Category: Ranger’s Journal

Happy New year to all our fans, and we sincerely hope you have a very prosperous year so that you can get your butts back to Tuningi for more safari fun times !!

Ok, so… this month we did not have too many busy days at the lodge, as everyone returned from the crazy festive season, but there were a few nice things that happened… lets have a look…..

Tsala and her handsome son made a couple of appearances, and it seems as if he is really responding well to the habituation process with the safari vehicles, and is taking the highlight of your safari to an all new level !!He is growing nicely, and was even seen on a young impala kill, which could have been his own, and that would prove that his mother and his massive instinct is driving him to become a real player here in the savannas of Madikwe.

The local lion pride, The Mica Pride…. Well… they are just going from strength to strength, and the cubs are growing fast. The 2 Chimbro males have been spending a huge amount of time here around the lodge, protecting the land from raid by the males from the north, which has resulted in some seriously loud screaming matches which reverberate deep within your body as you just sit down to a glass of wine at dinner time !!

The other interesting sighting we had this month, was the unfortunate death of a male giraffe which we think got struck by lightning not far from the lodge.

He did however give us some awesome sightings of lions and hyenas that came in to feed on the bounty.

But I want to concentrate on the scavengers, and the role that they play once the bigger predators have left the carcass….

What Are Vultures?

A vulture is a bird of prey that scavenges for its food, meaning that it searches the ground for animal carcasses to eat. Typically, these carcasses are what is left uneaten from other predators. This bird species is divided into two distinct groups: New World vultures and Old World vultures. New World vultures are native throughout North and South America while Old World vultures can be found in Asia, Europe, and Africa. Despite their differences in origin, most vultures share a similar appearance. Vulture heads are typically bald or covered in much shorter feathers than those found on the body. Additionally, vultures have a large, hooked beak, which makes tearing and eating flesh easier.

Cultural Significance of Vultures

In many cultures around the world, particularly in Western societies, vultures are viewed with disdain. Commonly, people tend to look down on these birds as dirty, ugly, and unhygienic, failing to recognize their importance. People of other cultures, however, hold the vulture in high regard. This is true with the inhabitants of the Tibetan plateau, where vultures are part of traditional funerary customs. In this culture, people are not buried after death as a means of controlling preventable infectious diseases. Instead, the dead are laid to rest in the sky. Monks prepare the bodies of the deceased and set them on platforms to draw the attention of nearby vultures. The vultures discover these human bodies, ingesting them and carrying them off into the sky. Many people view this as one final good deed as the deceased is able to offer something to another living creature before going off to rest in the sky. This practice is not unique to Tibet, however. Historical evidence suggests it has been practiced by cultures around the world for over 11,000 years.

Role of Vultures in the Ecosystem

Vultures are often overlooked as lowly scavengers. However, they are a key component to maintaining healthy ecosystems. Because of their role as nature’s garbage disposers, vultures are able to keep the environment clean and free of contagious diseases. These birds have an extremely corrosive stomach acid that allows them to consume rotting animal corpses. These scavenged leftovers are often infected with anthrax, botulinum toxins, rabies, and hog cholera that would otherwise kill other scavengers. By ridding the ground of dead animals, vultures prevent diseases from spreading to humans and animals.

Vultures and Poaching

Because vultures are attracted to carrion (dead animals), they have played an indirect role in helping authorities identify illegal poaching activity. This is particularly true of elephant and rhinoceros poachers, who leave the animals’ bodies after removing their tusks and horns. Vultures are attracted to the remains and fly in circles around the ground where it has been left behind. Authorities are able to track recent instances of illegal hunting by following these scavenger birds and taking note of where they are circling.

Poisoning Vultures

Because vultures attract attention to illegal poaching activities, they have become the number one enemy of poachers. A common practice of many poachers is to poison the carcasses left behind after removing tusks and horns from elephants and rhinos. The poachers do this to kill off the vultures so that they can continue their illegal work undetected. One example of this occurred in Namibia in July of 2013, when over 500 scavenger birds (including vultures) were poisoned from a single elephant carcass. It is important to remember that in addition to these direct deaths, many others were killed indirectly. This is because many of these birds quite likely left behind offspring which were relying on their parents to bring food back to the nest. Experts claim that this poisoning case is one of the worst in the history of Southern Africa.

Vultures are also indirectly poisoned by local farmers and hunters. In African countries, for example, farmers often leave poisoned meat or carcasses on their farmlands. They do this to distract predatory animals, like lions and cheetahs, from killing villagers and their livestock, like cows and goats. Unfortunately, vultures are also attracted to this poisoned carrion and many have died as a result of ingesting the poison. Something similar happens in the United States, where many hunters use lead ammunition to kill target specie, like coyotes. Once shot, the animals typically run off into the wilderness and die. Vultures then find these animals and set about consuming them. These birds end up eating some of the lead ammunition as well and are slowly poisoned. California condors are most likely to suffer this unfortunate fate.

Effect of Smaller Vulture Populations

As a result of direct and indirect killing, many vulture species are now endangered. Of the 23 vulture species (16 Old World and 7 New World) 16 are considered vulnerable, threatened, or endangered. The population of several of these species has declined by over 90% in some areas of the world. When vultures are unable to clean up the carrion in an area, other scavenger animals increase in population. The scavengers that tend to move in where vulture populations are low include: feral dogs, rats, and blowfly larvae. While these animals do help to remove carcasses from the landscape, they are also more likely to spread disease to human populations and other animals as well. In India, for example, the feral dog population increased significantly after vultures consumed cow carcasses poisoned with diclofenac, a painkiller. These feral dogs carried rabies and went on to infect other dogs and local people. Between 1993 and 2006, the government of India spent an additional $34 billion to fight the spread of rabies. India continues to have the highest rate of rabies in the world.

