Olive Baboons was making its way back to the river where it was going to sleep in the trees for the night.

A pride of lions, “flat cats”, close to water and waiting for night when they can enact their deadly play. (double click on the panorama to enlarge it).

“The eye is the notebook of the poet.”

~James Russell Lowell

We got back to camp early one evening. This was the scene from the front of my tent. The evening chorus had begun with crickets chirping, nightjars trilling, Fish Eagles calling and lions roaring. There was also the occasional screech from a young baboon being disciplined as they settled down for the night.

Another pride of “flat cats”, sleeping in the afternoon shade after a hearty meal of zebra.

Open plains with plenty of room for a young giraffe to cavort.

A “gathering ” of giraffe assembled to intimidate two young cheetah – and it worked.

One lucky Black-backed Jackal which had managed to catch a scrub hare and was taking it back to his family.

While waiting for “flat cats” to get active, this was the scene from the back of the vehicle looking out towards Chamulio mountain.

Rested and now alert in the fading afternoon light. This lioness was scanning the landscape for her next meal.

“Painted skies colour our imagination. New beginnings and a new day. A new story to tell and to treasure.”

~Mike Haworth

Early morning, out on the plains watching the new day dawn.

The Grumeti river in spate. This was September so not the rainy season but a good shower flushed the system.

Late afternoon with plenty of cloud around. The sky was illuminated as the last rays of light burst through cloud bank before the day gave way to night.

“Big skies to stretch your vision. The space to breathe deeply. Room for your senses to swim and your imagination to play.”

~Mike Haworth

Oh, that sense of space.

Unusual to see a pride on the move out in the open in mid-morning. Something must have disturbed them.

A panorama looking up the rise towards a herd of wildebeest and Thomson’s gazelle gazing peacefully (double click to see an enlarged view of any of the panoramas).

The dawn of a new day – pregnant with expectation and filled with promise.

An overcast and somewhat foreboding view of the Grumeti river around mid-morning. 

Later in the day, the Grumeti river in spate, a test for anyone or anything wanting to cross it.

A few of our distant relatives enjoying the spring blossoms in the verdant trees on the banks of the Grumeti river.

“Muddied in the attack. Feline warrior, armed with canines and claws. Independent, resourceful and fearless. Rest for there are more battles to come.”

~ Mike Haworth

A lone and muddy lioness resting after having captured and killed a warthog next to the water.

On the west side of the Grumeti river closer to the Kilawira range of hills.

“A huge other worldly ball rises above the horizon and pushes down the veil of darkness. This ball of blazing of colour will change everything, heralding a massive transformation at the start of each day.  This transformation which takes place in the cool and quiet is called dawn.”

~ Mike Haworth

A humbling view of the sun peering above the horizon and through the Balanites at dawn.

A minute or two after the sun has peered above the horizon. It was cool and quiet creating a sublime sense of being of alive.

A herd of elephants moving away from the Grumeti river. The herd was clustered together possibly because they smelt lions in that area.

Twisted, gnarled but still standing tall, waiting for dawn.

A family group of giraffe in an open space where they could relax and had a good visual of any encroaching threats. 

A young male lion, well sated, walking back to the edge of woodlands to rest in the shade.

A Tawny opportunist in search of meal as the pride of lions moved away from their kill.

“There is something other worldly and spellbinding about watching the sun rise above the horizon. That ball of shimmering oranges and yellows rises like a phoenix out of the darkness below. The light heralds the change in shift, the cue for the nocturnes to settle down to rest and the light brigade to take up arms. Still cool and quiet, but warming and brightening.”

~Mike Haworth

An African sunrise with Balanites in the foreground.

It is difficult to explain the feeling, but the Serengeti fills your senses. There are vast open spaces with big skies giving you the feeling of being able to breath deeply.  It is a wild place where the rules of survival have existed for millennia. You are acutely aware that you are a visitor in this wild place and you need to respect its ways. The vistas will make your senses swim. The colours at dawn and dusk are spellbinding. The abundance and diversity of wildlife will refresh your soul. Visit this wild place for a few days and it will give you a window into a world of immense intelligence and structure which has a natural rhythm choreographed by the weather. So far humans have a minor role to play here but it is a critical role to preserve this wonderful spectacle and diversity for future generations to learn from.

“Nothing but breathing the air of Africa, and actually walking through it, can communicate the indescribable sensations.”

~ William Burchell

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at its inter-connectedness and let its be.

