Feeding the addiction

Stanley - Thursday

I’m in the bush, recovering from the world.  I am a total addict.  The more I’m here, the more I need to be here.

This time, the contrast with what came before is very stark.  Even though I have internet access (spotty at best), I’ve had no interest in keeping up with what is happening.  I’ve left behind the pervasive anger, intolerance, and deafness that is blanketing the planet.  I don’t know what is happening in the Middle East, Europe, or the USA.  I don’t know what my Facebook friends are up to.  Have the markets spiked because of the US election?  Or tanked?  I don’t really care because there’s little or nothing I can do about it.

Life is basic here.  Wake up early; have a cup of coffee and some fruit.  Occasionally egg and bacon.  Head out in the rickety Land Rover to wander around the three thousand hectares of bush I have traversing rights on.  Hope to see something interesting.

There is always something interesting.  The first blades of grass pushing through the drought-stricken earth fascinate me.  How do they do it?  Where do they get the energy to brave a new year? 

And in the midst of the barren red soil, a gorgeous plant with red flowers stands proudly for all to see.  

And another:

I wonder how long they will last.  Will they be eaten?  Or wither away, more victims of the drought?

Animals are sparse.  Not surprising really, even though the waterholes are full thanks to the floods of four years ago, which replenished the water table.  Unlike the grass, which is virtually non-existent, the trees look good, most with good foliage, also thanks to the good water table.  I guess their roots can reach the water.

He has right of way.

Surprisingly the impala look healthy – must be eating leaves, since there is no grass.  But I see very few youngsters.  Perhaps the impala women took a year off from being pregnant because their offspring would die for lack of food.

The most interesting animals this time have been two mother-child pairs of rhinos.  (Frankly, I can’t tell the difference between a baby boy rhino and a baby girl.  Not at a distance anyway.)  Someone else saw eight rhinos together, something I’ve never seen.  We’re all worried about rhinos – over a thousand killed in South Africa alone this year.  Poached to satisfy irrational desires in Vietnam and China.  It’s impossible to stop the poachers, who have little to lose.  We should be doing more to stop the demand.

Also interesting is seeing the corpse of a hippo.  Starved to death by the drought.  Enough water in the dams to survive the heat.  But nothing to eat.  Sad.  However, the vultures weren’t complaining.

Here's a hippo uncharacteristically out of the water during the day scrabbling in the dust for something to eat.  The vultures are keeping an eye on him too.

There are a few animals about - always delightful to look at.

Elephants are fine - plenty of leaves on the trees

Don't know what the steenbok is living off - luckily it needs little

A warthog praying for rain

The buffalo also look healthy - must have learnt to eat leaves

Sometimes I don’t drive around hoping for an interesting chance encounter.  Sometimes I take a cooler of food and drink to a hide and settle in for a few hours to watch the passing show.  There’s always something going on.  If there are no animals, there are birds – about four hundred species in this area alone.  Except when there is a drought, when many of the seed eaters are smart enough not to arrive.  This too has benefits – I don’t worry about trying to identify each LBJ (little brown job) – there aren’t any.

But I had one spectacular sighting – a pygmy kingfisher – a bird I haven’t seen in years.  It’s about the length of one of my fingers, but much more beautiful.

Yesterday one of the first migrants returned - the woodland kingfisher.  Its call fills the air.  Click here to hear it.  One of the magical sounds of the bush.  And early in the morning I heard to iconic call of the African bush - the African fish eagle.  Didn't see it though.  Click hear to hear its beautiful call.

Photo: Hennie van Heerden from www.beautyofbirds.com

And the rollers have started to return too - one of the stunning birds of the bush.

And early in the morning I heard the iconic call of the African bush - the African fish eagle.  Didn't see it though.  Click hear to hear its beautiful call.

African fish eagle - a cousin to the bald eagle, I would guess

 When the day is over, a gin and tonic awaits – medicinal, of course.  It’s important to take quinine to minimise the chances of contracting malaria.  And a glass of wine or two to prepare the mind for contemplation.

Then early to bed.  And the next day, the cycle repeats.

It is special here.  As I write this blog, I can hear some male lions grumbling about something.  Probably not happy that their female partners haven’t provided enough food, or that they had to exert themselves to get to it.  And when male lions grumble, the whole neighbourhood knows about it.  The decibel level of a lion’s roar must be about equivalent to a jet engine.

I also hear hyenas calling.  I don’t understand hyena talk, but I imagine the message has something to do with food.  Perhaps the food the lions are grumbling about.

And before I finish writing this blog, a miracle happens.  When I started writing, the sky was glowing with millions of stars.  Orion and his belt and sword were over there.  And I’m sure I saw his dog, Canis Major, wag its tale and wink, watched by the seven sisters.

Then a flash or two in the distance.  A bit later a gust of wind.  Another gust.  Then for fifteen or twenty minutes, the wind howls.  Mosquito-repellant cans blow off the table, doors bang, chairs blow over.  The sky is now full of lightning, but surprisingly little thunder.

More wind.  More lightning.

Then the thunder starts.  I love it.  Flash, bang, crash.  Mette hates it and burrows deep under her pillow.

