Battle at Seronera!

Hi All, I wanted to share a series of amazing photographs I received from one of our Arusha guides Stanford Milinga, that his guests took. He was out on a Safari in the Seronera part of the Serengeti with his clients when they came onto the bellow scene, it is a tremendous battle between some lions and a big bull Buffalo. When it started, Stanford and his guests were the only people there and then was later joined by Harry Lucas and his guests.

It is indeed amazing and very lucky to witness something like this while on Safari and although many guests would like to see a kill from start to finish, it is seldom seen and when it does happen guests are often shocked as to how violent it is and then don't want to watch anymore, its not always a nice clean fast kill. This battle lasted for almost thirty minutes to one hour before the lions managed to finally kill the Buffalo, note how they keep away from those sharp horns in the front and keep attacking the Buffalo from the back. Basically what they are trying to do is tire the Buffalo out and get it of its feet only then can they go in for a kill by grabbing the animals neck and suffocating it. 

Well done Stanford this is indeed a once in a lifetime sighting. 

Butterflies

Who can drive around the bush or walk in a beautiful garden and not help noticing all the beautiful and sometimes very brightly colored butterflies flying around in all shapes and sizes. The thing is that most people do notice them and love looking at them but not many people know much about them. Butterflies are in a way like birding in that you need to look at the butterfly and then try and locate it in a book to see what its called. The problem is that most butterflies are very fast fliers and they often sit resting with their wings closed vertically above them, which can make identification difficult plus they are difficult to get close to. 

But butterflies are probably the most well known of all insects and many peoples favorite insects. Adults normally have beautiful colors and feed primarily on nectar but they also get nourishment from rotting fruit, animal dung and dissolved minerals in wet sand or dirt.  Butterflies have four stages in their development namely egg, larva, pupa and adult. The larval or caterpillar stage feed on different plants depending on specie and some are even host specific only feeding on one kind of plant or family of plants.

Lets look at a few common Butterflies that you normally see driving around and what they are called, these butterflies are great to point out, as they are very pretty! 

African Monarch (Danaus chrysippus)

The African Monarch is a very common butterfly that you see al the time flying around, the larvae of this butterfly feeds on the Milkweed family of plants, because the plants are poisonous it makes the butterfly foul tasting and not palatable to predators and this is why he also flies very slowly as he knows he does not have to worry about anything eating him. He is mainly orange and black, typical warning colors that he is poisonous and not good to eat.

African Monarch Butterfly ( Danaus chrysippus), image from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Broad –bordered Grass Yellow (Eurema brigitta)

The Grass yellow is also a fairly common butterfly and they are hard to miss as they are a very bright yellow color.  They are relatively slow fliers and stay close to the ground. You can often see them in small groups around water and animal dung. The larval host plant for this butterfly is: Hypericum aethiopicum and Cassia mimosoides.

Broad bordered grass yellow ( Eurema brigitta), image from Wikipedia.

Citrus Swallowtail (Papilio demodocus)

The Citrus Swallowtail is also a very difficult butterfly to miss, you see them almost all the time, it is a rather large butterfly (wingspan 85mm) compared to others and flies slow enough so that you can see it clearly. It is a beautifully colored butterfly with black bands, spotted and speckled with yellow; they also on the hind wings have 2 black, blue and orange eyespots.  The larvae of this butterfly are sometimes a pest in citrus trees as they can consume large quantities of leaves.

Citrus Swallowtail (Papilio demodocus), image from Wikipedia

Scarlet Tip (Colotis danae)

A small but beautiful butterfly and often seen in savanna and thornveld country, as the name suggest it has very bright scarlet color wing tips. This is a very fast and restless butterfly and for this reason very difficult to get close to. Host plants are Maerua angolensis and Cadaba natalensis.

Scarlet Tip (Colotis danae), image from Wikipedia.

Brown- veined white (Belenois aurota)

The Brown veined white is probably one of the most common butterflies especially of the white butterflies, further down in South Africa they also annually do huge migrations over the interior millions in number. Their larvae host plans are Boscia oleoides and Maerua cafra.