Have fun,

Mike

Serengeti hooves

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The annual migration of wildebeest and other grazing herbivores across the Serengeti-Mara ecosystem is one of the greatest spectacles in the natural world.  The Serengeti is well known for its vast herds of wildebeest and zebra which migrate in a clockwise route from Ndutu in the south around February and March up along the western side of the Serengeti through the western Corridor around May and June and on up to the Masai Mara arriving there from late July through to September. The migrating herds then follow the rains back down to the short grass plains of Ndutu in time for calving season around February each year. The down leg back to Ndutu is usually along the east side of the Serengeti. Wildebeest are known to have a very good sense of smell and are thought to be able to smell rain up to 25 kilometres away. The migration encompasses around 1.5 million wildebeest, 200,000 zebra, 18,000 eland and 500,000 Thompson’s gazelle. Needless, to say the the resident predators take full advantage of the passing feast.

“Millions have passed following the smell of rain. Distant thunder calls the herds. Ancient paths show the way. Darkened skies sit on the  grass plains at the horizon.  That smell of wet earth conjures the sweet taste of new grasses. Thousands know this and thousands are driven by this association regardless of the known danger from canines and claws. This is storm chasing on the grandest scale.”

~Mike Haworth

There is a great diversity and abundance of herbivores in the Serengeti. These herbivores include eland, Debussa waterbuck, wildebeest, Coke’s Hartebeest, Topi, Impala, Grant’s and Thompson’s gazelles, zebra and buffalo. There are also the smaller herbivores such as reedbuck and duiker.

By mid-September, the migrating herds had passed through the Western Corridor section of the Serengeti National Park some three months earlier. It was very evident that the migration has passed through as the grass had been well and truly eaten down. There was still water from the infrequent rains in September but the grasses were only just beginning to recover. The majority of the wildebeest, zebra, topi, eland and Thompson’s gazelle migrate as part of the mega-herd, but not all. A fraction of these herbivores stay in the western corridor. They stay in sufficient numbers to enable the territorial predators such as lions, hyaena, cheetah and leopards to survive through the lean time.

“Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass but learning to dance in the rain.”

~Unknown

Many of the wildebeest left behind are bulls which stand in their demarcated territory. This particular bull was full of the joys of spring bucking and prancing around just for fun, by the look of it.

Another lone wildebeest bull moving around in his territory.

“The earth exists for all beings, not just human beings.”

~Unknown

We saw many topi in the western corridor. These antelope are a sub-species of a tsessebe. They look like hartebeest. Their coats have short hair and have a lovely sheen to them. The topi are very quick and if they see the predator in time they can usually out run them. The next image shows a topi flying with all four hooves off the ground.

Topi are incredibly quick and have been known to reach speeds in excess of 80kms per hour. They also show off their strength and prowess with stiff legged prances like a lipazzaner  and bound on all fours, like gazelles.

“To watch a Topi lope, then dash and race,  and pronk and prance, reveals a sense of power and joy well beyond the pure flight response.”

~Mike Haworth

The topi has a striking reddish-brown body colour and distinct black patches on its face and  just above its leg joints and greyish shoulders and flanks.

Topis are gregarious but when one male intrudes on another male’s territory, the two go down on their knees to fight with their horns in what becomes a pushing match to establish dominance.

Male topis have their own territories which they mark with dung and they also mark grass stems in their area with a secretion from their preorbital gland. The can stand on these mounds for a long time trying to be noticed.

“Be curious not judgmental.”

~Walt Whitman

One of the herbivores which does not migrate is the buffalo. We found a few large herds in the Western Corridor. Presumably this is what keeps the lions going through the lean phase from August to May.

This is a strong animal with attitude. Buffalo will always look directly at you and lift their head and look down their noses at you.  This was one of the bulls protecting the one flank of the herd. He was not about to take any nonsense from anything.

“Nature’s drama is never the same. Expect the unexpected it is sometimes low down, sometimes high up, sometimes fast, and sometimes slow. Each time mother nature reveals a little more, and each time you get a sense of how much you have still to learn.”

~Mike Haworth

Another herbivore which does not migrate is the Masai giraffe. Giraffe have different patterns much like a fingerprint, but giraffe in certain regions have a particular  pattern type.

This was bull giraffe using his full extension to browse on his favoured part of the tree.

Another group of Masai giraffe seen on the way to Nyasiriro plains. It is not often you see giraffe lying down but this individual must have felt secure because it could not get up quickly if there was a threat.

A family group of Masai giraffe down the road passed the Grumeti landing strip.

A single female eland down near the water pool dammed by the road embankment. Eland are very wary and will normally walk or run away from a vehicle. This must have been a young adult judging from its size and the size of its dewlap, the flap of skin below its neck.

Grant’s gazelle are bigger with lighter colouring and have no dark brown side stripe like the  Thompson’s gazelle.

Wildebeest and Thompson’s gazelle grazing together on the open plain.

A female Thompson’s gazelle and her fawn. They stopped to have a look around and in a split second were off.

You may notice the lack of zebra images. While we saw zebra, we do not see many and I did not get any images interesting enough for this post.

