Another bloody safari - Mara and Ol Pejeta October 2015

[Kitsafari]

 

 

 

Ironically, we begin our trip report with some actually unwelcome excitement at Nanyukii airstrip, where we arrived more than an hour early to find our Safaritalk flight on the runway and two pilots pointing at their watches

 

 

Did anyone notice this? If so, then no, @@Game Warden has not branched out, Branson-like into aviation. Just a slip of the spellchecker on my iPad, which appears to have added Safaritalk to its list of words, but not Safarilink.

 

 

I did notice it and wondered what safaritalk flight? then noticed in a later post you mentioned safarilink, and realised that you meant safarilink... @@Game Warden will be pleased you had ST on your mind during the entire trip!!

 

 

no pix of the handsome man? really? oh i'm so disappointed.

[Kitsafari]

An aardvark!! you darn lucky... guy. in OMC too! now i'm really jealous.

 

 

that's one handsome Olooloo boy, and i forgive you now for not showing the dastardly handsome man.

 

I feel for him. sure he won't solve any mathematical algorithms (i sympathise with him because I can't either), but we can't be so arrogant as to say animals have no feelings or emotions. I've heard a female dog searching for her "lost" pups and I had felt so guilty and so terrible hearing her calls. So I don't think I would have been able to bear hearing him call for his brother.

 

such an adorable leopard cub. I dare not ask if it's still seen.

[pault]

An aardvark!! you darn lucky... guy. in OMC too! now i'm really jealous.

 

Put your glasses on! You're jumping the gun. The aardvark comes later - seriously! I hope you haven't been receiving inside information about my stay at Ngare Serian. None of it is true, if so.

[pault]

@@pault

 

What a fantastic trip and you really have your way with the camera. You make Looove to it

 

I´m off to Masai Mara next week (my third time), what a treat and inspiration this is. I will return with a trip report of my own.

 

Thanks. I look forward to that, but not as much as you should look forward to your visit. Lots of good stuff around at the moment, especially in Olare Motorogi, but the reserve is really good too. With the amount of work you put in, you'll see so much. Hopefully they've had some rain as they needed it. Might even bring some of the big wildebeest herds back.

[marg]

@@pault,,,you are one smart dude to understand your wife so well. Great report and looking forward to more.

[twaffle]

Your trips are always jam packed with great sightings, they spring to life.

[madaboutcheetah]

Oh WOW - you saw an Aardvark?

 

Continues to elude me ..........

Btw, also, hoping you saw the OMC male Lions from the Moniko pride. If so, can't wait to see photos........

[armchair bushman]

I had actually noticed the "Safaritalk Flight", but couldn't decide whether you'd done that on purpose or not.

Really like the Singing Cheetah shot. And super sighting of that Aardwolf. And now there's mention of Aardvark at Serian? Don't tell me you saw Striped Hyena or Honey Badger as well?

[Sangeeta]

Really like the Singing Cheetah shot. And super sighting of that Aardwolf. And now there's mention of Aardvark at Serian? Don't tell me you saw Striped Hyena or Honey Badger as well?

Some people have all the luck!!

 

But haha, what with the runaway airplane, the white-bread & pasta weakened guide, the lion-cheetah-leopard trifecta, the absconding dodgy knee camp manager, and the tingling buns () oh what fun this promises to be Won't even be jealous of that crazy luck as long as you keep writing this!

[johnkok]

We were so looking forward to meeting up with you at Serian.had given us a heads-up and we had asked at Serian the day we rocked up. They said they did not have anyone of their list. Some days and some checking around later, they said you were going to be at the other Serian camps on 4 Oct (we were leaving on 5 Oct) and not the Main Camp that we were staying in.

 

We had been so looking forward to not only meeting you both in person but also to trying to set up another GTG with all of us 

 

As for your TR, another classic @@pault special in the making.

[pault]

GTG next time I am in Hong Kong @johnkok Definitely. Actually I was going to visit around Christmas but now my family are coming over to Thailand so that's off.

[PT123]

@pault

 

Great reporting as always PT! So far, excellent sightings - even an aardwolf!! The picture of the vulture airing out its bloomers made me laugh out loud.

[Game Warden]

@@pault Please do consider doing a review of the properties you stayed in for Safaritalk's new Lodge and Camp Review subforum.

 

Thanks, Matt.

[MR1980]

Wow, wow, wow @@pault!! What a great read and even better images...!! Thanks so much for sharing, you've had so many great sightings and I can't even start to name which images I like best because I can't choose... Looking forward to seeing more...

