Windy Day at Samara

Today we had a late start, because Haley had to take the cruiser to do a game drive for some guests that are staying at the lodge. Sometimes there are a lack of game rangers on the property so either Haley or Alwyn need to drive around the guests. Everyone but Drew and I went down to the south part of the property to retrieve some tents that we put up a week or so ago, in hopes that we would go camping there soon; however since a few of the volunteers here are going to Addo Elephant National Park this weekend, they need a tent for the night. I decided not to go because I will be seeing the same animals they will see later in my stay in Africa, and because I kind of need a little time away from some of the volunteers here. The wind would be horrible today in the South, so Drew and I figured we would see more around here if we just us two went walking around. We walked for about 5 hours around the property and saw a lot of cool birds such as the Brown-hooded King Fisher and Southern Boubou to name a couple. We tried to sneak up on a few Red Hartebeest, but they were all over us because the wind was blowing in their direction. I saw a leopard tortoise and the spotted eagle owl, which was cool because I haven’t seen either one since I’ve been here, but the owl got flew away before I could get a good picture. Alwyn, Drew, and I are going to do our own mission while they are gone. We are most likely going to stay out in the bush for an entire night, and try and find some interesting nocturnal action, like a jackal hunt, an aarvark searching for termites, a group of rhino sleeping, a genet hunt, or maybe something completely different… we’ll just have to play it by ear

Pictures!

I forgot to mention that one of the cheetahs brother keeps coming by the boma, so they are trying to capture him as well, by using that trap Alwyn is standing by. They are putting zebra meat inside it tomorrow, so I'm curious to see what happens!

Mammal Survey, Cheetah Boma, Lecture

Today Alwyn and I woke up at 6 to fix a flat tire, but then realized that there was no glue to patch the inner tube. We ended up coming back to the housing quarters, having some breakfast, and then fixed the tire with the entire group. After the tire was fixed, we went on a drive on the outskirts of the valley to do a mammal survey. Peter, the general manager of Samara, asked us to drive by the cheetah boma every day so that the cheetahs would become less skittish to people over time. One of the female cheetahs in the boma is very shy, and always freaks out when we drive by, but I’m sure she will get used to us soon. After our drive, Graham Curley, a professor at Port Elizabeth, gave us a talk about how science is relevant to game management, and habitat conservation. He gave the lecture at the tracker academy, which only a pitching wedge away, so that all the tracker students could listen to the talk as well. One of the trackers, named Nathan, is the only tracker student I know relatively well, so I asked him if I could go out with him and the students soon, and he invited me this weekend, so that will be fun. These guys know so much about the bush, so I can’t wait to pick their brain about everything they know. The weather today is very cold, probably about 40 degrees, 30 wind-chill, so I don’t think we are doing much the rest of the day. I’ll convince Alwyn to take us on a night drive after dinner, because the nocturnal animals seem to enjoy colder temperature. It was cold last night as well, and the sky was so unusual looking...

A Day with Peter the manager

Today we went on a river walk to do some research for the vervet monkey people. They only study two groups of vervet monkeys, and are curious to see how many groupings there are on the river. Since they are busy doing their daily research on their particular monkey groups, we generously did a monkey count down the dried up river. We only counted 4 monkeys, which was a bit of a disappointment, but the walk was nice nonetheless. After the walk we had some lunch, and then Peter the general manager of Samara came and gave us a talk on mammalian surveying and erosion. Then for the first time, he drove us by the cheetah boma to try and get the cheetahs to be less skittish when a car drives up to them. They have 5 cheetahs in the boma at the moment, 3 of which are going to be sold so that the antelope on the property can manage their population size. So once the other two cheetah are released to roam the property, they will have these new chips installed on their body, so that the rangers and the reserve management team can track what they are eating, how often they are eating, and where they are roaming, so that they can accurately decide how many cheetahs can live within the property. After visiting the boma, we drove to the land rehab site, where my reed project took place. Peter was very impressed with the work we had done, and insisted we continue our hard work. Tonight’s soccer game should be a great one… Spain versus Germany is going to be a battle!

Reed Project Touch-up Day

Today we split up in the same groups as we did for our hike the other day. “Team America” went and did some final touches on the reed project, and the Brits went with the Vervet monkey people to follow them for the day. Peter, the general manager of Samara, is going to check on our erosion work tomorrow, so Alwyn wanted to make sure it looked as good as possible. I put in a few more reed walls that were longer than the rest, and built them up 3 reeds high, instead of 2 reeds (like we did before). The wind has been howling all day, and the dust has been blowing everywhere, so we will probably just take it easy for the rest of the day. I also need to nurse some huge blisters on each of my hands that are killing me from making holes for the reed posts to fit into. Once they become calluses, I’ll be good to go! Finally there is some soccer to watch tonight (Nederlands versus Uruguay). I don’t know what I’m going to do once the World Cup is over… It’s gone by so fast! The monkey people are going to come over and watch the game with us, and have a braai if the wind dies down. I’m pulling for the Nederlands all the way now.

Kandoa Mountain Pictures

Kandoa Mountain Camping

Yesterday we went up Kandoa mountain, and hiked up there for the day, and camped outside an abandoned farmhouse during the night. The grasslands are a great spot to find black wildebeest, eland, cape mountain zebra, buffalo, and steenbok. We split up into two hiking groups since there are 9 volunteers here now. One team, which we named “Team America” because it was the 4th of July, consisted of Jack and John, who are the two guys from Alabama, Drew (South African), Alywn and I. We managed to sneak up pretty close to a group of black wildebeest, which was neat, and we convinced John to crawl up on a territorial male, which isn’t the smartest idea because they will usually mock charge you since humans seem much smaller on all fours. He didn’t get charged, but it was quite comical nonetheless. We got back to our campsite at about 3:30 to get some firewood, and set up our spot for the night. We built a fire, had a braai, and then went on a night drive in hopes of finding an aardwolf. We didn’t really see much, except a few zebra, jackal, and wildebeest. We all were going to sleep inside the abandoned farmhouse, but Alywn thought that it was infested with fleas, so we slept on the front lawn instead. During the night two male buffalos were grazing 5 meters away from us, and I was the only one who woke up while they were there. I was afraid they were going to step on us, so I watched them graze for an hour or so until they moved off. Today we saw the buffalo in the morning not too far from our campsite as we were driving down the mountain. It’s only 2pm now, and I believe we are going on a river walk today. Another lovely day!