“The very essence of instinct is that it is followed independently by reason.”

~Charles Darwin

What I find amazing is that all the herbivores feed on different parts of the savanna. According to the WorldWildLife.org, different herbivores tend to feed on different plant species and on different parts of a plant. This reduces competition and enables a grazing sequence by different ungulate species. They eat different types of fauna, be it buds, leaves, or stems. Furthermore, some herbivores prefer areas closer to woodlands and others open woodlands and others open grasslands. Kudu prefer thickets in woodlands, impala prefer savanna, Grant’s gazelle prefer herbs and shrub’s  lower foliage, eland eat shrubs’ upper foliage, wildebeest usually feed on a wide variety of nutritious, short grasses, and topi tend to eat long grass leaves. Giraffes have no competition at tree top level. Buffalo are able to eat long fibrous grasses so tend to clean up grazing areas in the Serengeti.

“What is life? It is a flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the winter time. It is the little shadow which ruins across and loses itself in the sunset.”

~Crowfoot

You can also tell the type of food that herbivores eat by their size and shape of their muzzle. The group of herbivores classified as ruminants have specialised stomachs. and lack upper front incisors and have a dental pad instead. This feature is especially evident in giraffe, buffalo and wildebeest.

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at its inter-connectedness and let it be.

Have fun,

Mike

Serengeti raptors

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Mid-September in the Serengeti is early spring. This is too early for most of the raptor migrants, so we saw mainly residents. Migrants such as Steppe Eagles had not yet arrived.

“Once you have travelled, the voyage never ends, but is played out over and over again in the quietest chambers. The mind can never break off from the journey.”

~Pat Conroy

The raptors in the Serengeti at this time of the year were Tawny, Bateleur, Martial and Long- Crested Eagles, an array of Goshawks, Snake-Eagles and Grey Kestrels. On our second day we found a Tawny Eagle hanging around a lion pride. Tawnys know only too well that where there are lions there are bound to be edible scraps. This adult Tawny Eagle saw the lions on the side of the Masira hill and flew over to the largest tree closest to the lions.

As the lions moved away from the kill site this Tawny Eagle took off from the tree to come down and look for scraps. Often you will see a Bateleur and a Tawny Eagle waiting together. The Tawny  does tend to dominate the Bateleur at a kill site.

This Tawny landed where it thought there were some scraps but had to walk around looking for the left-overs.

“When the doors of perception are cleansed, men will see things as they truly are, infinite.”

~William Blake

A Grey Kestrel perched at the top of a dead tree branch in the early morning light. This Kestrel was just outside our camp. It appears grey from a distance and the yellow cere and yellow legs are distinctive.

Dark Chanting Goshawk patrolling the grass plains. Chanting Goshawks are so-called because of their far carrying and melodious calls. The head, breast and upperparts are essentially dark grey, while the underparts, other then the breast, are white, finely barred with black. The primary feathers are black and its tail has broad black and white bars. 

This Dark Chanting Goshawk flew for  about 30 to 40 metres and then landed to investigate something in the grass then flew off again and repeated the process over and over. It often calls from a perch or in flight, making an accelerating series of piping notes and fluty whistles, which has been described as a song or chant. There are many notes in a series. It gives a high-pitched “peee-u”. Although quite capable of hunting for themselves these Goshawks are known to follow Honey badgers and ground hornbills  looking for scraps or an opportunity to steal their food.

“There is nothing invisible in this universe! There is only our lack of eyesight!”
~ Mehmet Murat ildan

This Secretary bird was also scouring the grass plains looking for anything to eat from snakes to insects, small rodents and birds, even bird eggs. This is an aggressive raptor with legs and feet that can deliver great strike precision. There is no distinctive sexual colour dimorphism.

The Secretary Bird’s legs are scaly below the knee and the feet have hard pads underneath. Although they look like long-legged eagles; their front toes are too small to grab prey. Instead they stamp on snakes to kill them and will devour the entire snake swallowing it head first into its crop. Often it will regurgitate the snake later for its partner or young.

Ruppell’s Vulture is now listed as critically endangered on the IUCN’s Red List. We saw only one in the late afternoon on the ground near where a pride of lions had fed. The Ruppell’s Vulture is much larger than the White-backed Vulture. Its back is a mottled brown and white and the base of the neck has a white collar, and its crop patch is dark brown. Although we saw this character on the ground, it is not uncommon for this vulture to soar at heights of 6,000 metres. They tend to be found mainly between the equator and the Sahara and in east Africa.

“The eyesight for an eagle is what thought is to a man.”
~ Dejan Stojanovic

The Long-crested Eagle is one of a group of smaller eagles. Its long crest on top of its head is its key diagnostic feature. It also has whitish legs with yellow feet. This eagle prefers to hunt along the edges of forest and woodland areas, especially those adjacent to grasslands as it preys mainly on rodents but will also prey on birds (mainly chicks), frogs and reptiles.

