Author: Focus Online Dev
Rangers Journal February 2020
Fantastic February
Welcome to our February Rangers blog, hope you guys will enjoy the news and photos that are posted here today for you.
We had our last big beautiful rains for the year, and it was great! I will never complain about rain again as we have been in severe droughts in the past and this year was exceptionally good, and you ca see it in All new newbies that has arrived, and even with all the fabulous plant and flower growth that we got this year. Even some of our old creepy crawlies that was absent came back in full force.
In the wet times we were a bit struggling finding our favourite lion pride in the south as many roads were inaccessible due to the rain …… but when we did find them, they gave us some memorable times. Monomoholo will always give a great show when he not with his beautiful girls by signing that real African theme song of his that will always stay with you and long you back to this Magic place and Africa, we call home.
We have some exciting news! The Matlapa female from the south have produced new cubs! Three beautiful youngsters. Unfortunately, we could not get any photos of them yet, only had a quick glimpse of them as she moved them to a new hiding spot.
There are lots of water around after these good rains and have brought back some of the big buffalo herds back down in the south where grazing are also very good, not just for them but a variety of great plains animals like zebra, wildebeest, impala, red hartebeest, gemsbuck and even some eland.
The two male cheetahs have been seen very often and has given us some good sightings. The yellow tag female that lost her cubs should be coming back into heat very soon, so we are holding big thumbs. But in other news with the cheetahs is that the red tag female that is roaming more of the east of the reserve has produced 4 cubs! FIRST TIME IN 15 YEARS that Madikwe produced cheetah cubs!
The two boys seem to have a lion magnet attached to them as they are constantly running into the northern pride – luckily, they have their wits about them and avoided bad conflict with them.
We also had some great interactions with various animals like lions and elephants, which is always very interesting to watch.
We had ones again had some GREAT black rhino sightings, a lot more than we had in the past as this is a good thing that our numbers are climbing – Big up for conservation here and our Anti – Poaching
Team.
The wild dogs have been sighted quite a bit this month and gave us some great sighting of the youngsters playing around and having some fun.
Munye our resident male leopard has been spotted a few times but a little more difficult this time as the grass are extremely long – unless he climbs in a tree and make our job a little easier to spot him.
He has sometimes been like Houdini as we only find his tracks coming past the lodge and only find him on camera as he walks past our waterhole (thank you for technology).
I wish you all were here to hear Monomolo give us his best song and have the great sounds of the Madikwe bush around you.
I which you a lovely month and don’t forget to catch our next big newsletter.
Bush Regards
Ruan and The T-TEAM
Rangers Journal Festive Time
Hello again to all our fans !!
Hope you all had a great festive time, as we had here in the savannas of Madikwe.
The lodge was super busy… as always, and we had some amazing gusts join us for this very special time.
The rains have come on thick so far this year, so the bush is looking really pristine, and I myself have not seen it like this for many years now, as it seems the drought of the last 5 years has given up a little to Modjadji, the rain Queen.
Ok so this is a joint newsletter including the highlights from December and January all in one.
So let’s start with Andre’s highlights from December…
Greetings from the Tuningi team we hope you had a lovely festive season and a happy new year.
We had a huge amount of rain this month, and with all this rain magical things tend to happen in the bush. Madikwe looks like a green emerald jewel exploding with new life, by new life I mean its baby season folks.
The impalas and Blue wildebeest are giving birth, and we are having so much fun watching these little babies enjoying their new life. All the babies are bouncing and running around with youthful energy and exploring their new world. Unfortunately, with the abundance of babies around they also fall prey to the carnivores, especially the Wild dogs that’s why we have not released our 2nd pack yet.
The Wild dogs are doing great and looking very healthy. The pups are keeping up with the adults and getting fed well. With a lot of mouths to feed they need to hunt every day and we’ve been lucky to witness brilliant sightings close to our lodge this month. We cannot wait for the 2nd pack toe be released that we can have more sightings of these wonderful animals.
