This curious “beast” was spotted while driving around in the Kruger National Park. This is what we saw. Can you see it also?
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Here it is, in case you failed…
Bush stories and anecdotes
Hamerkop
Although the hamerkop (Scopus umbretta) is the sole member of the genus, it is now believed that it has genetic similarities that are closer to the pelicans and shoebill stork than other water birds.
We find these true Cinderella of the swamps extremely interesting despite being rather common and overshadowed by the most colourful species. Perhaps their better known feature is their huge nests that take them 2 to 4 months to complete and that are often used by other birds as well.
I have mentioned that these birds frequently visit our former pool (now a water reservoir) in Harare and spending long hours stalking the African clawed frogs [1]. I was intrigued by how the frogs were caught as I always heard a splash but, by the time I looked, the frog had already been caught.
A couple of years ago, while camping at Shumba in Hwange National Park [2] I had the chance of seeing a hamerkop hovering over the dam there but it was evening and I could not watch it long enough to find out whether it was fishing or on some other kind of display so the mystery continued.
Luckily, during our visit to the Kruger National Park early in October we were stationed at a water pond waiting for large game to come to drink and, during the time, we were entertained by a couple of hamerkop that were feeding and we could watch them at leisure and resolve the issue.
Each bird repeated a routine that involved landing on shore and, after a time that went from a few seconds to a couple of minutes of walking about, take off and fly very slowly over the water with dangling feet and slow wing beats that would keep it just above it. During the hovering its feet sometimes touched the water and it occasionally would drag them on the water surface.
While we were there the bird was performing this routine constantly and our comment was that it must be effective for the bird to spend all this flying energy on this, apparently, futile activity. The answer to our questions came after about an hour when the bird suddenly landed in the water with feet and beak and emerged victorious with a frog!
It then took off from the water and proceeded to eat it. Unluckily, after its success the bird landed on the opposite shore of the dam so I could not even guess at the identity of the frog and only managed poor pictures.
[1] See: https://bushsnobinafrica.wordpress.com/2015/09/05/garden-and-gadgets/
[2] See: https://bushsnobinafrica.wordpress.com/2014/10/31/watched-at-shumba/
Spoiled siesta!
A loud “crack” woke me up from my after lunch nap, or at least I think that that was the reason for the interruption of my daily ritual (well, I must confess that sometimes I wake up myself up with my own snoring but that is another matter…).
In any case, when I regained my faculties after a while (a slower process as you grow up), I did not hearing it again but I became aware of some loud splashing noises nearby. My son helped me to focus and informed me that -apparently- a croc had caught something and that our campers next door had seen the action.
I had already made contact with our neighbours -coming from Zambia- as soon as they arrived earlier to warn them about the viciousness of the baboons at the campsite that forced us to get a guard as described earlier. In fact, despite my cautioning, they still suffered the consequences while they were away on their first game drive, although they had taken the normal precautions that are usually enough!
So, I went to see them to find out what they had seen. Luckily they had not only witnessed the event but also taken pictures of it! They had detected the commotion in the water and heard the noise. A crocodile had caught a rather large terrapin and, after kit was trying to devour it.
The crocodile eating the terrapin. Picture by Eloise Wells.
The event was a surprise to me as we usually see both terrapins and crocodiles sharing their water territories ignoring each other! Perhaps the terrapin was already dead when the saurian found it? We will never know.
The crocodile resting after trying to swallow its prey. Pictures by Eloise Wells.
The victim was rather large but eventually the croc had managed to break its carapace -the crack- and it was busy trying to swallow by the time I watched. Although I could not help feeling sorry for the unfortunate victim, it was an interesting event, worth mentioning.
The crocodile was busy for a few hours until it moved off and we lost it for a while. It reappeared later a few metres downriver with its mouth closed so we believe that it had already consumed its prey.
The crocodile after the event. Picture by Julio A de Castro.
Believing that only to write about this would not have been enough, I asked our neighbours to let me have some of the photographs of the event for this post and they kindly did so. Thanks to their generous contribution I am able to share them with you as the story that, without pictures, would not have been the same.
Wild elephants…
As we were in the Zambezi valley, after Mana Pools we decided to spend some time in an area of the river that we knew through our earlier boating experiences when we were in Zambia in the early 90s (blog posts still pending, oh dear!). A number of fishing camps are located near Chirundu town, one of the border crossings to Zambia.
We had fished in the Zambezi before and had some great fun with tiger fish (Hydrocynus spp.) so we wished to try our luck again. We know that there are large Vundu (Heterobranchus longifilis) lurking somewhere[1] that we had, so far, failed to catch (and release, of course).
