And The Bigger Stuff!

 It happened again! A week after the buff kills, on another bright and sunny Sunday morning, I learned about the lion pride on a buff kill. On Mansimvula! After I had just written and posted that it is not likely to happen again, within our narrow borders, for a very long time. I was astounded. Mostly, I was thrilled. The last kills were over a particularly rare full moon that happens only once in decades and I thought the chances of seeing something similar were about as rare. This time, it was in a spot only accessible to us here at Mansimvula and there was only one other vehicle arriving later that afternoon.

I packed the necessary paraphernalia into the Landie, basically enough to last at least a couple of days and set out for the North. Mansimvula is very diverse in its topography, geology and resulting habitats that thrive in different areas. Where we enter off the main road, at the southwestern corner there is a gently contoured ridge that runs northeast to a third of the way up the eastern boundary. This is all a deep sandy soil and used to be dominated by large Knobthorns and Marulas with pockets of Mopane, interspersed with Bushwillow, Terminalia and Raisinbush.

The land is a long wedge-shaped strip that runs almost north-south from the main access road in the South, the Argyle road, to the old Kruger boundary in the North. The boundary is still there but the fences came down in ’92.

In my youth, when the fence was there, it was not much at all and didn’t really hinder any movement of animals; what couldn’t get over it went under or through it and it was permanently washed away in the dry riverbeds that all drain into the Olifants River Valley. As kids, we derived great joy out of standing on the other side of the fence and boasting we were standing in Kruger, like it was any different to the bush on our side of the fence.

The middle third of this little piece of heaven is a series of ridges that run east-west and create hills and dips that carry rainwater into the Ntsiri river that, at only one place on our western boundary, curves sharply into Mansimvula as it snakes its way to the Olifants.

In the Northern third, the ridges become steeper, the valleys deeper and it is quite rocky. The first couple of ridges are predominantly decomposing granite with a few boulders sticking up on each of the ridges but each ridge becomes rockier going North so that the northernmost ridge is a huge quartz deposit with rocky slopes and snow white boulders sticking out of the quartz-strewn stony ground.

I found the carcass, it was a sub-adult buffalo and it lay in some shade just before the start of the steepest part of the ridge, at the edge of a little amphitheatre of red dust that is a convergence of a bend in the road, a couple of intersecting game paths as well as a territorial spot for a number of animals and, having just been through the impala rutting season, it was a huge dustbowl with a large midden in the middle, the surrounding lek or bowl, trampled flat from rams fighting, mating and generally stirring things up, chasing females around.

Hardly anything had been eaten of the buffalo; it had been gutted, some ribs were gnawed and it seemed as if most of it was intact. It was lying at an angle, almost on its back with four stiff legs sticking up into the air at a strange angle. About 10 meters beyond, a big male lion lay on his back, legs also sticking up but loose and floppy as in sleep. His belly was full and he breathed that heavy, short-breath pant that all uncomfortable cats do. It’s supposed to help digestion. I think it’s more to help indigestion.

I looked for the pride and finally saw an ear flick off to my right on the ridge looking almost due west. It was still early in the afternoon and the cats were quite inactive, some must have been asleep. I couldn’t see them unless they raised their heads or rolled over. They were about twenty metres away from me beyond the carcass but off to my right a bit. For them to get to the carcass, they would almost have to walk towards me.

As I gathered this information in my head and decided I was already positioned quite well, one of the youngsters got up and tentatively moved a bit closer. He stopped and stretched and almost seemed to be calculating his chances. Nothing happened so he continued, pretending to have no interest in the buffalo, walking towards me at an angle, instead of towards the carcass but glancing that way to make sure he was still safe.

He was close enough. Out of nowhere, a huge male, belly bulging and still blinking sleep out of his eyes, rushed the carcass and sent the youngster back to his mother. The male looked at me as though I had instigated it, then turned and settled down in the shade for a while to make sure that the youngster was settling down again with his siblings. 

It was like he suddenly made a decision as he stood up and tugged at the buffalo, dragging it by a back leg through a Knobthorn felled by an ele. I could hear the scraping and gripping of his and the buffalo’s skin by the recurved thorns that arm the tree's branches. He stopped when it was free and stood there a while, panting from the effort, a stiff back leg of the buff resting on his shoulder. He came around to the head, gripped it by the shoulder and turned it around and dropped it to breathe some more, then dragged it away towards his brother, finally straddling the buffalo with his belly swaying from side to side as he waddled away, showing immense strength. He no doubt came to the decision that the only way to keep the kids at bay was to drag it to where he wanted to sleep instead of having to get up every time one of the others ventured too close.

 Sadly, he dragged it out of sight and I was reluctant to go off-road into the thicket just to see them sleeping. One male was still visible although he was fast asleep and facing away from me.

As things started to settle down, I heard something scream behind me. It was quite a chilling sound and at first I thought of a small mammal crying out but as I heard the sound again, looking at the lionesses and youngsters and the fact that there wasn’t much interest shown, I realized it must have been a francolin or something. I reversed and hadn’t had to go far when I noticed a Gabar Goshawk fly up into a Bushwillow, so I continued reversing beyond it to see what would happen. It was a bit of a stalemate, the raptor wasn’t about to do anything with me watching so I turned around and went up onto the ridge for a couple of minutes.