What Can Be Done to Save Vultures?

In order to save the vulture species from extinction and protect the complex ecosystems from becoming overrun with carrion and disease, the current number of vulture deaths must be reduced. Around the world, but mainly focused in Asia and Africa, nonprofit organizations are working with local governments to implement conservation plans. These plans typically include public educational campaigns in order to target local populations, farmers and poachers. Because vultures are also used for traditional medicine in some places, these organizations and governments are working to create regulations that control the killing and selling of vultures. Additionally, many organizations are dedicated to increasing research of vultures and their roles in the ecosystem.

It is important to remember that even though the vulture species lacks the cute cuddly appearance of some endangered species, it is still a critical piece to a much larger, complex ecosystem. The world needs vultures to help control the spread of disease.

We also had some awesome sightings of the male cheetahs taking down a zebra, which was quite I big one I might add, and the news of the females is that they are doing extremely well, and have seemed to have split into 2 and 1, and they have already had some interaction with the males, resulting in one of the females getting slightly injured, which we fixed up. They have been making some kills, and we hope that they are learning how to deal with the bigger predators like hyenas and lions, as this would be their biggest victory for survival here in Madikwe.

With all the rain we have had this month, the bush is really starting to turn green, and the animals are loving it !!Not as much as the amphibians though, and I just want to share some info on the FOAM NEST FROG, which I am sure you have all seen at some point….

Sometimes animals do the strangest things. Like building a nest out of foam. It just seems like a strange choice of places to lay your eggs, but hey, if it ain’t broken, don’t fix it. Anyway, today’s animal, the grey foam-nest frog, chooses this method to reproduce. I guess that makes sense, given the frog’s name.

Foam-nest frogs are found in Africa, pretty much everywhere south of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. They live in tropical and subtropical forests in the north, and in drier savanna in the south. Dry areas are not the best habitats for frogs, who lose moisture through their skins, but the foam-nest frog has some key adaptations to deal with this.

One of the ways the frog conserves moisture is by tucking its legs under itself, keeping its surface area low. It also has impermeable skin, unlike most amphibians, which lose water freely though their skin. This allows the foam-nest frog to produce uric acid as excrement instead of urine, which saves a ton of water. Finally, the frog is able to secrete a waterproof cocoon in the dry season to further minimize the amount of water lost.

When these frogs mate, however, all attempts at conserving moisture are thrown out the window. Defenestrated, even. The female secretes some nasty fluid from her cloaca, on a branch or structure overhanging some water. Males then join the female, and whip up the secretion into a foam. Many males can join the party, and sometimes multiple females will also show up. The females have to return to the water multiple times during this process to get enough liquid to build a suitable nest.

Once the nest is prepared, which can take up to seven hours, the female lays her eggs in the foam. Anywhere from 500 to 1300 eggs can be laid in a single nest. The eggs hatch in the nest and in three to five days the tadpoles drop out of the nest and into the pond.

Why these frogs choose to build nests out of foam I do not know, but my guess is that the frogs want to keep the eggs moist, but out of pond where predators might have their way with them. That may not be why, but at least the foam nest thing makes these frogs super cool!

Ok… well.. that’s it ….

See you all soon ….

Regards,

Gavin and the T-Team

For the last time this year I will update you on the movements and adventures of the animals in Madikwe.

We got some rain over the past month that made a massive difference in the bush and with the greenery came plenty baby animals.

The Redhartebeest and Gemsbok were some of the first to have their young.  We then started to see a few impala babies too.  But with more rain, within a week or so most impalas gave birth and the herds almost doubled in size.  The Wildebeest are in smaller herds but most of them had little one as well.

This photo was taken seconds after the little wildebeest was born, still wet and struggling on its feet.

Other very good news, is the 3 female Cheetahs that were released into the park.  They have been in the Wild now for about 2 weeks and are doing very well.  None of the females are unrelated, so that will help with the genetics once they start to mate.

The one female has split away from the other two and is living a solitary life as female cheetahs do but she is doing very well and making kills.  The other two are still together but will eventually split.  They too are healthy and are hunting very well.  As far as we know there has not been any interaction with any of the males.  Updates will follow!! Fingers crossed!!

The male cheetahs, both coalitions, are still all over the park.  With the recent full moon, they surprised us again with their incredible movements.  All we can hope for is for them to find the females and treat them well.

Tsala our favourite Leopardess have shown us her cub a few times.  It takes effort, time and a little luck to find a leopard in Madikwe.  We saw their tracks a few times, but sometimes in areas we cannot follow through.  The times we could, we did.  One thing better than seeing a leopard, is seeing a mother and a cub.  The cub is about 8-10 months old, it is the first time she raised a cub to this age.  We really hope this young male can keep himself out of trouble when she leaves him to hunt, which she does very well. All our encounters with the two, she and the young one looked full bellied and in great condition.

The lion pride in the south of the park had been quite entertaining but also annoyed us.  They would for some reason we do not know, split up and walk all over the place, which makes finding them more difficult.  But then the times we do get to see them, they are quite active.  The Bafefo male is taking good care of the females and the cubs, while the Chimbro brothers protect their territory.

These were just some of the sightings we have had.  This month was packed with excitement and great sightings.

The young male leopard was seen a few times. Here we saw him at night on the move. He still moves on the south boundary of the park and hope nothing too exciting attracts his attention on the other side as he can easily jump over the fence.