The road to Jecha Camp was easy to find just before Chirundu and we managed to slip through the very long lorry queues that are a feature at borders, not only in Africa but also in Latin America.
On arrival to this true green oasis after the Mana Pools dryness, we were warmly greeted by the owners of the camp and shown to our comfortable bungalows. In the meantime we were warned that elephants were frequentl visitors. It was stressed that the latter were wild elephants, unlike the ones in Mana Pools (?). We remembered our Nebbiolo wine incident but politely kept quiet. The elephants are part of a small population of about forty individuals that live in the area and that also visit Chirundu town where they -as expected- come into conflict with the local residents.
There were elephants all the time!
“If an elephant approaches the swimming pool while you are there, move to the opposite side and wait” said the Manager and then added: “they are allowed to drink from the pool but not to bathe”. I immediately imagined the consequences of such an event and remembered the famous elephant in the pool scene of the movie “The Party” with the late Peter Sellers!
THis one came quite close..h
After arrival we spent the sunset at the hide overlooking a small stream where we spotted bushbuck and s few rats up the tree where the hide was built on. After dark we went back to camp (by car as advised) and we were greeted with the “elephants in camp” warning. We were advised to move carefully around the facilities in the dark. As we had no plans for “night walking” we were not too concerned but, indeed, the elephants were walking about feeding on the pods from the apple-ring acacia from the lawn. One of them -I thought smartly- was picking pods only from under one of the camp lights!
That night after going to bed, we heard a commotion at the back of our chalet and realized that two elephants were apparently busy unpacking our car! When we went to inspect the situation, we saw that, despite the watchman’s efforts to shoo them off, they were intent to get the contents of our roof rack! Only then we realized that we had -carelessly- forgotten our Mana Pools rubbish bag on the rack and that was the reason of their intense interest! Aware that there was nothing to be done -apart from re-collecting the rubbish the following day- we returned to bed, leaving a worried watchman that we failed to persuade to leave the animals alone!
One of the troublemakers near the car, after the rubbish incident.
Luckily, the following morning the car was still there, intact, but we spent quite sometime collecting all the bits and pieces that they had scattered around the area!
Elephants were not on camp sometimes but rather all the time! In several occasions we were forced to move away from our sitting areas to keep a prudent distance from the pod-collecting giants that would get too close for comfort.
Although we tried our hand at fishing, only our son caught a medium-sized tiger fish after a lot of boating efforts over the two days we spent in the river. However, fishing was only the excuse to travel the Zambezi! We had a great time remembering our old days when we navigated these waters in our inflatable rubber dinghy and we really enjoyed seeing the large pods of hippo and the occasional elephants drinking and feeding at the river shore.
[1] From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vundu: The vundu is the largest true freshwater fish in southern Africa, reaching up to 1.5 m (5 ft) in length and 55 kg (121 lb) in weight.
Check in…
Some “local customers’ heading for the Reception area at Mana Pools National Park.
Needless to say that we queued correctly while guessing what their business was!
Luckily, they seemed satisfied when they left a while after!
Only then we proceeded to check in!
This is the beauty of Mana Pools National Park: the unexpected is commonplace.
Night visitor
A camera trap is now part of our safari gear as we find it really useful to unobtrusively spot animals at camp and I have already published a few pictures and videos taken with it in the blog. It often reveals what animals that are around and then you can be prepared for their possible appearance and also for surprises as you will read below and in future posts.
This was the case while we stayed at Swimuwini rest camp at Gonarezhou National Park last August. A genet was detected by the camera trap moving near our bungalow.
It was relatively easy afterwards to find it moving about the camp and close to our bungalow in search of something to eat. As it was relatively tolerant of our presence, I took a few colour pictures later on.
All genet species are indigenous to Africa although the common genet was introduced in Europe long ago and it became established there. Related to cats they have a slender body, a rather long ringed tail, a pointed snout and partly retractile paws. Although they have shorter legs they are very agile and fast and they are at ease both on the ground and on trees. They are omnivorous and, apart from invertebrates and small vertebrates they feed on fruits and plants.
An interesting observation, again through a camera trap in the Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park in South Africa, showed a large spotted genet riding on the backs of both buffalo and rhino![1] So, next time I see any of these large mammals I will look for extraordinary riders apart from the usual oxpeckers!
[1] See: https://wildlifeact.com/blog/camera-traps-catch-strangest-behaviour/ for some amazing pictures.
Spot the beast 29
While watching elephants at the Nyamugwe pan in Gonarezhou National Park, a small movement caught my eye up this dead tree. This is what I saw from the distance. Can you see the beast?
