November 21
1400
Sitting in the outdoor dining area of our bungalow at
Olifants Camp. Olifants is a beautiful
camp, built high on a bluff overlooking the Olifants River. We were lucky enough to book a riverside unit
for three nights and we have a lovely view of a bend in the Olifants, looking
far to the south.
The Olifants has water, but it’s running very low. Like everything else in the park, this area
is extremely dry. Many animals are
suffering, especially animals like impala that are dependent primarily on
grass. A very hard time for them and
they seem to be losing condition by the day as their ribs and pelvises become
more obvious. Kruger runs in cycles of
wet and dry in 10 or 12-year periods and it looks like it’s just beginning a
new dry cycle. Not clear what climate
change could mean for that otherwise predictable pattern. Obviously, some animals win and some lose
with each transition.
When I started writing this, I was eating some crackers and
a cheese-like substance, but I’ve put them up now. As I sit here now, I can see a half-dozen or
so vervets prowling around the neighborhood.
They’re extremely aggressive here and I’ve been expecting a concentrated
attack. Yesterday I pulled out a piece
of firewood out of the bag and have it at the ready as my vervet scaring
stick. They of course know that a little
stick 15 inches long is not much of a threat and I suspect they know that when
humans are fat and have gray hair, they don’t have to be concerned about a stick
in the least. And literally, while typing this, they’ve robbed my next-door
neighbor.
Last night we ate at the restaurant overlooking the river
and encountered a new menace. The place
is overrun with red-wing starlings.
These are medium sized birds, and very intelligent. The adult males are quite beautiful, glossy
black with beautiful brick-red patches on their wings. They’ve learned to mob diners and will swoop
down and take food off your plate while you’re eating. Some of the tourists love it and at the table
next to ours sat a young couple in love from some European county that will
remain unnamed (but for the sake of illustration, let’s just call it BELGIUM)
and they gave the birds free reign. He
photographed the birds and she video’d as the starlings fought over food right
in front of them. At the table on the
other side, a group of people from another country (let’s just say from the
home team) came and started feeding the birds and then decided the starlings
were annoying so picked up and moved indoors, after training the birds to now
focus their attention on us.
But the point of the story is that while we were sitting
there, a tall, thin South African man walked in to take a table. He’s one of those guys who seems to have a
permanent scowl etched into his face. As
he approached the table he’d selected, the starlings swirled around him. And
then he said, “Piss off!”. And it
worked! The birds, obviously reading
something about this man’s personality and intentions, left him alone
throughout his dinner.
So that got me thinking whether the skillful use of those
well-chosen English words could solve the vervet problem. Since last night, I’ve been practicing. When the ladies in the shop ask where I’m
from – “Piss off!”. When the lady asks
if we want a lid for our takeaway peanut butter banana smoothie with protein,
“Piss off!” “Mr. Streck, how many bags
will be checking for this flight?” “Piss off!”
Plus the vervet scaring stick. And, as I’ve been writing this, a vervet sits
in my neighbor’s dining area, eating an apple.
He ate a few bites out of it, decided he didn’t like it and threw it
onto the ground. He’d undoubtedly prefer
bacon. Those people are going to be pissed when they get back from wherever
they are right now, but it’s not like you’re not warned about the Little
Bastards when you check in. Oh, now he’s eating white bread.
Day before yesterday, we closed the day with a frantic drive
on the S100. Looking for lions without
success but we did get the briefest look at a group of four cheetah.
Yesterday, we left Satara and took the long back way to
Olifants. Along the way, we spotted
three tawny heads sitting up some considerable distance from the road and
recognized them immediately as male lions.
Not great shooting – too obscured by bush, too far (even using the 600
with a 1.4 extender) and too hot (meaning way too much heat haze). We re-positioned to try and find some angle
to shoot them without much success. As
the morning heated up, they moved progressively deeper into the bush, looking
for better shade. Then a light
transporter with a military guy standing in the back, part of the anti-poaching
effort, drove up. He was talking loudly and at the sight of an upright figure,
the lions got up and moved down into the drainage line and completely out of
sight, though not before we thought we saw that there might be four males in
total. After the military vehicle left,
we drove back up on the road to our original position, hoping that for some reason
they’d come back out. Then a miracle happened (which I won’t explain here) and
the first lion stepped up over the rise and walked past the car. I still had the extender on and was
frantically trying to drive to position the car for the best shot and he kept
altering his path to avoid the car. He
was a young male, but with the beginnings of a beautiful mane. Then, another, younger male came out. And then another. Gina kept asking if I wanted to take the
extender off, but they came through too quickly and I didn’t have the
time. It was nice to see these lions and
to be close but photographically, it wasn’t going to be great.
Gina and I sat there talking about our fortune in having the
lions walk by the car and I was taking the extender off when out of the corner
of my eye, I caught some tan movement.
Shit. There was the fourth male
standing right next to the car. More
frantic repositioning but a couple of nice (though tight) frames came out of
that. He was another young male and was
very, very pale in coloration. People
talk about the white lions of Kruger.
They’re not albinos, just a very pale, almost white, coloration. This guy was not as white as that, but he was
very light and striking. The standard
wisdom is that these ‘white’ lions don’t typically survive since they’re much
more visible to potential prey.
Yesterday evening, we stayed in and rested. This morning we got up at 0315 and went on a
bush walk. It was overcast, very warm
and humid and still for the walk and as the morning progressed, thunderstorms
built off to the west. The rangers cut
the walk short out of fear of rain and after our return we indeed got a nice
shower. Now that weather’s blown through and it’s hot, windy and humid. Not as hot as earlier in this trip, but
plenty hot. It’s interesting that while we’ve had a nice shower today, it seems
like nothing has changed. It’s still
dry, dusty and hot.
We’ll head out on another drive in a little bit, but I’m not
especially optimistic. All of the animals will be under bushes, panting in the
heat. I’m struggling with photographic output on this trip. I think I was very lucky during my first two
trips to KNP but even the last time here in ’13 seemed to generate more in the
way of images. Still, it’s a beautiful
place to be and I can’t forget how lucky I am to be able to do this.
And, now for Gina’s Quote Of The Week: “Hey, you take that
finger back!”
Cheetah
Young Pale Male Lion
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