Just before the rain waterholes had been the place to be.  Later in the morning and early on the afternoon game drives when the temperatures were hot, the animals were seeking comfort at the water.

Thank you to everyone that joined us this year and we hope to see you back at Tuningi again.

Regards

Cornelius and the T-Team

A Warm Madikwe hallo to everyone,

We had amazing guests this month, with amazing sights and great weather. Its been very hot, and getting warmer, but we had a little rain to help the vegetation along and help the animals with a bit of water. It has gotten very dry with the heat over the past month, so the waterholes have been very active with wild life.

Elephants have been a daily occurrence at our waterhole. Swimming, drinking and giving the guest a lot of mid day  entertainment.

The male Cheetahs have been around, marking as they go and then jumping on top of a termite mound to rest with a nice view of the plains. Always eager to strike a nice pose.

The three females are still in the boma and we will keep you updated with their status every month.

Lions, Lions, Lions. Everybody loves these massive cats and deservedly so. The cubs are doing very well and the older ones are almost ready to start hunting with mom. The younger ones are still super playful. The pride is all over the place at the moment but we still get good sightings off all off them.

We have been blessed with great Leopard sightings this month. Tsala’s cub has been spotted a few times and he looks healthy and strong. We are cautiously optimistic about his future since he would be the first cub she raises to adulthood. We have seen her a few times, chilling in a tree and once even hunting and killing an Impala. Munye has also been out and about and seems to be settling in the south.

Happy holidays to everyone. Be safe where ever you travels take you. And remember, we are always awaiting you return.

Kind Regards

Jacques and the T-Team

A warm Rocktober to all of our fans again….

Yes, this month has been ROCKING with some very exciting news, that our UNDERGROUND HIDE has been completed !!

If you are a keen wildlife photographic enthusiast (like me…. Hehehe), you will love the new edition to the lodge, and this has long been a priority goal for me to achieve here at Tuningi, and now we have one !!!

So, while you used spend some time at our awesome waterhole underneath the Fig Tree enjoying a cold beer or crispy G&T, which by the way was not too shabby either, you can now go underground and get on ground level with the wildlife that comes for a drink at the waterhole, and you will be blown away by the experience, as the elephants walk right past the windows, giving you some serious perspective of the size of these awesome creatures. You will be able to create some amazing images with a wide-angle lens, and even get some nice low angle photos of the giraffe, zebra, buffalo, kudu, impala etc. bending down to have drink.

So lets get into some of the highlights for this months sightings….

The temperatures have been soaring, and we have even had some early rain at the beginning of the month, which has kick started the savanna into a spurt of new growth much to the appreciation of the animals, as they were only expecting this to happen after “SUICIDE MONTH” which is October, the driest month of the year. So the bush has started turning much greener, and promises of a good rainy year lay ahead. We have had numerous sightings of the rare and highly endangered black rhino, and they are always going to get your blood pressure rising as they run towards the vehicle with some tenacious intent, but will always stop, snort and then run away into the undergrowth nearby. Please remember, that our rhinos in Madikwe are under threat from the scourge of poaching, and if you would like to help us fight this war, please don’t be shy to contact us so that we can give you the details of Madikwe’s own conservation fund, where you can make a difference by donating funds no matter how small or big it may be… every little bit helps !!

P.S There are a lot of online sites out there doing great work, but in most cases Madikwe never gets to see any of these funds, so please this is the best for Madikwe directly .

Speaking of rare… we also have been seeing a herd of Eland around the lodge, and when they are close enough to get a photo, you are reminded of the sheer size of especially the males, which can weigh around 850kg !! With the heat comes some awesome sightings of elephants at the waterholes quenching their never-ending thirst, and then taking a mud bath to cool down, spraying cool mud and water over their bodies to accelerate the cooling of blood via thousands of veins and arteries close to the skin surface where their body temps drop by as much as 5 degrees Celsius. Our local pride of lions with the 6 cubs are doing extremely well, and are been successfully protected by the 3 males which dominate the south west of the park. On one occasion the 2 Modimo males from the east made an incursion one day, which scattered the pride in all directions, but thanks to the quick response from the boys, they were soon pushed back into their own territory further east, and have not since returned.The 2 male from the north have also made several incursions tot the south, and one morning we followed them beein chased at high speed back north and over the ridge by 2 of the local boys, with a lot of accompanying roaring and scent marking to enforce the dominance they have put in place here.

The lionesses and their cubs are producing some amazing sightings, as the cubs have a never-ending desire to get the last bit of protein rich milk from mom, which is soon going to dry up, as the cubs approach the day they will be weaned off of this life-giving treasure. The Bafefo male, which seems to be spending a lot of time with the cubs, is slowly getting to know his offspring more and more intimately, as they push his levels of patience by biting his tail, mane or just jumping over him in their youthful games . On one amazing morning we were involved with the start to finish kill on an impala, which raised a few eyebrows, as the clinical coordination of the lionesses to catch one of the faster prey items awed the galleries on our vehicles. The prize was small, and the competition to grab the best part of the hapless impala was intense, and the images speak for themselves…. Cheetah sightings have been good, with the 2 coalitions of two males still patrolling the entire park in search of females, which until recently they have not yet found. The good news is that the park has acquired 3 females which are due for release into the park around December after their habituation process in the holding facility in the north. We are hoping with abated breath, that they will establish themselves into the system, and give us some cubs soon…. The other awesome news that we mentioned in previous newsletters was that we thought that Tsala, our resident leopardess had a cub, and we can now confirm that she has… She was spotted on a few occasions with a very healthy looking 8 month old ball of fur. Sightings of her however have been very scarce, as she is very crafty at evading us as only a leopard can. So we hope that she will finally be able to raise this cub to adulthood. We are going to be monitoring this very closely.Munye has also been a little scarce this month, but we did have one memorable sighting of him, as he moved his impala kill from the tree to a bush on the ground, and the stealth and strength that these cats possess is immense, and will blow your socks off if you lucky enough to witness them in action.