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A curious squirrel keeping an eye on our movements. Squirrels -to us- look somehow out of place in Africa but they are a frequent sight in Southern Africa.
Matlakusa
You will recall that on 20 August 2014 I published a post titled “A tusk task” (https://bushsnobinafrica.wordpress.com/2014/08/20/a-tusk-task-2/) where I presented the finding of ab elephant bull that, as far as I could tell, had not been identified before. I called this animal the “Balalala tusker” as we saw it near the Balalala area at Kruger National Park.
A month later in “Unraveling the tusker mystery” (https://bushsnobinafrica.wordpress.com/2014/09/21/unraveling-the-tusker-mystery/). I reported that I got confirmation that what we had seen was indeed a new tusker that “will definitely escalate him to the top of the list when the time for the naming review comes and hopefully at that time he will be confirmed as a new bull and named“.
The naming process took a while during which I kept asking the Emerging Tuskers Project (ETP) of the Letaba Elephant Hall of the Kruger National Park for progress but I had no news for over two years. When I was starting to lose hope, on 28 June 2017, I received an e-mail from the ETP that I reproduce below.
Dear Julio,
I am sure you are convinced by now I had forgotten you. I am sorry this process took so long… I finally got the media release and approvals done and I can formally tell you now that your bull is named Matlakusa.
It proved quiet an interesting story in the end, as once we had identified your bull as a new bull, we noted that with one of our other new bulls some of the submissions characteristics matched your bull better and we actually managed to split these sightings far more accurately after the great series of images you and another contributor provided so it actually helped link the two new bulls and discover a completely new bull and a new area for him as well.
Below is the link to the website as well as the info for Matlakusa (this is a summary of the info that is on file with the project), if you have any further questions please do not hesitate to contact me.
https://www.sanparks.org/parks/kruger/elephants/tuskers/emerging.php#matlakusa
Origin of Name: ‘Matlakusa’ from tlakusa, in Tsonga meaning to ‘raise, lift up’, this is a large open pan and bore-hole, alongside the eastern border, southeast of Malonga in the Kruger National Park and links to this bull’s large home range.
Range: Northern and Far Northern KNP.
Special Features: This bull’s ivory closely resembles that of Xindzulundzulu, that it is fairly symmetrical, straight and widely splayed with a shallow curve from a side profile. The left ear holds the defining characteristics that separate these two bulls, there is a R5.00 sized hole in the tip of the lobe as well as an area of damaged cartilage at the top give a large v-shaped ‘collapse’ in the ear. A very small u-shaped notch and two R0.20 holes are visible on the middle of the lobe but only at close inspection and with the ears extended. The right earlobe had a R0.50 sized hole towards the bottom of the lobe that has recently been torn and is now a u-shaped notch with a small hole towards the inner lobe above this. Other than this the lobe is fairly clean edged. A small protrusion of skin is visible on the trunk at the top adjacent the left tusk. Visible from a side profile is a growth on the left foreleg behind the leg just above the joint.
General: Initial images of this bull from Joël and Di Roerig were identified as Xindzulundzulu due to his ivory shape. Later in 2014 a full series of images submitted by Julio de Castro [1] between Shingwedzi and Balalala created a dilemma as at the time as Xindzulundulu was known to only be local to Shingwedzi and a new bull was suspected. Additional images by regular contributor Frans van Achterbergh submitted showing his left and right side allowed the defining characteristic’s to be seen and to be able to determine that there were in fact two separate bulls. This revelation allowed two previous sightings one of which was by Ian & Deirdre Outram and the other by Forum member Lion Queen both in 2012 that were both previously thought to be Xindzulundzulu but could not be confirmed as the locations did not make sense and defining characteristics in these images were not very clear. However the receipt of the 2014 submission with clearer images could confirm these identifications. Several other images placed with Xindzulundzulu’s monitoring file could now also be separated out as being those of Matlakusa and in 2015/6 it was decided that sightings of him were sufficient to name the bull confirming his status.
Kind Regards
Kirsty Redman, Interpretive Officer, Nxanatseni Region, Kruger National Park, South African National Parks.
As you can imagine we are delighted that our contribution assisted the ETP to identify Matlakusa and separate it from Xindzulundzulu as a new tusker.
Matlakusa showing off its ivory!
We look forward to find Matlakusa again during our next safari to the KNP next week. We hope that Matlakusa will continue to live its peaceful life for many years to come and that its ivory stays with it, where it belongs!
[1] the Bushsnob.
Night surprise!