When in flight the underside of its primary wing feathers are white. This eagle was perched on a dead tree stump which was quite low to the ground. As you can see this is a perch hunter.

A lone Black-chested Snake-eagle. They are usually solitary and have that distinctive snake-eagle shaped head  with a crest and small beak. This snake-eagle has a dark brown head, back, face and chest. This raptor is a member of the fourth group within the Accipitridae family along with Serpent-eagles and Bateleurs.

Snake-eagles’ legs and feet are protected from snake bites by thick imbricated or overlapping scales. On take-off, this Black-chested Snake-eagle revealed a white under wing with black bars on the underside to its secondary feathers and black tips to the underside of its primary feathers.

Snake-eagles have those very distinctive piercing yellow eyes. From a distance, the Black-chested Snake-eagle can be mistaken for a Martial Eagle but it is much smaller and does not have dark brown flecks on its breasted feathers. Importantly, the Martial has feathers down to its feet whereas the Snake-eagle has yellow scale covered legs. When in flight the Black-chested Snake-eagle has white underwings while the Martial has dark underwings.

An intimidating looking dark morph Tawny Eagle. This raptor was sitting on a branch above a lion kill. It was waiting for an opportunity to feed on the mostly consumed carcass.

Judging from the full crop, this Tawny Eagle had already fed well but must have been disturbed, probably by a lion.

“…. each with its own beauty, and each with a story to tell.”

~Stephen Jay Gould

This image shows just how extended this Tawny’s crop can get.

Of all the raptors I have seen the Tawny has probably the greatest variety of morph colouring, ranging from blonde to striped to tawny to dark brown. In the next image, the dark morph Tawny was joined by a normal coloured Tawny. These two waited patiently for quite a while. Eventually their patience paid off and they were able to feed on the remains of the carcass.

“Evolution tells us where we came from, not where we can go.”      

~Jerry Coyne

A Brown Snake-eagle. This snake-eagle is brown all over and has the characteristic bright yellow eye. This is the largest of the snake-eagles and although an eagle, its leg feathers do not grow down to its feet. This eagle is a snake killer – feeding on puffadders, cobras, mambas boomslangs and any snake its sees in the grass. If there is a dearth of snakes it will feed on chameleons, lizards and other reptiles.

The Brown Snake-eagle is also solitary, and is often seen perched on top of tree for hours just searching the grasslands below for prey.

The Brown Snake-eagle usually hunts from a perch so this character must have seen something interesting and flew past us. The Brown Snake-eagle tends to go for larger snakes that the Black-chested Snake-eagle.

In flight, the Brown Snake-eagle has brown under wing coverts and silvery-grey underside to its primary and secondary wing feathers.

There is minimal interaction between snake-eagles and other raptors. The Tawnys seem to like to mix it up with other raptors mainly because of their size and brawn.

“Evolution has developed man to such a high degree that he builds zoos to keep his ancestors in cages.”

~Unknown

In the view of most paleontologists today, birds are living dinosaurs. As Stephen Brusatte, a paleontologist at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, indicated a bird did not just evolve from a T. rex overnight, but rather the classic features of birds evolved one by one; first bipedal locomotion, then feathers, then a wishbone, then more complex feathers that looked like quill-pen feathers, then wings. It really makes you marvel at the lineage of birds.

“You travel with modern lines, but you come from ancient times. Old genes in modern feathers. Your acute primal eyes miss nothing. You wear wild armoury on your face and feet. Your primaries help you to feel your way into skyward thermals. Oh we have still so much still to learn about you.”

~Mike Haworth

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at its inter-connectedness and let it be.

Have fun,

Mike

Serengeti’s bone crushers

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This is another post from my trip to the Serengeti in September.  The abundance of prey and predators is a perfect environment for Spotted Hyaenas, which are also known as ‘laughing hyaenas’. The hideous ‘laugh’ is really a signal of submission. Hyaena can also be spelt hyena, but I prefer the former because these are such unusual animals. They are also nicknamed the “bone crushers” of the bush. Spotted Hyaenas have a bite force of around 1100 pounds per square inch (psi) compared to lion at around 700 psi. By comparison the strongest bite force is exerted by a Nile Crocodile at 5000psi. This would partly explain why the wildlife is so scared of the water in the Serengeti and Masai Mara. The reason hyaenas have such a strong bite force is partly due to the structure of their skull onto which powerful jaw muscles are attached together with high bone density in their jaws and thicker than normal enamel on their teeth. The upper and lower teeth interlock creating a powerful locking and shearing force.