The Wild Dogs in the park, have started moving around with the puppies, and have been spending quite a bit of time in the south west, much to our great approval. The puppies have a voracious appetite and the pack has had to kill almost daily to satisfy the hunger of their offspring.All 6 puppies are looking very healthy and loving the free roaming lifestyle that wild dogs have, and are very inquisitive, exploring everything that roams in their kingdom.

On one afternoon, after a deserved G&T had by our guest on drive, we went in search of the wild dogs. As the temperatures started cooling, we managed to locate them, and they were keen to hunt ….

After following them for some time, they bumped into a big male giraffe, and the pups showed some cute antics as they tried to figure out whether or not this juggernaut of the savanna was edible. They soon lost interest in the giraffe, and came out at a waterhole, where the light was just sublime, and made for some awesome photos.

Wild dogs don’t drink too often, as they get most of their moisture requirements from the animals that they eat, but given an opportunity, will drink if they pass by the precious resource.

A Dazzle of zebra also pitched up at the waterhole at the same time, and one of the adults mock charged the herd as they were quenching their thirst, which created pandemonium, as they all tried franticly to get out of the water.

The break-away pack of 3 females have also been spending a lot of time on our side of the park this month, and are proving that they are a very efficient hunting unit, as they are creating havoc with the poor impala population wherever they seem to go. Lets hope that we can possibly find a male with new genetics to begin a new pack in the park….

Well… thats all folks….

Hope to see you all soon, back at Tuningi Safari lodge….. You know you will be back !!!

Regards,

Gavin and the T-Team

Hi Everyone,

Tuningi had a fantastic September with extraordinary sightings and great guests. We even had the pleasure of being blessed with a bit of rain that was just enough to get that amazing fresh smell you can only experience in Africa called Petrichor. Petrichor is a new word Cornelius taught me recently which is the earthy scent produced when rain falls on dry soil. Lets get to some of the sightings and news we have for you.

 

 

I cannot start with any other sighting than this incredible encounter between buffalo and lion. On departure from the lodge one morning we were informed by one of our friends that he has found two of our dominant male lions. The news were welcomed with great enthusiasm since it was close to the lodge and what more exhilarating way to start the day.

 

 

As we arrived at the location we observed two lion brothers interacting with two buffalo bulls. The intention of the lions were to separate the buffalo from each other which would allow them to focus only on one and to prevent the other from helping his comrade. Buffalo are known to defend each other in occurrences like these and might even return to settle the score and retrieve its fallen comrade. Male buffalo physically peak at about 10 years of age and normally leave the herd once they have been conquered and replaced. This by no means mean they are easy prey. The lions succeeded with only one buffalo left to take on the fight.

 

 

Then the struggle began. Even though this was quite an old Buffalo, they knew it would be a struggle to take him down. Buffalo, in my opinion, is the real life representation of never giving up, being known for their brute strength and and mean demeanor.

 

 

In this photograph, if you look closely, you can see both his back legs are pointing forwards. Lion are known to attack the hind side and rear legs. By this point the lions have tried to immobilize him by chewing of the back leg tendons. The buffalo is chasing the Lions around on his knees. This Buffalo would not give in, he would not surrender, showing of his never say die attitude. What a legend.

 

 

This continued for about an hour before the third male joined in the action. Now three male lions were still unable to bring down the interminable fighting buffalo. Enter the five females and the six cubs, still being unable to end the struggle.

 

 

After the female Lions entered the fray, one male started showing a bit too much interest in a female in in heat. The dominant brother of the three took offense and the brothers had a scuffle. This while the Buffalo on three legs were still alive and surrounded by the remainder of the pride. Two and a half hours later we eventually decided to head back to camp.

 

 

The following morning, almost 24 hours later, the lion pride managed to finally take the Buffalo down. Almost five kilometers from where it all started. What a sighting. Hats off to the Buffalo that wouldn’t stop fighting.

 

 

The Wild Dogs have finally started moving away from the den site in the mountains. They came to visit our area for a while. The pups are about six months old now and looking very healthy. We are proud to say the Wild Dog population is now up to nineteen Dogs. They are slowly rebuilding after the rabies outbreak a few years ago.

 

 

The male Cheetahs are still doing very well and we see them often. There is some news on the Cheetah front. The shareholders of some lodges banded together to get some female Cheetahs to Madikwe. This is a very difficult process since there are so few wild female Cheetah out there and owners’ don’t really want to let their females go. They eventually got three females from a breeding center. This is not ideal since they have never been in the wild, are not familiar with the new environment and being around other predators. An action plan is in place to overcome these issues, but only time will tell. At this point we are trying to be positive and hopeful that they will make it once they get released into the main park.

 

 

And that is all the news we have for you. Who doesn’t love a Giraffe and a sunset…

 

Kind Regards

Jacques and the T-Team

To drive before sunrise and after sunset has paid off massively the past month.

Every day the sun is rising earlier and setting later, so, we changed our game drive times accordingly. So, the wake-up calls are slightly earlier and we are out on drive a bit later.