Monomoholo and Kwandwe the 2 male coalition still rule in the Southwest and the Northwest of the park. It is clear our local Southern pride the Mica and Jamala pride prefer the presence of Monomoholo. He is busy mating with the females so hopefully in 3 and a half months we will have cubs in the South west. Mica the old lady of the pride is busy showing her daughter Jamala X the ropes of leading the Southern pride because she is getting ready to retire as she has started to lose condition.
The 2 Cheetah brothers are a very successful hunting combination every time we see them, they tend to be full and lying in the open and posing for the camera. On a sad note the female cheetah that was pregnant lost her cubs. It’s a big shock to us and everybody in Madikwe. The cause of losing her cubs are unknown , hopefully she learned from her mistakes and it will make her a stronger cheetah and more experience mother.
Our local territorial male Leopard, Munye kept himself rare as per normal, but we managed seeing him few times. The most memorable sighting was on the 31st December stealing the show just he like he knows how. We followed him threw some nasty rocky areas and we were awarded seeing him jump into a Marula tree. A new female Leopard starting to show herself more and more. Unfortunately, she is still very skittish, and only allows us to see her from a distance. Hopefully in the future she will be more relaxed and giving us amazing sightings.
All this rain makes the heavy weights very happy, Rhino black and white, Buffalo and Elephants sightings were out of this world. The big herds of buffalo approaching a waterhole is a sight to see. The big water holes are changing into swimming pools for elephant herds, and it brings a lot of joy on our guests faces and making for some memorable sightings. It’s always a nice surprise seeing a rhino wallowing in a secretive pan full of mud keeping himself cool in the mud on warm summers day.
From me and the Tuningi team have a blessed new year full of love and enjoyment
Andre
Ok, thanks Andre for that great news from December. So let’s get into the highlights from January….
So, I will continue with the heavyweights of the bush, the elephants. They are living in “ELEPHANT HEAVEN” at the moment with all the waterholes full to the brim and all the natural mud wallows providing them with all they need to manicure their thick skins on a hot summers day.
Swimming and playing in the water is a daily chore now, as they splash around in the muddy happy holes, lowering their core body temperatures, and also just for the pure enjoyment of the mud on their skins as it sloughs off the insects which pester them this time of the year.
Who says it is only in East Africa where you can see tree-climbing lions?!
They have been sighted here in Madikwe too… Yep I witnessed on one crispy post rainy morning our southern pride females jumping into a very random bush, from which they seemed to use as a better vantage point for something they may have been hunting earlier.
Now lions are not known for their grace in trees, but they do seem to enjoy the challenge that gravity has put before them, as their 150kg bodies hang on to the bark splitting claws as they jostle for a more comfortable position.
While we are talking about the southern pride, the Mica female, the prides “rock“, has been showing signs of deterioration, as she has just gone past her 18th birthday in late November, and she is now the oldest lioness in Madikwe’s history.
She still has decent looking teeth, so as long as she can still stay with the pride on a regular basis, to eat, she will break all age records for lionesses in the wild.
Monomoholo, the dominant of the 2 males here in the south pride has also been playing “ bodyguard” for the last month, and has been seen hanging out in an area where we think 2 of the females may have cubs in the hills around the airstrip. We are keeping a beady eye on this development, and hopefully next month we will show you some images of brand new lion cubs !!
The north pride has also been taken care of by Kwandwe, and he has been seen with the females a lot this month, as he knows that Monomoholo has the south covered, but joins him at the drop of a hat, when they suspect trouble is imminent.
We had one sighting of jackal pups that pushed the cute factor through the roof. There were 3 of the little buggers, and I will leave the images to speak for themselves, as they waited on their parents to return from a hunt one morning.
The next series of images shows elephants digging up soil and eating it, at very special areas here in the bush, called mineral hotspots, and basically all of the herbivores utilise these areas to boost their systems with minerals they do not get, such as sodium, calcium, magnesium etc in the plants that they eat. The term we use for this behaviour is called “GEOPHAGIA” which means to eat soil.
This time of the year the savanna pops up among the pallet of greenery, splashes of colour in the form of wild flowers. There are hundreds of different species popping up everywhere, much to the delight of the Brown Veined White butterflies which stop by these flowers to sip some sweet nectar as they continue their epic journey from the northern cape all the way to the Indian ocean where they lay their eggs on the way and then mysteriously just die in the middle of the ocean.
