March 2008 will be near the top of my list of most disturbing months in terms of human intolerance. Two incidents involving our tourist guides occurred that leave a bad aftertaste. On the first occasion, our sunset drive safari vehicle took a wrong turn and apparently trespassed on a neighbour’s property. In front of the guests, another tour operator verbally abused our guide. Later a threat was made to remove the keys from our vehicle’s ignition.
Even worse, on another occasion near Satara camp, another of our guides had strayed across to the right hand side of the road, where he stopped to allow clients to view an animal. The driver of another car alighted from his vehicle ( this itself is an illegal action) and struck our driver in full view of the guests.
To their credit our guides acted with the greatest restraint, and, on both occasions, behaved very professionally. I apologise for any negative perception regarding South African hospitality that may have arisen from these incidents. We have never before experienced such boorish behaviour.
I have reacted as follows:
The Sunset Drives will from now on, as far as possible, also be conducted on Balule Plains. The game viewing there has been excellent. As for the driver who assaulted Bongani, I have made efforts to identify him, with a view to institute criminal proceedings.
On a happier note, Viva Safaris has been chosen as preferred operator by another large travel agent. The effect of having hostesses at Tremisana and Marc’s has been acknowledged and we have received numerous positive reports. Well done Pearl and Gerda !
I promised in last month’s newsletter to give more input re the elephant culling. For practical reasons, we need to consider the emotions of the general public. The resumption of culling may well send a disturbing message to all wildlife lovers that the Kruger authorities are callous in their attitude to wildlife management. While I sympathise with wildlife enthusiasts and genuinely believe that no animal should be removed from Kruger, I am convinced that there is enough evidence to show that elephants do adversely affect biodiversity. My personal experience allows me to testify to the effect elephants have had on the vegetation around Tremisana Lodge. We had a herd of over 70 last year that stayed for two days. In that period the majority of Marula trees were either pushed over or significantly cropped. It looked like a cyclone had hit the veld. Today, after almost a year, the trees have recovered somewhat but are not as tall as before.
I have ascertained that the drug used in previous culls, Succinylcholine Chloride, commonly known as Scoline, will not be used again. The effect of Scoline is to tranquillise the elephant while the sharpshooter arrives. In this two or three minute interval, it was clear that the elephants were suffering and some even suffocated. The Park authorities have indicated that sharpshooters will cull the elephants without use of immobilizers, thus allowing for a vastly more humane cull.
I recall that when we first developed Tremisana in 1995, our night drives enjoyed numerous sightings of aardvark. Once the fences with Kruger Park were dropped and lions (and elephants) arrived at Tremisana, the frequency of aardvark sightings dropped significantly. Thankfully aardvark numbers have stabilized again, but I remember feeling very annoyed with the lions at the time ! I certainly never entertained the possibility of culling lions!
I believe that the main attraction of Kruger is its biodiversity and it is not uncommon for our tourists to see more than 25 different mammal species in a single day.
The issue of elephant destructive behaviour has resulted in our immediate neighbour refusing to drop his fences. He is an ardent arborphile ( lover of trees) and has some tree specimens that are around 1000 years old. If he were to drop his fences, the property would be instantly part of Kruger Park and its economic value would treble, but such is his awe of the destructive capabilities of elephants that monetary considerations fall away. I recall one of our elephants once broke through this fence and we had to hastily hire a helicopter to herd it back lest it damage the millennium-old trees.
GAMEVIEWING
As the veld dries out, so the gameviewing improves.
BONGANI started the month by viewing five cheetah eating an impala along the Orpen-Satara road. Further on he and his guests came across two Ground Hornbills eating a Puffadder.
On the 21st he found a pride of eight lions on Balule Plains. They were clearly full and showed limited interest in some buffalo and wildebeest a short distance away. On the 22nd his group were watching a fight between a Slender Mongoose and a Black Mamba. They were disturbed by another vehicle and the mongoose ran away. These fights are pretty even and in my experience, the mongoose is usually the aggressor.
CHARLES , as with Bongani , had a good 1st March. His group had a viewing of eight lions at a waterhole. On the 5th , he had excellent viewing on the S100 road : two separate leopard sightings, a pride of lions and three rhino wallowing in mud. On 6th Charles saw a cheetah with cubs as well as wild dogs – a fairly rare viewing. On a bush walk at Marc’s his clients came across mating buffalos. The next walk he undertook on 31st , the group were charged by the buffalo and Charles had to fire a warning shot which immediately put the buffalos to flight.
MESHACK also reports viewing mating lions on 2nd March. On 6th March, he spent over an hour while his happy guests watched two lionesses with four small cubs. Later that same day, the guests enjoyed a beautiful sighting of a large leopard right on the road. On the 19th a pride of lions eating a zebra was encountered near Timbavati. Another great sighting of 10 lions occurred on the Gudzane road on 22nd This same pride was seen on 24th stalking a buffalo.