“Living things are involved in an open dialogue with the universe, a free exchange of information and influence that unites all life into one vast organism that is itself part of an even larger dynamic structure. There is no escaping the conclusion that the basic similarity in structure and function are ties that bind all life together and that man, for all his special features, is an integral part of this whole.”
~ Lyall Watson

Hyaenas are social predators living in clans which are regulated by a strictly enforced hierarchy. In the hyaena world, the queen is the clan leader, females dominate and males are at the bottom of the hierarchy, a social system unique in the predator world. The hyaena’s closest relative is the civet.

“I would rather than a mind opened by wonder than one closed by belief.”

~Gerry Spence

Hyaenas love water. They will  happily lie in it to keep cool on long hot summer days. They even hide parts of a carcass in the water out of sight of lions, jackals and vultures.

Down  in the Nyasiriro plain alongside the road which runs from the ranger’s post to the Grumeti river was a large pool of rain water trapped by the road embankment. This young hyaena was determined to cross the pool of water, but was not sure about our vehicle.

It was not too deep so the hyaena did not need to swim and having recent rains the likelihood of  a crocodile in the pool was minimal.

This hyaena tried on a number of occasions to cross the pool of water. It could have just walked another 100 metres around the edge of the pool.

“Yugen – a profound awareness of the universe that triggers feelings too deep and mysterious for words.’

Once in the middle of the pool of water this hyaena lost its nerve and turned and raced back to the water’s edge. I liked the reflection in the water.

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One aspect of hyaena life that it is very evident in the Serengeti is that members of the clan disperse, and hide and sleep during the day in large tufts of grass and in shallow depressions. This wide distribution of clan members allows them to have eyes and ears over a large area. If lions make a kill, one hyaena has no chance of also feeding on the carcass but the lone hyaena will start to whoop which is a call to clan members for reinforcements. If enough clan members arrive they can taunt the lions enough to drive them off. If a male lion is present at the carcass, the hyaenas know their limitations and it is game off.

“Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know.”

~Pema Chodron

Spotted hyaenas will scavenge when the opportunity arises but they are skilled and tenacious hunters in their own right. Hyaenas are now also recognised as the region’s most numerous and ecologically important predators, killing more game than lions. The two hyaenas in the image below walked through a herd of Topi. These antelope were wary of the hyaenas and watched them the whole time while they were close, but Topis are very quick and a hyaena would have little chance of catching one in a chase even though a Spotted Hyaena is capable of running at 60 kilometres per hour..

The hyaenas were smelling the ground and grass searching for scent clues of new-born calves or injured animals. To sleep, Topis usually lie on their sternum with their front legs tucked under their body and hyaenas have been known to attack them on the ground while they are sleeping. Those extremely strong hyaena jaws enable them to hang on even if the Topi manages to get up onto its feet with the hyaena attached.

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This was one of the female hyaenas which wandered through the Topi herd looking for an opportunity. She looked to be one of the senior members of the clan, perhaps even the matriarch, just looking at her age, condition and girth.

At the top of a ridge in the Nyasiriro plain was a natural water hole, it could even have been a spring. We called it the “hyaena spar” as we counted eleven hyaenas in and around the “spar” at one point.

“Clearly, animals know more than we think, and think a great deal more than we know.”

~Irene M Pepperberg

The hyaenas lay in the water to keep cool in the middle of the day. This next character was lying in a small inlet on the side of the water hole. It only raised its head to see what the noise was all about and as soon as it saw our vehicle, it flopped down into the inlet again.

As you can see they are not shy about water and don’t seem to mind about getting too muddy. 

This young hyaena was playing with an antelope skin. It was wet and supple and must have been striped from a recent kill. Hyaenas have been known to line their den with skins when they have pups.

“Tell me, what is it that you plan to do with one wild and precious life.”

~ Mary Oliver

This female hyaena and her sub-adult pup were lying flat in the short grass very close to where we found a family group of Bat-eared Foxes.

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This female hyaena had a face marked by years of clan tussles. Hyaena’s ears seem to come off worst.

Hyaena have highly specialised morphology. It has a disproportionately large heart for its size, double the size of a lion’s heart giving it extraordinary powers of endurance. It has an ingenious skull shape with a massive zygomatic arch (or cheek bone) enabling massive jaw muscles to be attached to it.  Hyaena’s eyes are more forward positioned in the skull enabling them with superior binocular vision. The female gives birth through her pseudo-penis.

“The more you look, the more your see.”

~Robert M Pirsig

Hyaenas are ecologically important predators. Together with vultures they are the main members in the savanna waste disposal team. They can reduce an adult wildebeest to little more than a skull and a few vertebra in a bloody patch on the ground in minutes. These are some of the most intelligent mammals in the savanna and they lead complex social lives, networking and competing, cooperating to solve problems, recognising rank relationships of others, reconciling after fights and forming coalitions, according to hyaena zoologist Sarah Benson-Amram, a research fellow at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. When tested hyaenas even outperform chimpanzees on tasks requiring cooperation.