Brown veined white (Belenois aurota), image from Wikipedia

Diadem (Hypolimnas misippus)

The Diadem is a fascinating butterfly, it occurs almost everywhere in Africa and also a great part of the Indo-Australian region. The males and females look completely different so much so that they have different common names; the Diadem also displays the best example of mimicry in the animal kingdom. The female Diadem performs the mimicry and she mimics the African Monarch or Milkweed Butterflies, these butterflies are poisonous and distasteful to predators leaving the female Diadem safe. They look so similar that it is almost impossible in the field to tell them apart and what is even more remarkable is that where the Diadem occurs she has up to four color forms matching the color of the Milkweed butterflies found in the same area. The larval host plant for this butterfly is Asystasia spp, Portulaca spp and Talinum spp.

             

Diadem (Hypolimnas misippus) image from Wikipedia 

Female Mimic (Hypolimnas misippus), image from Wikipedia

Blue Pansy (Junonia oenone) and Yellow Pansy (Junonia hierta cebrene)

The Blue and Yellow pansy are also very comon butterflies and you can see them everywhere especially in the warmer parts of the day. These two species are a bit easier to get close to and you can normaly get a good veiw of them as they settle on the ground or on rocks slowly closing and opening their wings. The host plants for the Blue pansy are: Asystasia gangetica, Barleria stuhlmannii and Adhatoda natalensis. For the Yellow pansy: Adhatoda natalensis, Asystasia gangetica, Barleria pungens and Ruellia cordata.

Yellow pansy (Junonia hierta cebrene), image from Wikipedia

Blue pansy (Junonia oenone), image from Wikipedia

The above butterflies we just looked at are buterflies that are easily found and will give you a good start in butterflies, although they are hard to identify sometimes just becouse they are so small and fast it is still enjoyable and challenging and just like birding a lot of fun to go with your book and binoculars and try and see how many you can ID and tick. Of course there are many more species we could have put on the blog, some species you can also look up and study are species like Autumn leaf vagrant, African Migrant, Cabbage White, Common blues, Orange tip, Jokers and the Charaxes family these are also butterflies often seen and will give you a great building block.

More Pics from Camps

Hi All

Its great that we often this season get some great and interesting photos from the camps and their guides, nice to see what the wildlife is up to, below are some more nice pics from Dunia, Sayari and Olakira area, Enjoy!!

Big Heard of Elephants walking strait through Dunia Camp!

Elephant very close to Dunia's new solar panels!!

A beautiful shot of a Black Rhino in the open, Dunia Camp

Herd of Elephants passing Sayari's office

River Crossing Sayari/Olakira area, Photo: Ethan Kinsey

This last image from Ethan Kinsey is my personal favorite, taken in the Kogatende area, Northern Serengeti, it shows the Wildebeest actually using the Mara bridge to cross the river, something I have never seen up there before. I can remember guests always asking me "why do the Wildebeest not just use the bridge"?, I always use to say, " well it is because it is a man made structure and they don't know what a bridge is", how animals love to proof us wrong!!

Wildlife at Ubuntu Camp!

Hi all, have a look at the nice images from Ubuntu, and what is nice and a first, is a very nice little bird list of the birds around the camp.

Around the camp we have got the following species of birds

·         Lilac breasted roller

·         Black shouldered Kite

·         Green pigeon

·         Red cheeked cordon bleu

·         Dusky flycatcher

·         Bared faced go away bird

·         Superb starling

·         Mourning Dove

·         Mocking cliff chat

·         Brown parrot

·         Grey social weaver

·         Ruppels Starling

·         Red eyed dove

·         Magpie shrike

·         Marabou stork

·         Ring necked dove

·         White headed buffalo weavers

·         White backed vulture

·         Green wood hoopoe

·         Grey headed bush shrike

·         Northern white crowned shrike

A Feast For All !!

The Migration has now finally arrived in the Northern Serengeti to everybody’s relief. Camps, guides and managers don’t have to think of reasons to tell their guests why the migration is not here yet, with thousands of Wildebeest in the area and with many more to still come in everybody will now enjoy a couple of months of great wildlife sightings, Mara River crossings and some good predator action.