At night, returning to our bungalow at Swimuwini after a hot shower I took a detour to investigate what looked like a small pond. From a distance I shone my torch in the general area and I froze in my tracks. There was a crocodile there!
Without moving I maintained the light on the reptile’s head -all I could see- and I not only saw it moving but also its eyes shone under the torch’s light! “This is amazing” I thought while watching the beast. I dropped my towel and other shower implements and slowly approached the pond in the dark until I estimated to be close enough to have a good view. Then I switched on my torch again.
To my relief it was a false alarm but a clever ruse nevertheless! Someone had somehow placed a tree trunk semi-submerged in the pond with the intention of making it look like a croc. Whoever he/she was succeeded with me! The movement and shiny eyes were not fiction as the head was a resting place for a bunch of toads [1] that were using the wooden croc as their resting place!
I returned to the bungalow and the following morning I came back to the pond for a better look.
During the day the trunk was more obvious but less so when the toads were on it adding some greenish colour and movement to it!
Luckily it was a wooden croc but it was nice as it offered a good opprtunity to see the toad’s interaction and to take some nice pictures of the batracian colony.
[1] From Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frog). “The use of the common names “frog” and “toad” has no taxonomic justification. From a classification perspective, all members of the order Anura are frogs, but only members of the family Bufonidae are considered “true toads”. The use of the term “frog” in common names usually refers to species that are aquatic or semi-aquatic and have smooth, moist skins; the term “toad” generally refers to species that are terrestrial with dry, warty skins”.
Place of many elephants
It is clear that the more places you see, the more you learn and the more you realize the little you know! Enough of philosophical exertions and focus of the post, I hear you thinking!
Climbing Wrights’s tower to look at the Mwenezi river below spurred my curiosity about who Mr. Wright was but also about the general area where the Gonarezhou[1] National Park is located. The Great Limpopo Trans-frontier Park and Conservation Area was created on 9 December 2002. It took another four years for parts of the fence separating Limpopo in Mozambique and the Kruger national parks to be removed allowing important movement of game across the hitherto fenced area. Things move slowly in conservation!
Wright’s tower.
The sign in Wright’s tower.
Although in April 2014, Mozambique and South Africa signed a memorandum of understanding on biodiversity conservation and management of the area, particularly addressing rhino poaching in the Great Limpopo area, Gonarezhou is lagging behind in this integration. There are, however, fresh hopes that the unique agreement, signed in 2016, between the Frankfurt Zoological Society and the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority to form the Gonarezhou Conservation Trust may facilitate further integration.
Allan Wright was a district Commissioner in Nuanetsi, the District where Gonarezhou is. He arrived to the area in 1958 and declared himself to be an “ardent conservationist”. After a quick exploration of the topography, soils and plants found in the area he was convinced that it was “…From and agricultural point of view the whole area was in the lowest category, almost a wasteland…”.
So, the plans to divide it into farms for African farmers were gradually scrapped and his intentions made clear when he proclaimed:
“Before me, as far as the eye could see, was the vast, empty Gonakudzingwa Purchase Area – ’empty’ only in the human context for it teemed with animal life … the great wilderness looked mysterious, haze blue, inviting. What a heritage! What a wonderful national park this south-east corner of Rhodesia would make.”[2]
So, Mr. Wright managed to persuade the then Government of Rhodesia not only to spare the area from farming but also to give him funds to develop it. He describes his time at Nuanetsi in two books [3]. Mr. Wright’s efforts survived the years to come after his retirement and eventually crystalized in the creation of the Gonarezhou National Park in 1975.
Considering the Gonarezhou in the larger context of the Great Limpopo Trans-frontier Park and Conservation Area, the point where the borders of Mozambique, South Africa and Zimbabwe meet is known as Crook’s Corner. Suspecting that the name had its reasons, I investigate it further and this lead to the unraveling of some interesting facts!
It was because of its “tri-national” characteristic that Crook’s Corner attracted a number of outlaws that found the facility of moving among the three countries very advantageous. Apparently, the exact location of Crook’s Corner is on an island very close to the place where the Luvuvhu River flows into the Limpopo, near to the Pafuri area of the Kruger National Park.
Although there were other brigands, Stephanus Cecil Rutgert Barnard placed it in the world map. Barnard sought refuge there from his illegal activities related to hunting and poaching, two activities very difficult to tell apart in the 1900’s. “The one who swaggers as he walks” that is what his Shangaan nickname Bvekenya meant, arrived there in 1910.