“Intelligence is the capacity to perceive the essential, the what is; to awaken the capacity in oneself and in others, is intelligence”

~Jiddu Krishnamurti

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at its inter-connectedness and let it be.

Have fun,

Mike

Serengeti birdlife in spring

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It was mid-September in the western Corridor of the Serengeti.  A bit early for most of the migrants, but there were a few early arrivals. The resident avian population in the Serengeti at this time of the year is diverse and would gladden any bird lover’s heart. There was also a wide variety of habitats in which to photograph our avian friends. This post is a gallery of the birds we could photograph rather than the ones we saw. This post excludes raptors and Ground Hornbills, both of which are dealt with in separate previous posts.

“In Africa, I feel grounded in an indescribable way because by choice I had no connection to the outside world or technology. It forced me to be in the moment because I don’t know what the next minute will bring.”

~Karen Banks

Grey-backed Fiscal with its black patch across the eye and along the side of the neck down to its shoulder.

The Grey-backed Fiscal has a grey crown, nape and mantle.

Yellow-billed Stork feeding in a pool of water below where a pride of lions were resting in the late afternoon.

Yellow-billed Oxpeckers on the back of a Masai Giraffe.

“In the Serengeti the sense of abundance will envelope you. There is life everywhere you look. Each element is in a different state of ebb and flow, but all interwoven. In this abundance, diversity not numbers, takes on an altogether more important place in your awareness.”

~Mike Haworth

Male Yellow-throated Sandgrouse, head raised and alert. He must have heard something that concerned him.

Small flocks of these sandgrouse were foraging for seed in the short grass.

  

Male White-bellied Bustard displaying for the benefit of his female.

Female White-bellied Bustard.

Grey-breasted Spurfowl, this species is localised to this part of Tanzania.

“Nature uses only the longest threads to weave her patterns, so that each small piece of her fabric reveals the organisation of the entire tapestry.”
~Richard P. Feynman

White-browed Coucal.

This Little Bee-eater had caught a bee and was busy wiping off the bee’s sting against the branch.

“In nature, light creates the colour. In the picture, colour creates the light.”

~ Hans Hofmann

A pair of Little Bee-eaters hawking insects from this flimsy stem.

 

A lone Hottentot Teal on a pool of water dammed up against a road embankment.

I found it unusual that this Hottentot Teal was swimming alone in this pool of water. We normally see them in pairs. There were no other ducks around this pool of water.

“You can’t be suspicious of a tree, or accuse a bird or a squirrel of subversion or challenge the ideology of a violet.”

~Hal Borland

A male Ostrich, flushed with testosterone coursing through his veins.

A Malachite Kingfisher hunting in the pool of water below where we were watching a pride of lions.

A Capped Wheatear feeding on ants on this mound. This individual looked like a sub adult given its speckled breast band which will become black when an adult. The white supercilium and black bar on its tail feathers are diagnostic.

This character was very busy feeding on the resident ants around the anthill.

“Petite, nimble and uniquely coloured, you are available to only the eye that seeks you. You are like little jewels scattered through the grasslands. Self sufficient but woven into the tapestry of the wild life on the plains.”

~Mike Haworth

A Temmnick’s Courser out in the grass plains. This is one of three coursers found in this area, the other two are the Two-banded and Violet-tipped Coursers.

Wattled Lapwing with its brown body colouring and stripped throat markings.

The red frontal shield above its beak is diagnostic as both the white-crowned and Wattled lapwings have yellow facial wattles.

Spur-winged Lapwing with its distinctive black crown and nape and throat and white ear-coverts. It has a  brown mantle and that distinctive red eye. 

A Spur-winged Lapwing incubating her eggs alongside a large pool of water.

A pair of Sacred Ibis

One of a pair of Usambiro Barbets feeding on ants in an anthill.

Silverbird, a male in full breeding plumage, perched in front of a Rufous-tailed Weaver’s nest.

“Oh little winged traveller from far away places. Rest here for the summer. You are welcome and free here. There is enough for all and we are graced by your presence. Only you will know when it is time to return to that far way place, leaving us with only memories.”

~Mike Haworth

A Caspian Plover stretching near where we found a family of Bat-eared Foxes.

A Caspian Plover, a migrant from far-way places. This plover breeds in western and central Asia and migrates southward to eastern and southern Africa to escape the northern winter.

A Fork-tailed Drongo, one of nature’s great mimics.

A Hammerkop preparing to hunt from a rock in the Grumeti river. The river was teeming with crocodiles, so I am not sure who was going to turn out to be the hunter. 

