Africa Wild

Day 7 - 9th October (Continued)

As we sat on the deck we had a steady stream of wildlife.

Red Hartebeest

After 7-8 months of pregnancy, the females give birth to the younger ones. They usually prefer isolated areas for reproduction. The mother nurses and cares for the calves for about 4 years. However, the girls usually stay with their mothers for the entire life.

In case of these species, the males are usually with the mother for 2-3 years.







Shrew

Elephant shrews are fairly unusual mammals because they form monogamous pairs and mate for life. The pair stakes out a territory of a couple acres, and several species make tons of tiny paths so that they can easily escape from predators. The two elephant shrews don’t usually hang out together, but they mark their trails with scent glands to keep tabs on each other’s locations (“Hi honey, I’m still here!”). They also use their scent markings to point out sources of food.





Kudu

Females live in the small groups composed of adult females and their offspring. Groups usually have between six and ten members.

Mating season starts at the end of the rainy season. Pregnancy lasts eight months and ends with a single baby. Female leaves the group and isolate herself and the baby for the next couple of months.

First four or five weeks of the life, young kudu spends lying in the grass. After that, calf starts to follow its mother during short period of time each day. At the age of three to four months, young kudu follows its mother all the time. When calf becomes able to follow its mother constantly, they will return back to the herd.

Young kudus grow rapidly and they are able to take care of themselves as soon as they turn six months.
Kudu lives 7 to 8 years in the wild.

I agree - it's always a tough question to decide whether to stay in the camp or not at GK.
And up to now we've had the best sightings in the camp when being up there. But still we keep going
north and south for a few k's in order not to miss anything. Which we do in the end.

Beautiful morning light combined with a brownie and hartebeests You were lucky seeing an elephant screw

Grootkolk in the morning is wonderful

We always went out late for our drives as there was something to see at the waterhole

I love the shrew

Kesheshe!

Just read through the topic and some great tips and info.

ya ! Grootkolk is indeed a must

Day 7 - 9th October (Continued)

Yes still in camp. The weather changes quickly in KTP it is now 7am and we have some clouds coming in. We still have had no rain.









Red Headed Finch

Both the male and female share in the incubation duties of the rather large and roundish eggs. Clutches range from 4-8 eggs with 5 or 6 being pretty common. When you see the size of the egg in comparison with the size of the bird, you can see why calcium depletion is of concern with this species. The pair will begin incubation after the second to fourth egg is laid and lasts about 13-14 days. The young hatch out and look like they are all mouth. They are black and very fuzzy with large gaping mouths that are lined with yellow-white flanges. They fledge after 3 weeks and require another 2-3 weeks until they are independent. The young males can be identified upon fledging by the red colouring on their head. Their body lacing is finer than the adults, but males still have different body patterns than hens. Some hens may fledge with some red on their heads, but usually not as much as males and can still be distinguished by the breast pattern.





Sociable Weaver

Most of birds’ species build nest for only one breeding season, but Sociable Weavers use and maintain the nests throughout the year. They nest in colonies of up to 10 to 400-500 birds. They weave one huge nest for the entire colony. Nest is massive, as a huge apartment block occupied by several tens of families all year round.

At some distance, this huge construction looks like a haystack hanging in large tree or telephone pole. It may size up to 4 metres high and 7 metres of length. Looking under the nest, we can see the entrances to chambers, as “bee’s honeycombs”.

Nest entrances of chambers are tunnels of up to 25 cm long and 7 cm wide. Then, there is the round nesting chamber, of about 10 to 15 cm in diameter.







You will see a lot of:

Day 7 - 9th October (Continued)

It was now 7h30am and the bees had woken up. Yes there was a plug on the tap but we still had a problem. Yes we were instructed not to have bird baths out. I am no expert on this type of situation as having the bees around was not pleasant and some degree made staying at Grootkolk more of a challenge than normal. Even with no bird baths, a stopper on the tap and cleaning up any water after dishes etc. we still had bees.

We had rice crisps for breakfast and then packed the van with coffee, cold water and snacks. It was about 7h50am when we turn the van on and collected our permit.

We got to the top of the road and after some discussion decided to head south first to see if the predator's would still be at Lijersdraai. The drive there was quite.

On reaching the waterhole it was nice to see that the hyenas were playing in the water.

Spotted hyena

Female spotted hyenas also sport very, very long clitorises. The clitoris is so large (about 7 inches from the body!) that it is almost indistinguishable from a male penis. They also give birth through this clitoris, and so it may come as no surprise to learn that giving birth is extremely risky: Pushing a two-pound cub out of that tight squeeze means the female is prone to potentially lethal injuries. First-time mothers are particularly vulnerable to complications during childbirth: It is not unusual for them to die during the process.

Look so funny when they are wet

Your pics are great....just love the wet hyena!!