The wild dog pack is doing very well, and the puppies have just been given their bi-annual rabies shots, and seem to be in tiptop condition. The adults have been killing regularly, and are keeping the ravenous pups well fed. The other pack in the holding facility will hopefully be released this month sometime, and we eagerly wait for the number of sightings to increase twofold.
I found them one morning on the northern fence line where they had killed a huge male kudu, and were in a very playful mood after filling their bellies to exploding levels. They have a very strict social structure among their ranks, and so playing is a vital part of wild dog politics.
Ok.. well that’s it from me… I will leave you all with a few bonus images…
All the best,
Gavin and the T-Team
A Guide to Green Season in Madikwe
Rangers Journal November 2019
RAIN, RAIN BEAUTIFUL
It has arrived!
(ALL IMAGES ARE COPYRIGHT: RUAN SCHUTTE)
We received our first good rains for the season. There is nothing that smells so good then fresh like raindrops on the dry African soil.
So let us start with the great bird and insect life that nice rains have brought us. A lot of our migrants are back and the birdlife is good. All our small and big creepy crawlies have also woken up and are out and about. It is nice looking at the smaller things as well and not just the bigger animals.
All our beautiful wild flowers are coming up and making this wonderful place look even prettier.
Let us talk about what is happening with our lion soapy.
Kwandwe and Monomoholo has been hanging around together for some time down in the South where both of them had the opportunities to grab them each a beautiful girl ( Jamala and Matlapa)and mated with them, so hopefully we should have some little ones in the coming new year.
We had some very good lion sightings lately of lazy, playing, mating, killing and eating lions.
The yellow tag female cheetah has moved more towards the North West of the reserve where she is looking for a good and safe place to give birth . Yes you heard me right, to give birth! She should be giving birth anytime soon in the next weeks. It is sooo exting as Madikwe have not produced baby cheetah for a very long time. EXITING TIMES AHEAD.
Our resident tom leopard Munye has been seen a few times, and has given us some good sightings of him patrolling his territory and also feeding on a young warthog.
Gavin also found a new young female leopard around Inkwe pan which is very exciting news. Hopefully we will see her more often.
The dogs are out and about with the youngsters but are hanging around the East of the reserve for now.
Rhino sightings have been out of this world of both Black and White. We had great Black rhino sightings and as you know they are actually a lot more difficult to find than the white.
For now, I will say Goodbye and farewell, and will pray for more Rains to come.
Greetings Ruan and the T-Team
Madikwe Game Reserve Safaris
Rangers Journal October 2019
Welcome back to yet another instalment of our Rangers Journal !!
Suicide month is almost at its end with the promise of rain in the air becoming more and more apparent as we are all on our knees praying for the life-giving liquid to fall out of the sky and kickstart the transformation from dry and dusty to clean, green and fresh.
There are already signs of the amazing event that will unfold within the next few weeks as soon as the first big rains are expected to arrive within the next week, such as this Devil’s trumpet flower amongst the dead grass, which exacerbates the struggle of Life vs Death.
However, it seems as if “Life” will always win.
Ok, let’s get into what is the latest bushveld politics here in Madikwe for this month.
To Start with the cheetahs, Savannah, our local female has been doing really well, and has been seen regularly also making various kills this month, and she continues to impress us with her tenacious ability to pull down prey items such as full-grown male impala. This will bode well for her as she prepares to have her cubs… Yip, she has been showing us signs of her advanced pregnancy stages with her teat line getting bigger by the day. We are super stoked for her, and we wish her well for her last month of pregnancy.
The two Phinda males have for the most part been spending all their time in the north west of the park, and are also looking supreme, and seem to be ruling the north of the park. They are also almost never struggling to kill prey, as they seem to always be full bellied when we see them.
Our local lion pride have been acting rather weird this month, as on one occasion they ganged up on the Monomoholo male and inflicted bite wounds to his back legs, which put him out of action for a week or so, but he has fully recovered, and seems to have reinstated his dominance over the girls.