In front of the Grumeti Tented Camp on a branch overhanging the river. This Green-backed Heron was perch hunting right in front of us.

A Superb Starling close to our family of Cheetahs below Masira hill.

“Colour! What a deep and mysterious language, the language of dreams.”

~ Paul Gauguin

These Superb Starlings feed on insects in the short grass on the Serengeti plains.

A Black-headed Heron, one of a group which was hunting frogs along the side of a large pool of water alongside the road.

Pale Flycatcher

  

“Science cannot solve the ultimate mystery of nature. And that is because in the last analysis, we ourselves are a part of the mystery that we are trying to solve.”

~Max Planck

A Kori Bustard minding its own business with a few buffalo bulls as onlookers.

A Kori Bustard foraging in the open plain.

 

“Who designed you? What wonderful imagination therein. Blue eyes with white and black surrounds. A velvet-black forehead and a golden crown which shimmers in the sunlight as you walk. And splashes of scarlet in the most improbable places. Oh and when you dance together, it is magical.”

~Mike Haworth

Grey-crowned Crane. 

We found scattered pairs of Grey-crowned Cranes on the Nyasiriro plain.

A Ruff from Russia. This was the second wader we found which was an early migrant.

“I had an inheritance from my father,

It was the moon and the sun,

And though I roam all over the world,

The spending of it is never done.”

~Ernest Hemingway

An African Spoonbill swishing its bill back and forth searching for food under the water.

A Black-winged Stilt leading a pair of foraging African Spoonbills.

A Black-winged Stilt plucking insects off the surface of the water.

A Woolly-necked Stork sunning itself next to the pool of water along the road.

A female Bennet’s Woodpecker working on the entrance to her nest in a thorn tree above the lounge at the tented camp.

A male Cocqui Francolin.

A female Cocqui Francolin foraging in the plain near the lion pride.

A male Rufous-naped Lark displaying to females

A Rufous-naped Lark performing his display routine from an anthill to impress any passing females. 

A lone Glossy Ibis foraging in the mud in the pool of water alongside the road.

The colour of the Glossy Ibis came alive with the right angle to the sun.

A Lilac-breasted Roller. You can also find the Broad-billed Roller, the Rufous-crowned which looks very much like the southern African Purple Roller and the migrating European Roller.

The beautiful blues, greens and mauves of the Liliac-breasted roller.

 

East Africa has a wonderful variety of birds. We got to see a minute portion of this diversity. By virtue of its location, it has residents, migrants and vagrants. There is a much bigger variety of  barbets, go-away birds, francolins, weavers, parrots, sunbirds, starlings and even pratincoles in East Africa than in southern Africa. I already feel the need for more visits to marvel and photograph the wonderful colours of East Africa’s feathered residents and visitors. 

“You didn’t come into this world you came out of it, like a wave from the ocean.

You are not a stranger here.”

~Alan Watts

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at its inter-connectedness and let its be.

Have fun,

Mike

Batty about Serengeti’s foxes

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At the Grumeti Tented Camp in the Serengeti, we usually gathered at the open air lounge before first light for a cup of coffee and a rusk or muffin. This was a traditional meeting to work out where to  go for the morning and discuss what we hoped to see.  There were very few vehicles in this part of the Serengeti in mid-September which meant there were few eyes searching for the wildlife we were hoping to see. Much of the wildlife moves at night so there is no guarantee that what you saw at last light the evening before you will see at first light the next morning. Nevertheless, it was a fun exercise to find out what each one of us wanted to see.  The intriguing part of this exercise was that if you were absolutely precise about what you wanted to see, it was uncanny how often that is what revealed itself, not always but often enough to keep the mystery alive. I had seen one Bat-eared Fox in the Masai Mara a few years ago, so asked whether there were Bat-eared Foxes in the Serengeti. Our guide, Yona assured us that they were around, but were not common so we would be lucky to see one or a family of them.

“For the 99 percent of the time we’ve been on Earth, we were hunter and gatherers, our lives dependent on knowing the fine, small details of our world. Deep inside, we still have a longing to be reconnected with the nature that shaped our imagination, our language, our song and dance, our sense of the divine.”

~Janine M. Benyus

Guess what we saw that morning, our first Bat-eared Fox family.

“Man is not himself only…He is all that he sees; all that flows to him from a thousand sources…He is the land, the lift of its mountain lines, the reach of its valleys.”

~Mary Austin

It was only when we ventured south toward the Nyasirira plains that we found a family of Bat-eared Foxes. On this particular morning  it was cold and the wind was blowing hard. The two adults were above ground lying in the open just in front of their den. There are two distinct populations of Bat-eared Foxes in Africa, one that lives from Ethiopia to Tanzania and the other in southern Africa. The Bat-eared Fox is so named because of its distinctive bat-wing shaped ears. Its latin name is Octoyon megalotis where the second word in the name comes from ‘mega’ meaning large and ‘otus’ meaning ears.