The landscape has changed a sicnificantly the past month.  Most trees only started lost their leaves recently and in some areas the grass is still very tall. The August winds are here in full force making some days a bit uncomfortable with the dust all around, however the very next day we have beautiful clear skies.

With the strong winds, our tracking skills were tested as the tracks disappeared in front of your eyes. But, we succeeded at the end.

The past few weeks was, for me, a very rewarding time with the verity of sightings we had.

The Jamala lioness have four new cubs of about 2 and a half months old.  She is hiding them very well and protecting them rather aggressively.  She does not even want the vehicles get too close and warn us when we are close enough.

We saw them one day without her presence, when their older siblings lured them out of their hiding spot and played with their new family members.

Luckily we were gone by the time their mom came back.  I am sure a few growls and claws were lashed out at the older youngsters.

All the waterholes that still have water are full of activity. The waterhole at the lodge are busy on a daily basis with a variety of general game but also big herds of elephants enjoying a mud bath and a drink.

We saw both the coalitions of male cheetahs a few times in the north and south of Madikwe.

On one particular morning we went looking for them in the north western part of the park. After a while without any tracks to follow and the odd crow sitting without any indication of a kill around it was time for us to stop for morning coffee.

As I was about to stop, I saw a very excited Brown Hyena, and then a couple of Jackal. All of a sudden, hell broke loose behind a tree close by, when the Cheetahs defended their fresh kill from the hyena. They jumped and hissed at the hyena, saving their kill.

The hyena knew he would not stand a chance and left them to eat. He was still in the area as cheetahs will certianly leave something for the scavengers.

The young Hyenas at the den entertained us a lot the past month.  The younger one of the three has started to change color, looking more like a spotted hyena and less like a bear cub.

With warmer, longer days, come visit us and experience all of this and more with us.

 

Regards

Cornelius and the T-team

A hearty welcome to all our fans once again….

This month has seen winter on its back, and we look forward to some warmer temperatures to follow from next month onwards.

Ok, so this month has as usual been a cracker month as far as wildlife sightings go here at Tuningi Safari Lodge.

We will kick off with a very unusual sighting of White-Faced Owls that I found one afternoon just sitting in a dense acacia thicket right next to one of our game drive roads. What makes it unusual was that there were 6 owls all together, which is the most I have ever seen together in 18 years of guiding, as you usually will see them at night, not in the middle of the day in those numbers !!

Our local pride of lions has been spoiling us with a variety of awesome sightings this month, however they very seldom all been together all in one place at the same time. This is probably due to the fact that the females all have cubs of differing ages….. From 1 ½ years to just 4 weeks old… yes, our newest addition to the Mica pride is the Jamala females litter of 4 brand new cubs that we have located just last week, and this is causing the split in the pride, as the females with the younger cubs do not want the older cubs to come close and play with the very small ones, as they could be a little too rough with them.

They have however been very good at killing prey this month, with zebra been the preferred flavor for this month. As the cubs are growing older, their appetites are growing even larger, and the girls are having to work even harder to provide enough for the pride. Competition around the carcass is increasing and creates amazing sightings as they squabble to get the lions share.

The boys have also had their hands busy, as the Kwande and Monomoholo males have joined up to create formidable opponents to the north of the territory. The opposing coalition has been making regular incursions into the Chimbro brother’s territory, but they have been very successful in sending them back to their own territory further north of the ridge.

And while they have been away from the females, they have been eating well…. Yes male lions do hunt !! They hunt extremely well, they just go for the larger, slower prey like buffalo bulls, as they managed to kill this old guy, and they fed on it for about 4 days before leaving it to the hyenas and jackals.

The carnage does not end here…. One morning we following the older Chimbro and Mica female, as they were hunting what we could not see, when all hell broke loose, and the Mica female managed to catch a young warthog, and had it firmly in her jaws, and once the life had left the hapless pigs body, the big old guy decided that he was going to steal it for himself….. I suppose the king will always have right of way !!

As tough as the males can be, so can they also show some affection and be gentle to their offspring.

Here the king shows his softer side as some of the cubs come over to greet him, but as you can see he really just tolerates them by showing his massive teeth.

And sometimes the big guys just need to rest….

The cheetahs have also given us some WOW photographic opportunities, as they lay around in classical cheetah pose. They are still moving long distances throughout the park, still in search of females, but luckily for us they are frequenting the south west of the park, and we as rangers love tracking them down.

They also seem to have cottoned on to the flavor of the month, being zebra, as one crispy cold morning they managed to bring down a young zebra foal, and made short work of the meat, as they engulfed it in a very short time.

The wild dogs….. Well…. What’s that again…??

Yip, we are still not having much luck with them, as they are still denning in the mountains in the north east of the park, and we are still eagerly awaiting the time for them to bring their puppies down so that we can see how many there are…. But, we have been having a few sporadic sightings of what seems to be a breakaway pack of 3 females, that are roaming the boundaries of the park. Wild dogs will often create these breakaway packs of either females or males that will go in search of similar packs of the opposite sex, where they will then join to create a new pack, and this is how they ensure genetic diversity within the bigger population.

Our leopard sightings this month have been good, due to some very persistent tracking by us rangers, as we have been working tirelessly to find our guests the pinnacle of your safari.

Tsala has been the most difficult to find, and has made a few appearances, and seems as though she has definitely lost her cubs again !! Lets hope she can get this monkey off her back in the future.

Munye on the other hand is travelling huge distances, and has covered the whole south western section of the park, and on one occasion even went on a “ vacation” to the north west of the park, which has caused somewhat of a stir of amusement among the rangers in that we are left wondering why he is moving these large distances among the bigger males in the area. Perhaps he is testing the boundaries of his opponents, to see if he can settle in a space without too much competition from other males. He always seems to find his way back to the south western section of the park, and we hope that he will soon settle down and become the territorial male in our area, and who knows… maybe even mate with Tsala one day….