Bvekenya’s derived his living from hunting and or poaching mainly elephants for ivory as well as illegally recruiting labour for the mines (known as blackbirding) as well as trading animal skins. It was a tough life, persecuted by police and exposed to malaria! Bvekenya functioned illegally over vast large tracts of Portuguese East Africa and Rhodesia, successfully running his ivory past the law.
It seems that Bvekenya was a bit of an oddball, to put it mildly and, during the twenty years that he operated in the region, based at Makhuleke, he carried out a number of interesting exploits, from taming a herd of eland for milking to praising lose the beacon indicating the frontier so that he could move it to “migrate” his camp to a different country according to which one was after him! A larger than life character that T.V. Bulpin immortalized in his book “The Ivory Trail” [4].
More amazing still were Bvekenya’s conservation ideas that led him to suggest the creation of a Trans-frontier park at that time (1900!)! It would take over one hundred years before the politicians in the various relevant Governments agreed on the issue and it is still unfinished!
Bvekenya’s hunting ground included the present Gonarezhou National Park. In that general area he shot a number of large elephants for their ivory. It is believed that he was not a careless hunter and that, before killing an animal, he would check the dung with his Shangaan trackers to ascertain the age of their quarry. Only elephants that had passed their prime would be shot and then nothing was wasted as the meat would be consumed by the local people.
Despite his hunting experience Bvekenya was mesmerized by the sight of a particular animal known as “taller than the trees” in the local Zulu language: Dhlulamithi! Bvekenya met this very large tusker while hunting somewhere in Gonarezhou or nearby, at a muddy pan. The bull elephant towered over the large herd he was with. The ivory that Dhlulamithi carried touched the ground while it walked, leaving grooves in the sand behind its path! Bvekenya attempted a shot at the giant but, luckily for Dhlulamithi, a younger bull that walked in front of it at the fatal moment was hit and Dhlulamithi got away unscathed.
Bvekenya never forgot Dhlulamithi and, while still hunting and or poaching other animals, he kept following it. It took Bvekenya many years to find it again and when he did, towards 1929, he had it in his rifle sights but did not shoot the animal exclaiming “Let it live”.
Tusk size and shape varies with the areas. This bull in Hwange National Park carries thick but rather short tusks.
Whether this took place or not is an issue of debate as other chroniclers claimed that Bvekenya -an inveterate commercial ivory trader- would not have missed such a tusker. This thesis is supported by the appearance in 1932 -a few years after Bvekenya ‘s retirement- of two humongous tusks that were claimed to be Dhlulamithi ‘s that were eventually auctioned in London. The tusks weighed 73 and 73.5 kg and their origin is unclear. They are meant to be now at a London Museum.
Luckily, there still are elephants carrying heavy ivory roaming in the Kruger National Park and, with patience they can be found at the various watering points, particularly in the Northern part of the park [4]. Whenever I see one of these colossuses I hope that Dhlulamithi ‘s genes are still present in them!
These two “friends” were leaving one of the waterholes in the north of the Kruger National Park.
Masthulele seen at the Letaba river (Kruger National Park), together with the tusker below, the largest tuskers I have seen so far.
If lucky, next time I see these colossuses I will remember this story and hope that what I see still carries Dhlulamithi’s genes that will be passed to future generations.
The above, seen by the bushsnob in 2014, is no longer an unknown tusker! (In this regard, see: https://bushsnobinafrica.wordpress.com/2014/08/20/a-tusk-task-2/ and https://bushsnobinafrica.wordpress.com/2014/09/21/unraveling-the-tusker-mystery/ and the next post coming soon!)
[1] “Place of many elephants” is the Shona language is the more accepted meaning of Gonarezhou. It is also translated less often as “sacred place of the elephants” or “elephant’s tusk”.
[2] Quoted from from Wolmer, W. (2007). From Wilderness Vision to Farm Invasions. Conservation & Development in Zimbabwe Southeast Lowveld. James Currey, Oxford. 247p.
[3] Wright, A. (1972). Valley of the ironwoods: A personal record of ten years served as District Commissioner in Rhodesia’s largest administrative area, Nuanetsi, in the south-eastern Lowveld (unknown publisher) and Wright, A. (1976). Grey Ghosts at Buffalo Bend, Galaxie Press. Both books are out of print.
[4] Bulpin, T.V. (2011). The Ivory Trail. Protea BoekhuisEds., 4 edition. 240p.
Postcript: Apart from T.V. Bulpin’s The Ivory Trail book I recommend to visit the following links that will provide you with more detail, if interested:
https://www.africahunting.com/threads/the-legend-of-dhlulamithi.15191/
http://www.pendukasafaris.com/history/remembering-bvekenya-country-life-february-2003/
A Bushsnob out of Africa 