After a little research, I was surprised to find that there are five species of fox in Africa, the Fennec Fox found in the Sahara, the Cape Fox found in South Africa, Ruppell’s Fox found in north Africa, and the seldom seen Pale Fox, also known as the African Sand Fox or Pallid Fox found just south of the Sahara. The focus of this post is the Bat-eared Fox.(Source:https://synapsida.blogspot.co.za/2015/08/the-dog-family-foxes-of-africa.html)

As you can imagine with large ears like this, the Bat-eared Fox has a hard time when the wind is blowing hard. The sound of the wind must be like a roaring its ears, so it flattens them.

We found the den on a rise out in the open plain with hyaena, antelope and buffaloes all around. These are not big canids. The male is around 55cm in length and has ears about 13 cms long. 

 

“Experience is not what happens to you; it is what you do with what happens to you.”

~ Aldous Hux

Bat-eared Foxes are mainly insect eaters so do not compete with the larger carnivores, but that does not stop the large predators killing them if they get half a chance.  The other termite eaters are aardwolves, antbears and pangolins. Surviving on an all-insect diet required several adaptations which are found in the Bat-eared Fox. Firstly, their large ears provide acute hearing which enables them to hear insects such as dung beetles and termites under ground and in the thick grass. Bat-eared Foxes also have specialised extra teeth for shearing when chewing on insects, and their lower jawbone is designed to open and close rapidly.

Apart from pure survival, the fox adults were especially wary because they had two cubs. Bat-eared Foxes are socially monogamous and the male is actively involved in looking after the cubs once they are weaned off their mother’s milk.

The cubs clearly knew the rules and disappeared underground on cue from the adults, but as youngsters they were overwhelmingly curious and wanted to see what this thing was that was looking at them. The thing being our photographic vehicle.

“What I like about photographs is that they capture a moment which is gone forever, impossible to reproduce.”

~ Karl Lagerfeld

Cubs are born after a gestation period of about two months and are weaned in a year. The cubs are born in underground dens, usually during spring or early summer. A Bat-eared Fox family has several den holes in its territory, each with many entrances, tunnels, and chambers. The foxes’ claws are made for digging, and they can create their own burrow or enlarge an empty one made by another animal. 

 

Outside the den, the fox adults are ever vigilant.  The short grasslands in the Serengeti seem to suit them and the position of the den on top of a rise in the middle of the plain gave them a good visual of a large area around them.

Termites make up around 80 percent of their diet and there are many termite mounds on the plains of the Serengeti, so I am a little surprised we did not see more Bat-eared Foxes.

  

You can imagine that those large ears are like radar antenna and will pick up the slightest sound anywhere near. They locate their prey through their acute hearing. Bat-eared Foxes hunt in groups of two or three with hearing being their main sensory function.

“The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.”

~Leo Rosten

Just looking at their faces, their muzzle is small. The teeth of the Bat-eared Fox are much smaller and structured in shearing surface formation, different to other canid species. This is an adaptation to its insectivorous diet. Hunting for food is mainly diurnal, during sunrise and sunset. In the more northern areas of its range (around Serengeti), they are nocturnal 85 percent of the time. However, around South Africa, they are nocturnal only in the summer and diurnal during the winter.

 

It was interesting to see the fox adults quickly picked up on a Black-backed Jackal wandering in the direction of their den.  Immediately the male Bat-eared Fox stood up and stared directly at the Jackal.

Visual displays are an active form of communication. Only when the jackal continued to walk closer did the male Bat-eared Fox arch his back in a threat posture, with the female behind him lying on the ground with her ears flattened. 

When this threatening display did not work, the pair of fox adults ran toward the jackal in unison. The jackal decided this was not going to end well so detoured around the foxes den.

This Bat-eared Fox family had their den about a kilometre from water. They seldom drink water as they obtain most of their moisture from their food.

“You cannot get through a single day without having an impact on the world around you. What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.”
~Jane Goodall

Threats to these small canids are disease and floods (when caught in their dens) while the more immediate threats come from larger carnivores such as lions, leopards, hyaenas, cheetahs and African wild dogs.

“If future generations are to remember us with gratitude rather than contempt, we must leave them something more than the miracles of technology. We must leave them a glimpse of the world as it was in the beginning, not just after we got through with it.”

“We must not only protect the country side and save it from destruction, we must restore what has been destroyed and salvage the beauty and charm of our cities … Once our natural splendor is destroyed, it can never be recaptured. And once man can no longer walk with beauty or wonder at nature, his spirit will wither and his sustenance be wasted.”

~ Lyndon B. Johnson

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at its inter-connectedness and let it be.

Have fun,

Mike