One morning we made our way to the north eastern section of the park to go and have a look at the new kid on the block… “ Dineo “, a young female who has been giving the guys up in the north east a steady supply of good sightings, as she seems to have accepted the vehicles and has habituated very nicely to us coming to get some good images of her as she goes about her daily chores of being a leopard.

This particular day, she had managed to kill a very large male impala, and dragged it up into a shepherds tree, just in time before the hyenas could get to it. This was quite the feat, as she is not a very large female, and we certainly hope that she will soon be the mother of some cubs, which would mean an awful lot to us here in Madikwe, in that she will be the start of getting more habituated leopards into the park.

The hyena cubs at the den in the south is a great filler sighting to the bigger ones, as the 3 cubs have been parading their cuteness around the vehicles, and the younger cub has just started his transformation from baby fluff into his adult “plumage”, which is a must see… Your expectations of what hyenas are will be changed forever, as they are for me, one of the cutest things out here !!

As the temperatures start getting warmer, the elephants are starting to feel the need to even mud bathe at some of the pans, and sometimes becoming very protective of the scarce commodity, chasing any other animals away from their patch of fun in the sun.

Well, that’s it for this month….

Hope to see you all soon here at Tuningi Safari Lodge ….

Regards,

Gavin and the T-Team.

As the early winter mornings are getting colder, the trees and grass is getting thinner and viewing is getting easier.

With another month gone there is a lot of news to share.

The first big news is that a Hyena den was found. Jip, finally we get to see young and baby hyenas that are getting very relaxed with the vehicles.

They are not always out, but if we visit frequently enough we get to see them.

There are 2 four month old youngsters and one of about two months.

We were struggling to find leopards the past few weeks but we got to see Munye the young male from the south as well as Tsala the resident female.

She killed a male impala, but unfortunately she could not get it up a tree and she lost it to hyenas that night.

The waterholes are getting busy as winter progresses, with all the water in the bush drying up. Even on cold days the elephants have fun in the last spots of mud.

Both coalitions of male Cheetahs made themselves seen a few times and for a short while all of them were spread out in the south of the park.

The lions are doing very well in the cold weather. Their bodies obviously function a lot better than ours when the chill sets in.

They were not always together but within  a week they had four kills between the lot of them.
The Mica female had a wildebeest kill all by her self but then also spend a lot of time with the two Chimbro males.

The rest of the females and young ones had two zebra kills and a wildebeest in less than a week. There is also a possibility of new cubs with the Jamala female but still needs to be confirmed.

With the Wild dogs in a den far to the east of the park we do not get to see them very often. There are three females that has split from the pack and we get to see them when they move closer to our area of operation.

Hopefully the next cold month produces just as much excitement.

Hope to see you soon!!!

Regards

Cornelius and the T-team

Hello again to all our fans !!

May has been a pretty quiet month as far as the lodge not being as busy as we are used to, but has given us some good time to spend on maintenance activities in and around the lodge.The winter has arrived in earnest, as the morning temperatures have dropped substantially, especially in the mornings, but there is nothing that a nice hot water bottle cant fix while you cuddle up with it and your nice warm blanket as you watch the sun get out of its lazy bed of darkness and poke its warming head out of the savanna horizon accentuated by the distant roar of lions.

Our bushveld celebrities have however been doing very well, and have given us some very good sightings over the last month.

Munye, our local young male leopard has in the past reports been showing signs of setting up territory in the south west of the reserve, and has continued doing so, and is marking his territory more seriously now, and he is still overlapping his home range with a very large male, and on some occasions he has been following him in an attempt to oust him from his throne in these areas.He has also been on the scent of a female, which has got his utmost attention, and has been covering large distances in search of this female, which may be in estrus by bellowing out the rasping grunt that only a leopard can…. We hope he finds her, and begins his own empire here in the south.

Tsala, our local queen has made a few abrupt appearances, and seems to be behaving very strangely, and on one occasion we have noticed she may have a developing teat line once again…. Here we go again, and we should all have a special prayer for her so that she can actually raise the cubs this time around.

The cheetah boys in the park are also doing very well, and are moving huge areas across the park in search of a female which we are still struggling to find for them, as there just are not enough genetically unrelated females available in the country to be brought here, but we are still on a priority list to obtain a female as soon as one becomes available.

They also have had their tracking collars removed this month, and I am sure they feel very happy to get rid of that hideous set of jewellery

Our local pride of lions is doing exceptionally well, except for that fact that 2 males have started putting pressure on the Chimbro males from the east, and have made some incursions into the territory once or twice, which has resulted in the Chimbro boys coming home with a few more scars in defense of their stronghold, and seem to have settled the dispute as the intruders have fled further east.

The growing cubs from the Jamala and Matlapa females have endless amounts of energy at the moment and are spending most of their time playing which is very important in their muscle and coordination development for one day when they will use these skills in the hunt to feed the pride.

We also welcomed back the Club Excel group from London which is an incentive based holiday for their top performers, and boy… were they treated to a once in a lifetime opportunity…..

Thanks to the generous donation of the owners, Jim and Isobel Smith, they contributed towards the conservation of our rhinos in the park, which is extremely important as the rhinos are facing increasing threats from poachers on a daily basis.

So this is what went down…….

It was up early one morning to meet the vet, helicopter pilot and parks officials where we given a brief of the activity to follow, which was to treat an injured female rhino, and to notch the ears of her 3 year old calf.

