I’m not really going to do a full blown trip report but there are a few little snippets that I would like to share with you all.
Our trip consisted of 2 nights at Rooiputs, 2 at Urikaruus and then 4 at Polentswa. We set off on the 26th Dec, overnighted at Keimoes and arrived at KTP on the 27th. On the way Doug and I discussed our wish list….of course a Pangolin is always on the top of the list but we know that we will probably never get to see that…and we didn’t. But I had three other sightings on my wish list. Firstly it is ages since we have had a decent cheetah sighting…so that was #1. Secondly I wanted a lovely Cape Fox or Bat-eared Fox sighting. Again it is ages since we have had a really close-up sighting of either of these little creatures. Those two wishes were not too unreasonable I thought, but I thought my third item on my wish list was a little more difficult. I wanted to see a FROG…yes a FROG…a Bullfrog to be precise.
In order to see a frog we would need some rain to fall so I guess some rain must have been on my wish list as well….and boy oh boy there was no shortage of that. The puddles were building up everywhere and I was scanning each and every puddle to no avail …not a frog in sight. I was beginning to think that the bullfrog stories I had read about were just that…stories..tall stories. But finally 7 days into our trip while driving from Nossob up to Polentswa I spotted something in a puddle and not being quite sure what I saw I asked Doug to stop and reverse so I could have a better look….and yes there it was …I had my frog. I was so excited…I had FINALLY seen my frog in the KTP. And yes I had a photo to prove it. It is not a very exciting photo….but a photo of a frog it definitely is .
The next day together with our traveling companions we decided to drive up to Lijersdraai . Little did we know what was in store for us. Just before the Lijersdraai picnic spot the road was flooded and it didn’t take us long to spot a frog …and not just one little brown one …plenty of beautiful big handsome bullfrogs. Yet again great excitement. We counted at least ten…sitting very quietly in the water surveying the scene around them.
After taking plenty of photos we moved onto Lijersdraai and cooked up a yummy breakfast. We also had an interesting sighting at Lijersdraai which I will tell you about later. We headed back to Polentswa - we hoped the frogs would still be there and they were but a lot more active. It was our lucky day…the frogs were very active and it took a few seconds for us to realise that there was some serious mating on the go ….
look closely..one can see the frogspawn.
The loving couple..
There was a lot of activity…it seems every frog was vying for the lady’s attention….
The males would sneak up on each other …
and lash out quite violently…
There was a lot of flinging of frogs through the air but the dominant male did not let go of his girl….
“Leapfrog” was clearly the game of the day….:)
After about 15 mins or so all went quiet..the show was clearly over.
Well as you can imagine we were thrilled with this sighting…who would have thought that a dry and dusty road that we drove on in July would produce a flurry of frogs in January.
Follow this link to read more about Bullfrogs.
Bullfrogs