NELLY has had a good moth of gameviewing and is especially proud of the number of rhino sightings he had. I reckon that White Rhino numbers in Kruger must be close to 7000.
On my personal visit in March into Kruger, I tried to photograph something different from the cats that I proudly showed off in the last newsletter. Here are some of my photos :
 
 
I received a letter from a reader who happens to teach English in the UK. She complimented me on the use of the word “ coalition ” as the collective noun for cheetah and has asked for more – she intends to test her A level classes. Most of our USA guests usually use the word BUNCH to describe collections. For their benefit, as well as the teacher of English, I include the following :
(See how many you knew out of 10)
A POD of Hippo
A SOUNDER of Warthog
A CLAN of Hyena
A JOURNEY of Giraffe
A DAZZLE of Zebra
A CRASH of Rhino
A LEAP of Leopards ( I have seen at most two together so I think PAIR is also OK )
A BUSINESS of mongooses
A SKULK of Jackals
A DRAY of Squirrels
NEWS AT TREMISANA
Pearl has done a great job in hosting guests. Her friendly disposition and genuine concern about our guests’ wellbeing have really endeared her to our clients. Her daughter, Leigh, is also at Tremisana and is keen to follow a career in hospitality. She certainly has a great example from her mom !
The monkey troop is back and have decided that they also want to enjoy the new lapa. They play with the chesspieces, enjoy the hammocks also and even have a look through the odd wildlife magazine !
Tremisana Dam is almost empty. Our Warden, Wynand, has advised us to deepen the dam in the dry season. This may allow the water supply to last a little longer next dry season.
As mentioned in last month’s newsletter, a pride of eight lions pulled down a giraffe cow less than 100 metres from Tremisana Dam. The number of vultures present was unbelievable – I reckon all the Moholoholo vultures as well as the majority of Kapama and Timbavati vultures were there. A rough estimate was made at about 200 !! The lions stayed on Tremisana property for 3 days and the roaring at night was truly unforgettable.
NEWS AT MARC’S
A White Rhino is regularly depositing his dung in an effort to mark his territory near the main camp. The number of White Rhino is now over 20 and soon we will have to start exporting some bulls. The bulls are very territorial and are likely to kill each other if there is a shortage of space.
A new guest toilet has been built below the library which, in turn, has been converted to another room for our guides. Our tents are also complete and were popular over the Easter period.
Gerda has settled into her new role as fulltime hostess at Marc’s. Her fluency in Afrikaans is a big help to our Afrikaans-speaking South African guests.
A number of newly-born nyala have been noticed around the camp. Nyala appear to have two seasons when they drop their young : March/April or November/December.
The Klaserie River which runs through our property is flowing strongly and the nearby Klaserie Dam is over 75% full, so we are assured of water the whole year round. This bodes well for game viewing especially in the dry winter months.
NEWS AT CHEETAH INN
The fruit of the Waterberry, Syzygium Cordatum, has attracted numerous animals and birds. We have seen large flocks of Green Pigeons as well as Plum-Coloured Starlings, Purple-Crested Loeries and even a Narina Trogon. Mammals that enjoy the fruit are Eppauletted Fruit Bats and Vervet Monkeys that feed directly from the trees while Warthog, Duiker and Bushpig feed voraciously on fallen fruit.
These animals in turn have attracted predators and we have picked up spoor of hyena and leopard in the month of March.
The prevailing winds have been favourable and a hot-air balloon company takes off regularly from Cheetah Inn for its airborne safaris over the Kapama Game Reserve.
NEWS FOR OUR TRAVEL PARTNERS
Despite the increases in both petrol and food prices and the expected electricity hikes, Viva Safaris is committed to honour all advertised tariffs until 31 December 2008. We also undertake to maintain all standards and levels of service.
We have booked a stand at INDABA 2008 – the travel show held in Durban every May. Ronald has undertaken to use his carpentry skills to assist in decorating the stand. We invite you to pop in and have a cappuccino with us.
I include the best comments from our Guest Books at Tremisana and Marc’s. These were submitted by Pearl and Gerda respectively.
Tremisana :
Lucy Thatcher, Australia. “ Fantastic couple of days. Kruger was amazing ! Thank you to the warm staff for a friendly welcome ”.
Pablo and Irene, Spain. “ A beautiful place with the best people. We hope to return to Africa to see you all again. Thanks for everything ”.
Ian, Helen and Chris, UK . “ Awesome experience! Better than we imagined. We saw 4 of the Big Five on the very first day ! Staff were super – we didn’t want to leave. Guides were fantastic ”.
Marc’s :
Wendy and Ronald , wdancer@gpwaltons.co.za “ Wonderful, fantastic and good for the soul ”
Andrea and Sandra , Switzerland. “ What an amazing treehouse ! Thanks for this unique experience. Don’t forget the buffalos ! ”
Carlos Minoz, carlosmm08@gmail.com “ Incredible time ! Everyone was great and always helpful. Watch out for the buffalo ! ”
With kind regards,
Piero
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