On my return, just before the dusty bald patch of ground that was my general focus for the day, I saw the goshawk on the ground near to where I thought it had taken off from. It was plucking the feathers of a Crested Francolin, most likely a youngster by the size of it. I stopped as soon as I saw it but I think it was already preparing to take off. As soon as I focused the camera on it, it flew away with its prey in its talons, feathers swirling in the wake of the wing beats.

The rest of the afternoon was quite uneventful after the excitement following my arrival. For a moment I thought that the pride had slipped away in the short time I was watching the Goshawk. It wouldn’t have been the first time although they tend to do that at night. But then, as a cat rolled onto it’s back, first a paw rose into the air, then a leg and shortly after, another youngster lifted its head, most likely after being rolled on by the other one. They were all lying flat and pretty much in the same place. Ahead of me I could just about see one of the males but the other must have stayed with the carcass, deeper in the bush and out of sight.

For a while the only activity was the unusual appearance of a couple of dung beetles, crossing the dust in front of me, rolling big balls of dung they had gathered from the stomach contents of the buffalo. It showed that the kill wasn’t very old and looking at the pile of masticated grass and leaves, I noticed it was still quite damp. It was unusual in that I had hardly seen any scarabs throughout the whole of our very dry summer, having only seen a few when we had the pitiful showers that settled dust from time to time.

The pride was Lying up just East of the ridge and I was East of them but a bit lower down so that I was looking up at them and beyond to the sun sinking through the trees on the ridge. I couldn’t have planned it better, nor been in a better position for as the sun silhouetted the yellowing Bushwillows, the bold young male woke up and gazed intently in the direction of the males, trying to assess his chances. Golden light filled the glade around him and he arose and once again tried to get a bit closer to the kill. Then a lioness got up and she too walked down towards me, angling a bit to the front so that she walked right into the frame of the bright ball of fire that was the sun touching the ridge.

Soon others followed and I think I managed to capture some of these moments before the sun disappeared entirely. Dusk took over and as the rest of the pride settled in the dust in front of me, unchallenged by the boys, darkness deepened to a point where I couldn’t make out any shapes at all. It was still a long time before the last quarter moon would rise.

By then other Mansimvulians had joined me and we sat in the darkness with very little noise and activity. At one point there was some half-hearted roaring as if they were too full and tired to lift their heads. Quite unlike the full-blown, rivet-rattling roars that can sometimes echo through the night, especially these crisp and still winter nights.

I had a lot to do the next day so I bade them all farewell and goodnight. I had to psych myself up for my bi-monthly trip into Hoedspruit to get supplies and this time I had to go to two towns because I had to sort out some bureaucratic bullshit at the bank and that meant a separate trip to Acornhoek. This gave me an opportunity to spend some time at Kum Kula with Clint and to see what his elephant was up to since I was having a bit of elephant withdrawal with all the cat activity.

P.S. This blog would be incomplete without at least the mention of an elephant.

And an addendum:

My trips to the two towns?

Agonizing!

In more ways than one.

The night I arrived at Kum kula, I was keen to see the changes the ele had wrought and especially to see one of the only golden orbs I knew of that had made it through such a devastating season. She had disappeared for a while and Clint had posted something about it. From the photos I had seen, she looked like she was bursting with eggs. I suspected that she had disappeared into the foliage above her web to secure her egg case. A process that takes a few days considering the complexity of the structure.

It was dark already and looking up at her web, the hub about six feet from the ground and the main anchor points in the foliage at the top reaching up to eight or nine feet, I was looking up beyond the anchor points, looking for a cluster of leaves. When I spotted it much lower down I had to step back for a better angle and unfortunately a log prevented my feet from going anywhere but my torso and hips were already anticipating the move and basically I landed hard! On the brickwork and concrete of the pathway. On my coccyx. Sending a jolt of pain through the spine, vertically to the brain. It stunned me for a minute.

The following day, I had to face the corrugated hell of the Guernsey Road. At least only half of it to beyond the guernsey store where the tar began. It was the most agonizing few kilometers I have endured besides a few times in my past having had to be medivac'ed by old landies out of remote areas because of situations that required surgery.

Then, once I reached the mighty financial institution called a bank, having waited in line for an equally agonizing amount of time, I discovered that their computers don't quite recognize my physical address because there are no street names and house numbers and the entire trip was practically a perverse excuse for self punishment.

At least my shopping trip to hoedspruit the next day was relatively uneventful despite still being quite sore and I managed to accomplish a few things.

To conclude, I have neglected an old tradition and so, from the wintery blooms of Mopane Grove, succulents that have escaped the notice of elephants, nyala, duiker, porcupine et al, here are some flowers, for the Ladies! 

Especially my aunt, Annette, for a milestone of a birthday!

A magnificent yellow Kalanchoe sp.

The spectacular Coral Senecio, Kleinia fulgens.

And a tiny red Kalanchoe sp.