On the arrival of the chopper, we were called in by the pilot who had found our target, and we raced off in the direction that the chopper was hovering.

Once we all arrived, the vet darted both mom and calf, and herded them towards the road we were waiting on with astonishing precision, as the drugs started taking full effect.

Once the two of them were immobilized the vet and his team got to work, as the group helped pushing the calf from its side onto its chest to aid its breathing.

The following procedures are carried out on the rhinos:

• DNA samples from the blood, toe nails, and horn is taken
• The rhinos are given a shot of vitamins and antibiotics
• The ears are notched
• A micro chip is inserted into the horn and shoulder of the animal
• Horn measurements are taken
• The vet treated the female who had a hole in her cheek caused by fighting with another rhino

All of this work is done and the info is captured in a central database in south Africa, which is integral in the management of the species , as well is it also helping in the local management within the park to see where certain individuals live in the park which can also help in the event of an animal been poached, so that we can if the horns are retrieved from an incident, which can then link the crime to the animal, which ultimately helps in strengthening a case should it be needed once poachers are caught.

Ok….. so once all the guests got involved in the procedures and touching and feeling the soft shoulder and behind the knee bits of a rhino, and inspecting the horn… it was time for the vets to administer the reversal drug, and our rhinos got up with shaky legs for a few minutes before gathering their wits and bearings, and then trotted off into the bush all in much better condition that we found them in.

THE RHINOS WERE NAMED IN HONOUR OF JIM AND ISOBEL BY THE GROUP, AND WE WISH “BELLA” (FEMALE) AND “ SMITHY” (CALF) A SPEEDY RECOVERY.

If any of you out there want to get involved with any conservation work like this in the park, please contact us and we can arrange something for you on your next stay here at Tuningi !!

Well…. That’s it for now….

Best regards,

Gavin and the T-Team.

Another newsletter after our long absence.

The mornings are getting cooler by the day and we’ve had a few spectacular misty mornings.

You never realize how many spider webs are around until they are covered in dew.  You get to see all the different types of webs and sometimes the spiders.  This is a combination of Tent web Spiders.

 

 

Our local pride of lions have split up into smaller groups for a few days but then the whole family will reunited after some alone time.  The youngsters of about one year old went on an exploring mission for about a week but then needed the safety of the pride again.

The leopards were not easy to locate over the past month but Munye did show himself a few times.  He was seen on the southern fence walking up and down which could mean that he is looking for better opportunities.  Hopefully he will stick around.

In some areas of the park the long grass is thinning out, making it a bit easier to spot the animals.

However a Cheetah on top of a dead tree are much easier to see.

We had another stunning visit to the Tswene Tswene in the middle of Madikwe, one of my favorite views in the park.

In between all the big and exciting things we saw there were also the unexpected.

Hope you all enjoy reading about our adventure as much as I did.

Regards

Cornelius and the T-Team

YAY !!!!

THE NEWSLETTER IS BACK !!!

Yes, after having our computers back from the lightning strike we suffered in November last year, it has been very frustrating not to have been able to write any newsletters for all of you fans….

Anyway, that is now in the past and lets not waste any more time… lets get into this Months happenings in the bush…..

Ever heard of GEOPHAGEA ?

This what this giraffe is doing… They will actively search out old bones lying around in the bush, and chew them to get calcium which is lacking in the vegetation that they eat. This is quite a lengthy awkward looking exercise, as they jostle the bone in their mouths towards the back teeth which makes for a very comical sighting, pulling very funny faces as they do so.

We don’t often get to put up some worthy images of buffalos, as they seem never to portray their beauty, power and danger through the camera too well…. Until you are lucky enough to witness this…

One fresh morning, we arrived at one of the larger waterholes in the south, and found these two old bulls having one serious go at each other !! They bashed heads with the crack of a gun sounding as they wrestled each other for about 30 minutes with no sign of either of the males giving up. If you look closely you can even see the horns penetrating the eyes of the one bull, and also the blood oozing from his body from the lusty blows been dealt out in the fight.Males within the herd will fight and set up a hierarchy among themselves in order to win the breeding rights on the females.Nevertheless, the buffalo in this sighting got some well earned respect for their power and aggression once more.

Our local pride, The Mica pride, is blooming !!

There have been 2 new cubs born to the Matlapa female, they are around 3 months old now, and together with 4 other cubs in the pride their total is now at 14. Yes they are growing their need for food, and are having to search harder for prey, and that they are doing !!

We located them one day on a very large giraffe that they must have killed in the middle of the day, as we did see them the previous morning looking very hungry. The afternoon revealed that they had killed the giraffe, which is one of the bigger kills they have had for some time now. The interactions between all the males and the older Mica females was an awesome to witness, and it was a sighting that lasted for 3 days…

On another occasion, we located them at Tau dam, and noticed that they were not all together… The males seem to be splitting away from the pride very often, as they are moving to the extremities of their territories to patrol and reinforce the scents for other males which may want to enter the now very fragile territory with all the cubs running around at this stage. This never stopped the cubs from enjoying some naïve fun unbeknown to them the possible dangers they could face.

The males have also been helping the pride out with kills of their own… Yes, males od hunt. In fact they are very good killers, they just go after the more cumbersome larger prey, such as buffalo and giraffe, etc, much to the appreciation of the females in the pride.

In the months that we have been offline, the rains came down hard, which created a party atmosphere for the bullfrogs, and as you can see here they seem to be in their element with all the free standing water around, where the males are hard at work trying to secure a female to mate and create more little bullfrogs for the next season.