The Kwandwe male has been spending most of his time without Monomoholo in the north west looking after the Tchaba pride. This seems to be the boys way of keeping the females from both prides happy, and also making sure that there is dominant presence from these two brutes everywhere inside their now massive territory.
There is however a threat which is growing in power to the east. This comes in the form of the Kwandwe male’s sons… The Mahiwa brothers, which means “GIFT”, and are seemingly setting up territory in an aggressive fashion around the Vlei pan area and further eastwards towards the river, but every now and again are finding themselves wondering into the far eastern boundaries of their father’s territory, so we are very anxious to see how this story will pan out in the near future once these 3 young males will find their confidence and possibly come west to challenge Monomoholo and Kwandwe for the right to own the females.
They have also been absolute killing machines this month and have been responsible for killing on a regular occasion, and also brave enough to pull down even the strongest of adversaries, the old male buffalo.
The Mica Pride with its mix of experience and youth has given us some great photo opportunities. One fine morning we located on the pride at Vleisfontein, the old missionary station which is situated on the ancient ivory trade route between Mafikeng and Bulawayo in Zimbabwe, and is now our park headquarters.
On arrival, the 2 youngest members of the pride, Boipelo and Bontle were in a jolly mood and for the next half hour, they entertained us with their acrobatics and power display which the photos will show you below.
On the other side of the waterhole was the legendary Mica female which is now over 17 years old !! Yeah, she is a living legend and is till looking as majestic as the first day I saw her almost 14 years ago for the first time.
Her teeth are still looking good, and as long as she can eat, she should be ok, especially as she has passed on her finely-honed hunting skills onto her daughters which will definitely be looking after this awesome lioness as long as they can.
General game in the area has been epic, as large herds of zebra and wildebeest are always great to see, as they fill up the blank spots between the predator sightings, and if you really sit and look at their behavior for a while, it can create some good photo opportunities.
Munye has been a little evasive this month and has had us pulling our hair out a little as he has been spending a lot of time to the west of the lodge in the rocky sections which we cannot access easily. However, we had one awesome tracking session on him this week, with me and Andre going out after breakfast to see if we could track him down for the afternoon safari. It was a successful attempt, and after about 3 hours we eventually found him chilling out and taking a siesta underneath a guarri bush trying to avoid the now intense sun.
On returning in the afternoon with our guests, he had not moved an inch, until much later where he headed out in search of his next meal.
We also had a great sighting of the ridge monster ! This guy is huge , and he was on one of the mountain slopes one morning, where we watched him carry his honey badger kill into the rocks to eat it in peace.
I unfortunately could not get any images of him, but we are excited that he made no attempt to run away from us as he usually does, so it seems like our persistent attempt at habituating him to the vehicles is paying off slowly, and we will not give up, until we have his trust in our pockets.
We also had a good sighting of a pair of ostriches that were presenting us with their brand-new offspring, and it was awesome to see the little chicks trying to keep up to their giant parents as they trundled down the road.
Rhino and elephant sightings are off the charts this month, as the heat of the midday gets them all down at the waterholes. The cacophony of mud splashing and baby elephants screaming for their mothers to open the front legs to free the teat is sometimes deafening while you are sitting in the hide only meters away from them at the lodge.
Out there in the bush, waterholes are a good place to get your fair share of paciderm bliss as the sunsets and or dramatic dust bathing will get your shutter burning up.
We have had awesome black rhino sightings too this month, and on many an occasion the feisty buggers have come to within meters of the vehicles as they show us why you do not want to bump into them on foot out here, stopping in a cloud of dust and then snorting before turning tail and disappearing into the distance with the sound of the bush cracking as they charge off.
There is also something about being in the presence of the gentle giants of Madikwe, in the form of the old elephant bulls, which just exude the immense enormity of the largest land-based mammal on this planet. When they get close to you, you will not believe the power they possess as they quietly walk past without a sound.