 

Cheers,

 

Michel

Edited October 22, 2015 by MR1980

[johnkok]

GTG next time I am in Hong Kong @johnkok Definitely. Actually I was going to visit around Christmas but now my family are coming over to Thailand so that's off.

Just as well since we are off for a food safari in Japan (Kyoto & Osaka)

[pault]

@@madaboutcheetah I have one shot of the top of a male's head. Not what you were hoping for I am sure. Incredibly, we just didn't have time to see the males. We spent quite a long time with the animals we tracked down if worthwhile, and they all were, so we only had a few sightings each day.

 

@@Kitsafari... You know how to hurt. Still no honey badger. The animal that avoids us. First and last was in the dark in April 2006. Something more unusual though.

 

Hari's question was timely because I was looking at my photos and thinking of all the things we didn't see, or even look for. We spent so long with particular sightings - generally no feeling to move on because we found what we were looking for and stayed, and whenever we did have some spare time, up popped something else to take away most of the rest of our afternoon/morning. In retrospect it was the quickest three night stay ever. We barely seemed to scratch the surface. And we never felt the desire to stay out all day, because we saw so much between 6 and 12, we needed a couple of hours off to process it (and download the photos). Up at 5.15, coffee, armpits and teeth, pack gear, out at 6, breakfast at 9, back at 11.30-12 ONE HOUR OFF, lunch, coffee and chat, TWO HOURS OFF (well not really, download and culling photos took most of that), out at 4, sundowner at nearly 7, then back to camp after dark, shower, one drink (well half a one), dinner, one drink with a chat and then bed...zzzzzzz and repeat. Olare Motorogi boot camp. That two hours off makes me feel guilty though - seeing it in print. Slackers!

 

Anyway, after a pretty notable morning, notable sightings from our ante-tent that afternoon were a mouse (mongooses the day before) and a Silverbird. Apparently (according to relief manager Aki) this gets twitchers-a-twitching with excitement. One came to our tent every day and sort of hung around, along with a pair of woodpeckers and the usual superb starlings. I thought it was just my poor bird ID skills that I couldn't place it. It's a flycatcher and apparently very attractive if you twitch. I did take a couple of photos from my comfy chair with my feet up. Not seen to best advantage here, but I was only at the tent in the after lunch hours.

 

 

That evening we decided to go and see if we could find the lion cubs first - to see them clean - and then see what the rest of the pride was up to. Lion day, except it didn't really quite turn out like that.

 

First surprise (I don't say sighting because of course we saw lots - even without the numerous herbivores I am skipping the occasional lion, not to mention dozens of hyenas and jackals, and even some mongooses) of the evening was an African Rock Python, out in the open. Wow again!

 

 

Something over two meters long we thought, although Nelson wouldn't lie down to confirm it, so a small one. Just moving across the plains - actually to take up residence in an aardvark burrow we found out soon enough. We had about 5 minutes with it - enough to look from a couple of different angles and admire its relative speed. It wasn't pleased by our presence, but also did not appear too alarmed. Well, to be honest I don't know what an alarmed python does, but after initially stopping it carried on its way and held its course.

 

 

And I posted this in the Show us your reptiles and amphibians thread, but will repost it here because it's interesting to see the difference between cameras and lenses with the same subject in similar light. Which is a Sony enthusiast camera with an old Minolta prime lens and which is all Canon semi-pro?

 

 

That's today's first quiz question and a more than a bit geeky. Even photographers may yawn. The next two are crackers.

 

Who wins the fight? On the ground, Serious fights with significant stakes..

 

 

Tawny Eagle versus Maribou Stork

 

Ground Hornbill versus African Puff Adder

 

 

Answers later

 

 

The lions had moved barely 100 meters from the previous evening, with the mother with cubs deciding that she would take care of that dead wildebeest going spare - good news for Nelson as otherwise it would have been stinking up the cub sightings something rotten in a couple of days. Now full of slightly rancid meat they were a lot less active.Looked like we would be in for a long wait to see anything much happen. At least they were relatively lion-coloured.

 

 

However, one little male was alert as the ever-present flies were annoying him a bit. There weren't a lot of them but they were biting.His photographer was finding it hard to concentrate too.The positive side to this is that although a few vehicles came along to see what we were seeing, none stayed very long at all.

 

 

 

Annoyed, he decided to climb a small tree to escape them.But it wasn't easy to get comfortable.

 

Nowhere for the head to rest and not enough grip for the front paws....