Where do they go when it is dry ?

They can actually bury themselves into the mud and go into a very inactive stage called aestivation, which means that they lower their heart rate to almost nothing, where they waiting for the following years rain before emerging and staring the cycle again.

The cheetahs and wild dogs have been very scarce over the last couple months due to the very long grass that has taken over the Ophir plains area where they liked to hunt frequently. You can see below by the size of the grass that it will make life very difficult for them to hunt, as you can barely even see a full grown kudu in this grass… try to see if you can spot the kudu yourself….

We did however manage to see them on a few occasions and they are doing very well…. The Wild dogs are moving vast distances throughout the park at the moment trying to locate a possible den site for them to have their next batch of puppies. The alpha pair have shown signs of mating, and now we are hoping with bated breath that they will give us the amazing sightings around the den soon….

Tsala has been also very elusive, as it is hard enough trying to find tracks of her, never mind to try and spot her in this long grass at the moment. But, she has given us some great sightings of her up in the maroela trees she loves so much. The last reports of her having cubs have seem to be something of the past, as she no longer is lactating, and we have not seen any signs of her cubs anywhere. So we presume she has lost them once more… This is the umpteenth time that I have seen of her not raising her cubs to any decent size. Maybe she just doesn’t have what it takes to raise them successfully, but we still hope that she will have another shot at it soon !!

Munye, the young male has also been very active here in the south west, and is definitely showing signs that he wants to kick out the massive territorial male that resides there, so he will have to be very careful before he takes on this monster of a male leopard. You can see the result of the last fight on his upper lip, but it has healed rather nicely now, and we look forward to him becoming the new Prince of stealth in our area.

Closer to home, we have also got some very exciting news… “Klippie” our local klipspringer has finally brought home a female !! Yes, they seem to have created that monogamous bond, and are enjoying the confines of the camp and can be seen lazing around the camp on the room pathways, or even popping in to the lodge to say hi… They are our ambassadors, and gave us a nice surprise one morning as they were lying on top of our entrance gate posing and admiring their territory that is Tuningi !!

Some other random sights from the last couple of months….

So to finish off… we have had some really nice sundowner stops on top of the Tschwene Tschwene Mountain in the centre of the park which makes for some unbelievable landscape photography.

So ….. until next time….

I send you my best bush regards,

Gavin & The T-Team

Hi there everyone,

 

So this newsletter is going to be about only one sighting we had this month. It was the ULTIMATE Lion sighting anyone can ask for.

Before we get in to it, you can also follow us on Facebook at Tuningi Safari Lodge. The rest of the month’s sightings are on our Facebook page.

So it started out as the typical afternoon for Cornelius and I, we went down to the lodge and discussed what we are looking for and where we want to go. We decided to look for Lions and the only ones close to us was still a little drive away.

Because Lions tend to get active only when the sun goes down, we decided to take a slow drive there, have sun-downers and then go to the Lions. We were very excited because it has been a long time since most of the pride has been together, little did we know what we were in for.

So we ventured out and had a lovely drive up to our sun-downer stop where we were greeted by an amazing sunset. We had our drinks and eventually it was our turn to go into the sighting.

As we approached up to the sighting the pride came out of the thicker bush for the first time that afternoon, first goal complete. They went to lie down in the open for the normal bonding and stretching session after napping the whole day – good interaction between them, second goal complete. At this point we already had a better sighting than most people before us, little did we know…

Shortly after stretching they started off heading north towards the local waterhole. Probably needed some water after a long hot day. The sun has set and we have our lights out. As we followed them, we started noticing their body language changing from calm and relaxed to an incredibly focused killing machine using all its senses. Heads down low, eyes focused forward and ears pointing straight in the direction they are looking. The excitement starts to build, what could it be that has triggered their interest…

As we moved closer slowly we started to hearing noises coming from the water. The splashing sound was coming from about thirty Buffalo drinking. They had no idea that the Lions were so close. By now Cornelius and I were so hyped we could barely sit still.

The Lions approached the dam slowly and carefully, not to alert the Buffalo of their presence. Hunting Buffalo is no mean feat but it helps to have some muscle with you when you do. Lucky for the four females present, the big Chimbro male was also in attendance.

As we settled in to watch, I advised my guests to sit still and to be as quite as possible. It may take a long time before anything happens.

My words weren’t cold yet and all chaos broke out. Lions bursting into full flight, Buffalo turning and stampeding away and us trying like crazy to keep up with them. It was just dust and lights and a complete mental dash. We tried our best to keep up with them but the dust everywhere and we couldn’t see a thing.

We decided to go around and see if we couldn’t keep up with them from the side. All of a sudden the bleating started, we knew they had a Buffalo. The question was, if they were going to be successful in their kill.

As we arrived, we saw the Chimbro attached to the female Buffalo’s face. He was trying to suffocate her by biting down over her mouth. Lions will do this  in cases where the animals’ throat might be too large. The female Lions were running around in all directions. They were trying their best to keep the other Buffalo from coming back to help the caught one escape.

After a minute or so the females eventually got rid of the other Buffalo. Now they could help the poor Chimbro out. He has been holding on for dear life as this Buffalo was dragging him around like a rag doll.

In an effort to get it to the ground, the females started jumping on the Buffalo and biting her back legs. After another five minutes they eventually got her to the ground. The Buffalo’s last breath followed soon after. After catching their breath, The Lions dug in.

Unfortunately the video that I took doesn’t work on the blog. So feel free to watch it on our Facebook Page.

Till next time

Kind Regards

Jacques and the T-Team