Beautiful Photo taken by Mollel, guide at Ubuntu camp, Leopard feeding on young Wildebeest

I think the happiest of them all that the Wildebeest have arrived is the predators of the Northern Serengeti. They have waited a long time for the Wildebeest to come back to the area and although there has been other game to hunt, hunting has generally been tough till now. For the next couple of months almost every predator and scavenger will be thinking, eating, breathing Wildebeest and why because there is just so many of them and they are easy to catch especially at night. They don’t call the Wildebeest “the clowns of the bush” for nothing.

Even though many Wildebeest will be caught by predators and many will die of naturally of old age or disease or just wounded from their attempts at crossing the Mara River it does not make a dent in their population and every year there are new babies born to replace the ones lost during the great migration.

Antlions

Sometimes some of the most interesting things to show guests on a nature guiding activity are not bigger than a few millimeters, but they are more interesting and in some cases more ferocious than any Lion or Leopard or Crocodile.

Insects are all around us, you can see them almost anywhere and at any time of the day, and there are thousands of different types all doing different things and all fitting into their different roles in the environment. Unfortunately not all guests really like insects and for many they are simply a nuisance and everybody things insects bite, yes there are of course some that bite and sting but there are a lot that are completely harmless and extremely interesting. Over the next few weeks we are going to look at some interesting insects that are hard to miss when you are out in the field and because of that guests always point and ask questions about them.

One such insect is the Antlion. The Antlion is one of my favorite type of insects to show guests especially on a walk, but it works just as well on a game drive especially if you have stopped somewhere for a coffee brake or a picnic. Inevitably when you climb out of the vehicle you will notice these small strange pits constructed in the sand and the guests will ask you what it is.

Antlions are insects belonging to the family Myrmeleontidae and there are a lot of different species and not just in Africa. The name Antlion refers to the larval stage of this insect and the adults are called “antlion lacewings and they resemble something close to damselflies and dragonflies. The adult lacewings have long slender bodies, two pairs of narrow, long multi-veined wings and clubbed antennae.

Adult Antlion Lacewing.

The whole process starts with the female laying an egg in the soft sand, poking the sand with her abdomen until she finds a suitable soft sand area to lay her egg. The larvae, as far as insect go is a ferocious looking critter with three pairs of walking legs, a fat round abdomen, flat head and an enormous pair of sickle shaped pinchers, with sharp hollow projections. Antlion larvae have different ways of hunting but the ones in Africa and Tanzania make sandy pits to capture a variety of small insects and as the name suggests they also feed a lot on ants.

The pits that they use to capture their prey are made in soft sand and the antlion uses his abdomen like a shovel and by moving backwards and flicking sand out by using his head he makes a steep pit with very loose sand on the side walls and when prey fall in there they can not get out as the sides collapse under them as they try to get out the antlion also flicks sand at them to topple them over and get them to fall back to the bottom of the pit where he then immediately grabs them with those big jaws and starts to suck out the fluids from his prey through the hollow projections on the side of its jaws. When the antlion has finished feeding he simply flicks the dead prey out of his pit and to the side.

Antlion larvae Pits to catch prey.

The antlion eventually pupates which is a cocoon of sand stuck together with fine silk that they spin from a slender spinneret situated at the posterior end of the body. After about a month when the transformation into adult is complete, the adult antlion lacewing climbs to the surface and after about twenty minutes the wings are fully opened and it will fly of in search of a mate.

Showing your guests what the Antlion larvae looks like.

What is interesting for your guests is to catch an antlion by using a thin piece of grass and to gently “tickle” it to the surface and then put it in your hand and by turning your binoculars upside down let the guests look through it and it acts as a magnifying glass, you can then clearly see what they look like. After everyone has had a look gently place him in the same pit you found him from.

Food For Thought!

Hi all, this guide blog is great, and already we are learning more. Markus (Walking Guide Olivers Camp) shared some really interesting info with me the other day and I had no idea this was happening. The info that he send me was horrific and rather upsetting. Markus has a friend who is a guide and also a vet and she also does allot of work for Piece Parks and Elephants and she send him a article concerning possible hunting in Kenya.

As you will read in the article (which I will include at the bottom of the post) Kenya's wildlife is under tremendous pressure from Human encroachment and the result of this is alarming and increased poaching. While the wildlife is already under pressure, some American companies want to introduce sport hunting back into Kenya. Now...we al know that hunting does have its benefits and brings in a massive amount of income for countries and job opportunities, but this needs to be done ethically and based on scientific research whether or not these animals are in good number. There are some really good hunting companies out there and they hunt professionally and ethically and they are great conservationists and guides, but there are also some that are not.

