Fabulous wildlife encounters

Hello, Bonjour and Salibonani from Cawston Wildlife Reserve, Northern Matabeleland where I stay for about 2,5 months and help with the horses. In the past days I was very often in the bush as I did another game drive with an amazing sunset. Nothing can beat African sunsets, they are just at the very top and never disappoint you! During the drive I have seen sable antelopes, giraffes, a big impala herd that was jumping across the sand pad just in front of us, some shy zebras, wildebeests and kudus.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

The next day I wanted to do my first game count in one of the blinds close to a waterhole called Mpafa. I have to admit, it was very scary to enter it, as it was dark and somewhat below the ground. Inside I found some bats but no snakes luckily! However, I decided to get out again as the view was very limited due to high grass in front of the blind. Just when I was getting into my car, 5 giraffes came towards the waterhole and were looking at me for about 30 mins. Afterwards, they decided I might be dangerous and they tranquilly left the waterhole without drinking. I started my car and drove off just to find lots of game on the road leading to the waterhole, plenty of giraffes, impalas and a herd of sable antelopes was waiting for me. Such a fabulous game drive!

• 

• 

Dinner took place at my favorite spot at campsite and I had the rare chance to see a serval from the veranda during the night time that was just walking from the waterhole towards the thick bush. Such a great encounter!

Unfortunately, we have now some other horses with more injuries and one of them had a kolik. Luckily we found her in time and walked her as well as gave her one bottle of beer as this is supposed to relax the stomach. We mixed the beer with some honey and activated charcoal. No vet is close by so we must figure out ourselves what is working and what not. We looked after the horse during the night and made sure she was fine, which she was by the next day and we put her back into her paddock together with the ostriches. We used this opportunity to look for some ostrich eggs as the females should lay some soon, but didn’t find any yet. Let’s see next time, maybe we will find some very soon!

• 

• 

My new lessons learned while helping at Cawston Wildlife Reserve:

1. Learn how to distinguish between female and male species – if you are doing a game count, you better know which species you see and weather it is a male or female.
2. You need to act quickly if no vet is around – always be alert and check your animals for any symptoms that might have to be treated quickly.
3. Ostriches sound like lions – if you hear a calling similar to a lion‘s but you are sure there are none, it will most likely be an ostrich calling.

Cheers to wandering the world and the wonders of our lives, hope to see you see you soon for the next blog that will be about safari time – bye bye, salut and lisale kuhle ∞