Limpopo Valley Carnivores

Category: Uncategorized | Date: May 29 2008 | By: limpopocarnivores

One of the methods we are using for our census is scent stations, surrounded by swept sand. The idea is that any animals passing by will stop to sniff the scent pad, thereby leaving their tracks in the sand to be recorded. In the middle of the scent stations we place a pad soaked in fermented egg, which to us really is as bad as it sounds, but the wildlife and the canids in particular seem to find it irresistible. At each site we have a central scent station with the egg mixture, and on either side is a carpet pad hair snare that is laced with a different scent. The scents were are using here are perfume, fish oil, and catnip.

A scent station with hairsnare:

 

The problems we are finding is that many of the methods we are trying out are designed in places where the wildlife is perhaps less destructive than it is here. We have had elephants coming in and trashing our sites, Brown Hyaenas eating the whole scent pad, and of course the much discussed birds obliterating the previous nights tracks before we can get there to record them.

A hairsnare attached to a tree: 

Mishaps aside, the method is looking promising, and I am particularly keen on it as it is cheap, repeatable easily and has very low impact on the animals themselves. A perfect combination!

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Category: Snoopy and Barclay | Date: May 19 2008 | By: limpopocarnivores

While I head up the project, I have invaluable assistance from my fieldwork team and could not do without them. Azwifarwi is a student working with the Endangered Wildlife Trust’s Conservation Leadership Group. He originally came on a six month internship but we are very happy to announce that he is going to extend his stay with us for another six months. As in my previous post, he is going to be doing his Diploma research project on the Wild Dogs, while he continues with me. Much of our work at the moment involves spoor counts, which have to be conducted in the early morning to allow for the low angle of the sun to make the tracks in the sand more visible. By late morning when the sun is getting high, the tracks just seem to disappear. This means that Azwifarwi has free time in the afternoons when he can go out and study the Wild Dogs.  

Wendy originally worked on the Wild Dog project during the last research project which was focussing on the provisioning of puppies by adults. The data was hard to collect for just one person and so Wendy came on board to help with that. The data collection for that project has now finished and is being written up, so Wendy was able to come across to the Carnivore Census Project and share her excellent knowledge of the reserve and the wildlife with us.  

As Snoopy was my dog before the project began and lived alone with me, he is very much a one person dog and is reluctant to work for anyone else. I want to avoid this pitfall with Barclay due to it being more useful to have a dog that can be worked by one of a number of handlers, and so Wendy is going to be working with Barclay as well. We hope to be able to use the dogs on projects elsewhere and it will be ideal if at least one of them is not dependent on my presence to perform. As long as we are consistent in our commands and praise, I think Barclay will have no problem in working for different handlers.

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Category: Lions, South Africa | Date: May 16 2008 | By: limpopocarnivores

Here is the beautiful Rumpleteaser. What a cat! 

This Caracal was photographed walking down a fence late last year. It is the angle and perspective of the photo that makes it look so out of proportion.

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Category: Tracking | Date: May 15 2008 | By: limpopocarnivores

We do not really hate birds, but they are certainly not helping us out at the moment. We have set up scent stations along our spoor count transects with delicous scent such as fermented egg and fish oil on a pad of cotton wool in the middle of an area of swept, watered sand. The idea is that animals moving along the transects will be irresitably drawn to sniff the enticing smell and so leave a record of their passing by way of footprints in the sand. We have had some problems with this such as Brown Hyaenas stealing the scent pads, and Elephants taking exception to our efforts and trashing our scent stations, but the biggest, most persitent thorn in our side is the birds whose track are obliterating the tracks of our predators before we can record what was there. The high rainfall this year has led to wonderfully large broods of game birds such as francolins and guinea fowl, but this means that large groups are out forgaing at first light and they are quite literally trampling all over my data. We are hanging crunched up tin foil above the trees but it is serving as no deterrent whatsoever. Any suggestions would be much appreciated!

8 responses so far

Category: Lions | Date: May 15 2008 | By: limpopocarnivores

There is a pair of young lions that have been wandering around Venetia for some time now that have proved extremely elusive when it comes to managing to put a collar on them, so we are all extremely excited at having finally succeeded. Mungojerrie and Rumpleteaser are brother and sister and, in my opinion, are two of the most beautiful lions on the reserve. We bump into them from time to time, and the volunteer group were even lucky enough to see them hunting a kudu in front of their camp recently, but every time there is a vet on hand they disappear. We finally did it! Mungojerrie is now proudly sporting a radio-collar and so we will start to get to know the habits of this pair of youngsters.

In the photo Mungojerrie is the young lion on the right, and his father, Thunzi, is on the left.

They have been independent of their mother for over a year, but are sticking together for rather a long time for opposite sex siblings. We know they use the fence lines a lot as we often see them there. My husband has had a few encounters with them while checking our fence on his quad bike (ATV). Rumpleteaser definitely views him as prey and wastes not time in dropping down to stalk him. Being young and subordinate, it may be that they are looking to expand their territory or are simply avoiding the older, more established lions in the centre of the reserve. Now that we have a collar on Mungojerrie, we can begin to answer some of our questions.

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Category: Tracking, Wild Dogs | Date: May 14 2008 | By: limpopocarnivores

Azwifarwi, my very able field assistant, is working towards his diploma in Nature Conservation and as part of that needs to complete a project on animal behavior. After much deliberation, he has decided to focus his study on the pack of Wild Dogs on Venetia. The pack are somewhat more skittish than usual after having to be darted twice each for their rabies injections, and so the extra hours Azwifarwi will spend with the dogs will help to regain their trust in having a vehicle present. Even in their more alert state, the Venetia pack is an exceptionally relaxed and well-habituated pack and so offer some of the best opportunities for tourists to observe Wild Dogs in their natural environment anywhere in Africa. Trips to see the Wild Dogs are hosted by one of the dedicated researchers and guests are often lucky enough to witness them hunting. As we come into the Southern Hemisphere Winter, it is approaching the time we expect the Wild Dogs to make their den and have another litter of puppies. We are confident that the alpha female, Stellar (so named for a white star on her coat), is pregnant.  There should be some interesting data for Azwifarwi to collect, along with the data collected by Kristi, the Wild Dog researcher. Last year the den was only 10 metres from the fence line with our farm, right where the cheetah family crossed over. We can hardly wait to see what this denning season brings!

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Category: Uncategorized | Date: May 07 2008 | By: admin

We would like to extend our sincere thanks to all of you who have donated to us last month. In particular Theresa S. and Antonio Canella, but also to our anonymous donors. Your help is appreciated and we will keep you posted with the progress from the GPS collar once we have fitted it.

There was excitement all round and the usual emptiness of the bush was interrupted recently by the annual Bike for Beats Mountain Bike Challenge on Venetia. This bike race in aid of EWT pits riders from all over the country against gruelling conditions involving deep sand, vicious thorns and baking heat covering over 60km of beautiful scenery in the reserve. The population of elephants are unlikely to take too kindly to cyclists in their way so there is are Land Rovers at the front and back of the riders, and a helicopter above the course ready to step in if necessary. Should there be elephants on the track, the whole race stops until they have cleared the way. Thankfully, the elephants were again very well-behaved and no stops were made.

The race not only raises money for the EWT, but also gives riders the rare opportunity to explore this part of the world by bike. It was again a resounding success and we are all looking forward to next years race.

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