We also located on a giraffe which had died from natural causes, and had some lions feed on it before leaving it once it became a little too rancid for their liking. This gave the opportunity for the scavengers to move in and remove what was left. The stomachs of these beasts must be made of cast iron, as that rotting meat will put most of us mere mortals into the grave without a doubt. We are thankful for their role in the system as they can clean the environment of all the bacteria which could possibly otherwise create a disease outbreak here in the bush. Madikwe is one of the few places in South Africa, where you can find both the Brown and Spotted hyena living in harmony.
Well…. Until the rains come….
Catch you again next month….
Gavin and the T-Team.
Getting to Madikwe Game Reserve
Tuningi Rangers Journal September 2019
Dry, windy, dusty this is what u can expect if you come to Madikwe in September in October.
We had some amazing sightings this month and the guests enjoyed the experiences with us.
The summer is upon us and it is getting warmer and dryer and the waterholes are getting smaller as the animals are getting concentrated close to the waterholes.
The Mica pride in the south is doing very well and they gave us some memorable sightings this month. The two sub adults are growing stronger and always on the look out for prey and opportunities to hunt to impress the rest of the females in the pride.
The 2-male coalition Kwandwe and Monomoholo are regulars now in the South and they successfully took over the Mica pride. They are definitely the strongest coalition in Madikwe and most successful.
They are sharing feasts and mating with the Females
In the morning we are always out and about looking for fresh tracks. There is nothing more thrilling for a guide to see fresh tracks, especially lion tracks. It gets our blood pumping as guides and it’s a wonderful experience for the guest to see how we track, and doing what we do best. For us at Tuningi we take our tracking and finding animals very seriously.
Munye our resident male has been seen regularly this month and gave us real good show with plenty of good sightings. He is covering a huge area recently, hunting, patrolling and searching for females to mate with. He is really our golden Boy.
It’s always so wonderful and rewarding to see the expression on the guest’s faces the first time they see a Leopard. The holy grail of the big 5.
I am very proud to say that the new female cheetah is doing very well and looking better than ever. Looks like she loves the southern part of Madikwe where she has been seen many times.
She is a really good hunter and very successful, she is going to be a really good mother for her cubs. Imagine a cheetah female with cubs in Madikwe just wow can’t wait for that moment.
For the last couple of weeks, the 2 male cheetahs are patrolling and hunting very successfully here in the south and that’s a really good thing for us. The one reason may be …. Hint, hint …. yes you are right all to do with the female cheetah. These two boys just love termite mounts and using it for look out points for prey and scanning the horizon.
The pack of Wild dogs have not been seen for a couple of weeks because they are busy denning on the Tswene Tswene mountain exactly in middle part of madikwe. This is a very exited time for us and we can’t wait to see how many pups there are in the pack. Looking forward for our new pack that will be arriving end of December and hopefully bringing lots more Wild dog sightings.
We are so privileged to have a very active hyena den so close to our lodge. This clan of hyenas consist of 4 generations of young cubs and adults close to 6 individuals. Hyenas are always popular with guests just because they are such interesting animals. Hyenas got a very bad publicity because of the lion king that will stick with them for ever. Hyenas are very good hunters, better than lions, and are actuality ruled by a Queen with an iron throne in a matriarchal society. The females are much bigger than the males.
World Rhino day on 22 September celebrates all 5 species of rhino: Black, White, greater one horned, Sumatran and Javan rhinos. In Madikwe we have the black rhino and the white Rhino. The black rhino being the most elusive of them. Great effort goes in to keep them safe in madfikwe and Africa. They can live up to 45 years old and a white rhino can reach up to 2 tons and black rhino 1.4 tons. These animals are truly an African giant and iconic species of Africa.
The general game is not doing too bad either, considering how dry it is. The animals affected the most will be the browsers first because of the lack of leaves, especially the kudus. I can’t wait to see a beautiful kudu male browsing on succulent green leaves, and see madikwe green again. Let’s hope the rains are not far that madikwe the jewel of South Africa can transform again to the green Marico bushveld that we all love.