 

 

 

This kind of worked for a while, although it didn't look very comfortable...

 

 

And as he slid down and but more pressure on his hindquarters, the location of those thorns gave him an uncomfortable feeling not much better than the flies - he was a boy after all....

 

 

 

And after 20 minutes of edge-up-the-branch, try-to-sleep, slide-down, ouch! edge-up-the-branch again, etc. he gave up and decided to face the flies with his siblings.

 

 

Many of the pride were just 50 meters away (so maybe today had been introduction day - seemed like ti should be time) but they were as flat as flat cats could be.

 

One female started to roar. A very impressive sound as always at close quarters, but she couldn't even be bothered to sit up so it loses some of its power in the photographing.

 

 

We'd wondered where the males were, and after a few roars a tousle haired king emerged from a big croton bush (guess who got to sleep in the fly-repelling croton bush then?) to see what the fuss was all about, but the grass was long over there and so we only really saw the top of his head and his big mane. In any case, after seeing it was just a girl, he returned to his bush.

 

They were all probably as full as they wanted to be, and apart from the flies couldn't have been happier where they were - all flat. So we decided to leave them to it and go see what else we could find. We'd head for the open plains and scan them for something interesting. It was getting towards 6 anyway.

 

On the way, puttering along, Nelson suddenly stopped and pointed at a Tawny Eagle on the ground (I suppose there is a chance it could be a Steppe Eagle but I don't think so). Something wasn't normal but he had to look a while to work out what it was. We had to look a while too, but we drove over to have a closer look and between us (well I don't think Nelson really needed our help) we worked out what was going on. The very murky light by this time wasn't best for bird action, but the photos are okay and they certainly help tell the story.

 

The eagle was perched precariously on a bush with wings out. Our eyes made out something dark and nasty underneath (the camera sees much better than the eyes in this light).

 

 

 

Every now and again he would flap his wings to take off, rise a few inches and then flop back down again.

 

 

 

 

 

But he couldn't get airborne.

 

 

The slab of meat he had was too heavy to fly with.

 

So why didn't he just eat it there? Well, because he was a thief trying to escape the scene of the crime, and the victim was no shrinking violet weakling.

 

As the bloody-beaked victim approached, in that languid and circuitous way they do, the eagle tried to gobble down some more of the meat. Perhaps to reduce the weightt, perhaps expecting imminent loss.

 

 

 

Excuse me, but I think that is mine... and I would rather like to have it back.

 

 

 

The eagle's reaction completely foxed my camera settings and reaction times, but I'll show you the photo just to answer the question above, quite conclusively, I think. The response was clear.

 

 

#*%*#& OFF!!

 

 

The eagle struck instantly, in a flurry, and the stork went down like a deck of cards. Never even got a shot in. Game over.

 

And after about eight more hilarious, crashing bumping hopping attempts to fly, the eagle finally got his meal to the other side of a lugga and up onto a dead tree. It wasn't very high, but he obviously felt he wanted to eat his meal from a wooden table.

 

 

I have to say, for all the things we saw, that dust-up between the eagle and the stork was the most unexpected and possibly most memorable of all. I'll be asking that question for years. Dinner table bore warning!

 

 

Well after that, we were pretty "full" and said we could do anything - even just go for an early sundowner. Nelson asked whether we could help the Mara Cheetah project by looking for the Oloololo boy as KWS were coming up to dart either him or another cheetah with symptoms the next day and they hadn't been able to locate him yet. No problem with that - look for cheetahs and feel virtuous! Win-win

 

And we found him. Not long before dark, but well done Nelson. Amazing bit of tracking. He's really good with cheetahs and (especially) leopards - like they were his kin. There the boy was, wandering across a hillside, still calling for his brother and freaking out the wildlife.

 

He had an escort of 5 zebras and about 50 wildebeest to escort him safely from the premises. All he wanted to do was call for his brother, but he was being surrounded by animals that, once they realised he wasn't interested in hunting, wanted to bully him away as quickly as possible, just in case he changed his mind. It was like a kind of karma. He'd probably eaten some of their relatives in his day. The tables turned. But he didn't even seem bothered. the zebras and wildebeest mobbed him but he just completely ignored them, never changing his pace.

 

 

 

Two jackals joined in the mobbing when he came too close to their den. Oloololo boy still don't care. Just carried on with them yapping at his heels and then flopped down to rest - never ceasing the calling.

 

 

 

The jackals started to circle him, growling and yapping and I began to fear for his safety a bit. The jackals were becoming very bold. But he wasn't interested, Seen it all before I suppose.