And then I smell it.  Rain is coming.  Nothing nicer than the smell of impending rain in the African bush.

And then it rains.  Much needed rain.  Coming down horizontally.  Sometimes through the screens that comprise our outside walls. 

Even the lions are quiet.  So are the hyenas.  In awe of the storm and thankful for it.

And then it is over.  Just the sound of water dripping from the trees.

I settle down to finish the blog, thankful I had the foresight to cover the Land Rover.  I don’t like driving around sitting on a wet seat.

(Photos: Stan Trollip, Mette Nielsen, Martin Sambrook)

Drought

Stan - Thursday

It doesn’t matter what you believe the reasons are for why the climate is changing, the reality is that things are changing.  And changing quickly.  In all sorts of unexpected ways.

In a sense, it is the unpredictability of the changes that has caught us off guard. Throughout the world, weather patterns are weird - places having higher highs or lower lows; areas, normally dry, having floods; areas, normally wet, having droughts.  

For many people arguing about the role humans have played in climate change is the extent to which they get involved.  Their involvement is academic.  Certainly they read about what may happen if the oceans rise a metre or so.  What will happen to Miami or New York City, not to mention many Pacific Ocean islands and island nations that may disappear all together?

They may also notice a rise in some food prices.  But few actually experience what climate change can really mean to a community.

South Africa is experiencing a terrible drought this summer – not all of the country, of course, but much of the food-basket areas in the centre of the country, as well as the area around Cape Town, where severe water restrictions are in place.

I read about the fact that the farmers of the Free State province won’t have any crops this year.  

Non-existent crops in the Free State

Dams are empty or nearly so.

Dead sheep

I see hundreds of plastic bottles of water outside filling stations, all donated, that will be transported to the affected areas.  

There are hundreds of water collection points around the country.

People queuing for water.

Waiting for water.

I see photographs of cracked, arid soil with nothing growing.  I speak to people who normally use local beef to make biltong - the South Africa equivalent of jerky, but who now are importing beef so they can keep their businesses alive.  Many of the local cattle have died.

However, other than paying increased costs if I don’t cut my average water consumption in Cape Town by 20%, I don’t actually experience the effects of the drought firsthand.  I can still get water whenever I want it.

This week, for the first time, I saw for myself the effects of the drought firsthand.

I travelled to Ingwelala, a private game reserve bordering the famed Kruger National Park.  Normally it is rich in game because of its abundant grazing and browsing, as well as its dams, full of water pumped from boreholes.

This year, the dams are still full, but there are few animals because there is no grass to eat.  Having water to drink is nice, but if there is nothing to eat, it’s time to leave and find something better elsewhere.

What is strange is that the bushes and trees seem to have found water deep underground and are in decent shape, but there is no grass whatsoever – just barren sand.

No grass

Nothing for grazers to eat

The most noticeable difference from normal times is the devastation of trees and bushes by elephants desperate for something to eat.  Hungry elephants have toppled hundreds of trees just to get to the few delicious leaves at the top.  The same elephants have uprooted hundreds, if not thousands, of bushes to get to the moisture of the root systems.  

Apparently elephants find some moisture around the roots

Could be a scene after a WWI bombardment

More devastation

Elephants are breaking through electric fences into camp to get to the fresh-water pipes.

Baobabs store water in the trunk.  Elephants often dig into the trunks to get to the moisture.  Rocks placed around the base of the tree are designed to keep the ellies away.

Concrete pyramids to keep ellies away

To make things worse, the elephants are so stressed that they are behaving unpredictably.  An Ingwelala member, casually watching some elephants, was chased for no reason for over 600 metres by an irritable elephant, which needed to blow off some steam.  Fortunately nobody was hurt.  My co-author, earlier in the year was also charged, and friends Aron and Jenny had their car damaged by an irritated ellie - while they were in it!

Elephant charging Aron and Jennie's car - photo by very scared passenger (Roger Taylor)

We normally have a few hippos on the property, but they’ve also left because here is nothing to eat.  A friend who just returned from Kruger told me that the hippos there are in such bad shape that they are foraging during the day (instead of at night).  Many are severely undernourished.  In fact, Kruger is considering culling hippos because of the drought.  Read more about it here.  

Kubu would definitely be short-tempered if he found himself in such a situation.  

Even though it is a very depressing sight to drive around Ingwelala, there are a few bright spots:  the impala and kudu are doing well, probably because they can browse as well as graze; the giraffes are fine because they can reach those succulent leaves high up, and the lions and leopards are in hog heaven (that doesn’t sound right!) because all they have to do is hang around a waterhole and dinner comes to them.

Giraffes are browsers - fortunately for them.

The kudu are in good condition - they browse as well.

The warthogs hogging a small pond.

The point I’m trying to make is that if you want to understand the real effects of climate change, go and stay somewhere where changes are having a dire impact, where lives are at stake, where the future is uncertain.

PS.  After I had finished writing this blog, I came across this video of a game park, Madikwe, in another part of South Africa.  As I said, the weather is weird everywhere.  Click here to watch.