Thats all for this month Folks,
Regards,
Andre and the T-Team
Hyena Facts You Didn’t Know
Tuningi Ranger’s Journal August 2019
The windy month in the bush has been living up to its name, with the days starting out nice and serene, and then around our coffee breaks on the morning safari, we get exposed to the trade winds which are characteristic of this time of year. This sends dust into the air…and our eyes… lol…. But also creates some awesome sunrises and sunsets. The general game don’t like the wind much, and seem to get all bunched up in a tiny huddle, as they cannot hear the predators coming, and the opposite happens for the predators, in that the wind will help them with masking their smell and sounds when they go after their prey.
Otherwise the bush is really getting dry at the moment, and will get even worse in the next 2 months. Waterholes are always busy, and have been giving us some awesome elephant action shots as they enjoy themselves in the mud. The mud also helps them to cool down, helps as a sunscreen and also irritates the parasites on their skin, so it is kind of like a day spa for elephants.
The female cheetah which was released a few months ago is doing extremely well, and she has been mating with the 2 males in the north west of the park a while ago, so we are all holding our breaths to see if she will get pregnant and give us our first cheetah cubs in more than 15 years in Madikwe. Besides that, she is also stretching her legs, and is travelling huge distances, primarily in the south of the park, and is covering around 15 km in a single night on occasion.
The south pride of lions have been slowly getting more exposure to the brutes from the north west, and have started accepting them as their new kings, and we hope that One of the Jamala females will come into oestrus soon, and possibly give us some new cubs before the end of the year.
The north pride has been doing really well, and have been making up the bulk of our lion sightings this month. The 2 sub-adults have what seems to be never ending energy levels as they stalk, pounce and jump on each other as they hone their hunting skills.
The 3 Mahiwa males who have now left their mother and are going solo in the south east of the park are becoming seriously impressive, and we have been seeing them more often as it seems as if they are trying to displace the Lone Modimo male, who is also been seen with the south pride females on the odd occasion. So In the near future things could heat up and the 3 strong Mahiwa boys will probably come up on top soon.
One morning we also found the Mahiwa males lazing around Melorane pan after having a drink, when a brown hyena pitched up. The brown did not realise that one of the lions was stalking him, and we thought that the poor guy was toast… But, as the lion pounced the brown hyena gave an almighty shrill sound and the lion stopped in his tracks, giving the frightened hyena time to make his hasty retreat. To live another day.
Munye, our resident male leopard has been super scarce this month, and we have not been seeing him as often as we would like, but there is also more signs of that new female which has been making her presence felt after the void that Tsala left a couple months ago. We are in the process of trying to habituate her to the vehicles, and it seems like it wont be as easy as we thought, as she is still very weary of our vehicles.
The wild dogs are still denning in the Tshwene mountain complex, and should be about to leave their safe house shortly, and hopefully we will see the puppies running with the adults soon.
Other good news on the wild dog front, is that we have acquired a new pack. 3 Females from Hluluwe (Natal) and 5 males from Tswalu(Cape) that are to be introduced into a boma/holding facility and will be in there for some time, as we try and bond them to create a new pack. Then we should have our quota of 2 packs in Madikwe once more.
The hyena den in the south west, has been producing some amazing sightings, and we now have seen 4 generations of cubs that are 8, 4,3,and 2 months old. The cute factor is crazy, and their bear-like appearance is startling. Which is in fact the truth… Yes, hyenas are more closely related to bears than any other animal.
The cubs are super curious when the adult are around, and will come right up close to the vehicle to inspect its passengers, but are equally skittish if the adults are not at the den on a particular day.
The playful antics of the cubs can sometimes be rough, which is the way that they are forcing their birthrights over less hierarchal cubs, as you are born with your rank. So if your mother has a very high rank in the clan system, you as the cub automatically inherit that particular status and rank.
We also has another rhino die of natural causes at the beginning of the month, and also gave us some great opportunities to photograph these awesome animals, and I always try my best to dispel any myths that hyenas are always the “baddies” of the African Savannas .
The general game sightings this month are always incredible this time of the year, as they congregate around waterholes, and inevitably there will always be a predator not far from them, lying in wait to secure their next meal.
So next time, if you are planning your trip to Tuningi…. August and September are cracker months to see all that Madikwe has to offer !!
Thats it for this month…
Regards,
Gavin and the T-Team