As Safari Guides there are normally topics that we try and avoid with guests, topics like religion, politics, sex and hunting as these topics can lead on to heated debates and arguments. This post will be good for you to read and keep for yourself so that you are aware what goes on in other countries and generally what our wildlife has to deal with, if only they could speak for themselves !!!

By Chris Mercer

Hunting, along with dealing in wildlife trophies, has been banned in

Kenya since 1977. Trophy hunting was accurately described by the new

Kenyan democratic government as ‘a barbaric relic of colonialism.’

Unfortunately, other assaults on wildlife have been at work.

A wave of migration from strife-torn Somalia and Sudan has aggravated

the human over-population. The Kenyan birth rate is among the highest

in the world. The population has risen from five million in 1946 to

thirty million in 2006. This has resulted in massive human

encroachment into range land areas which surround the game parks and

that in turn causes human - animal conflict,and the snaring of

wildlife on an unimaginable scale. Kenya’s wildlife has declined over

40 percent in general terms in the last few years with some species

such as buffalo declining over 90 percent in numbers. Roan Antelope

are down to 900 (from an estimated 20,000.)

Photographer, Rob Carr Hartley believes that within a few years Tsavo

West National Park may be denuded of it's wildlife. Poaching is

completely out of control. Deforestation in all six watershed areas of

Kenya is causing the rivers to dry up and even some lakes and rivers

such as the Mara, are expected to run dry soon. Kenyan wildlife

<http://www.africageographic.com/archives/>  is in deep trouble. With

wildlife woes of such magnitude, adding hunting pressures will simply

aggravate the problems, and could properly be described as

environmental terrorism.

In 2004 a lavishly financed campaign by Safari Club International

involved flying Kenyan conservationists and officials to exclusive,

elite hunting farms in South Africa and Zimbabwe in order to persuade

the Kenyan government to resume trophy hunting. The President decided

to refer the hunting issue to a national public participation process,

starting with a Wildlife Symposium, which took place in September

2006. The government appointed a Steering Committee, who asked me to

attend, as I have campaigned against canned hunting for years.

The reason for holding the Symposium was to test Kenyan public opinion

on the issue. However the hunting industry never sleeps and the

conference was sponsored by USAID, an American Foreign Aid agency with

close links to Safari Club International, and greatly involved in

using U.S taxpayer's funds to benefit the hunting fraternity through

schemes such as the notorious Campfire programme in Zimbabwe. The

incontestable fact is that American tax funds were used to finance an

expensive international conference in Nairobi whose sole relevance to

Americans was to enable the trophy hunters to devastate wild lion

prides and other animals in East Africa – for fun.

The Symposium itself was a great success. It was attended by about 160

people and included the director of Kenya Wildlife Services, members

of parliament, and other dignitaries. It was jam packed for both days

by everyone who was anyone in wildlife conservation. It was mid-

afternoon before I got up to speak and show my presentation. There

were gasps of shock from the audience as the first videos showed a

poor lioness being shot out of a tree with an arrow and a wounded lion

charging a hail of bullets from a mob of hunters. When I followed this

by explaining the colonial aspects of hunting there were spontaneous

cheers from many delegates. The sponsors looked shocked.

The conference was not playing out as planned. The meeting became

intense. As I explained how hunting propaganda deceives the unwary,

with video footage for visuals, the symposium became noisy, with loud

cheering for each point made. Then I got onto the Snap or Snipe

statistics, published in Africa Geographic

<http://www.africageographic.com/archives/> magazine and based on Ian

Michler’s research, which show how poorly revenue from hunting

benefits the country, when compared with that from eco- tourism. After

my presentation, the expression on the faces of the USAID organisers

said it all – they were visibly glum and looking shell-shocked.

Eventually, the Kenyan government decided against the hunters. But I

am sure that Safari Club International, and it's ally in the American

government (USAID), will do all in their power to expand and maintain

their killing fields in Africa.

(*) Chris Mercer is an Advocate, who practised law in Zimbabwe and

Botswana and lives now in South Africa.