 

 

The jackals circled in closer and closer and then suddenly, for no apparent reason, stopped and trotted off back towards their den.

 

Of course Nelson had long since called Dr Broekhuis and she arrived just after the jackals. She was very grateful to Nelson, and they and sometimes we chatted about the plans to dart a cheetah for blood tests tomorrow. She had originally planned to spend the night with him to make sure she din't lose him as KWS could only come down from Nairobi for that one day, but both she and Nelson thought it was unlikely he would leave Olare Orok that night, so they could catch him in the morning.

 

It was too late for a sundowner now, so we headed back to camp in the dark, spotting hundreds of wildebeest and a hyena. We said goodnight to Nelson and hi and chat to Aki, who excused herself a moment and then came running back to say Nelson had radioed in that he had seen an aardvark, and would we like to go and try to find it. We would! So we got in a vehicle, driven by one of the kitchen staff and found a wildcat! But it was "just" the feral cat- wildcat that was occupying Aki's office and even Darren and Emma's tent in the absence of the dog (that dog is going to be pissed when he gets back). Rather far away from camp for a not-quite wildcat, but if you remember the photo I posted in 2011 (yeah, like you would...ha ha... but you might!) she has plenty of wildcat blood..........anyway, we found Nelson, who was trying to find the aardvark again, and transferred to his vehicle, along with Aki, so the staff could get back to his work.We drove around in the dark for 20 minutes but had no luck.

 

Ha... that surprised you didn't it? A great day, but no aardvark to cap it.

 

After a quick shower, we had dinner in our tent that night as we were the only guests in camp - more would be arriving tomorrow. It would have been romantic, but we were knackered!

Edited October 22, 2015 by pault

[fictionauthor]

Bore me some more, please! I'm loving these photos, the eagle and the stork, dirty lion cubs, the cheetah who will not be shooed away, all wonderful.

[Atravelynn]

Your illness might be stress related when you believed you were being flown to Somalia. The jumping Maasai is magnificent. What a clever good natured guide. I hope he gets a copy of the work of art that resulted. I've never seen such cute, muddy cubs.

 

Scrolling down to write this, I saw some leopard cubs. So don't you dare try to pass this trip off as boring.

[Kitsafari]

 

An aardvark!! you darn lucky... guy. in OMC too! now i'm really jealous.

 

Put your glasses on! You're jumping the gun. The aardvark comes later - seriously! I hope you haven't been receiving inside information about my stay at Ngare Serian. None of it is true, if so.

 

 

the magic of Paul and Mara......

 

i don't need glasses - i need a spelling bee!

 

i'm still very jealous....

[Kitsafari]

Love that eagle and maribou stork scene! what a contest - or rather not much of a contest and you documented it.

 

much as I fear snakes, that rock python is beautiful especially when it was all straigthened up.

[ravipatel888]

Have to bookmark this report - excellent photography @@pault! Looking forward to the rest....

[Marks]

Only up to the first page so far, but the cheetah photos are great and the bush pie sounds delicious. I debated long and hard about which of those things to mention first. Looking forward to catching up on the next two pages.

 

Edit: just caught up. The eagle/stork rumble is once in a lifetime!

Edited October 23, 2015 by Marks

[jeremie]

I am really impressed by the quality of your pictures

[Atravelynn]

Nice shot of a heart wrenching situation with the cheetah intent on finding a brother that he never will. What a special leopard sighting with the cub. Did you get an estimate on the age? I hope this one survives.

 

Oh no, not another obstacle to cheetah survival--some kind of flu!

 

Fascinating eagle-stork confrontation. What a privilege to see it. How easy it is to miss these struggles that probably go on all the time but last fleeting moments.

 

So what's supposed to be boring?

Edited October 24, 2015 by Atravelynn

[johnkok]

That Tawny Marabou confrontation alone is worth the price of admission (in my books). Your words brought it to life, and your picture added to it. Good thing your reflexes (& your wits) were in shape :-)

 

We also had James help Elena look for two male cheetahs (did not succeed but tried valiantly, and for quite a while). One of them had been rather ill (apparently he was all swollen), and had been dosed but they wanted to try and give him a second dose. I cannot recall how it turned out but I fear it did not turn out well. There is some disease out there in the Mara which is killing cheetah, and they are not yet sure what it is. (They have ruled out poison and tainted meat as cheetah do not scavenge.) As if wildlife (& cheetah in particular) do not have enough problems/pressures.