Author: MH Focus Online

Like everything in life, winter time has its ups and downs.

It is so good to be back at the lodge and in the bush, to be able to chat and share some of my photos with you guys again. As well as letting you know what is happening out there in our beautiful Madikwe.

We came across this herd of Elephants crossing the road. Rushing off, it appeared as if they were late for a shopping special at the local market! Samuel and I decided to make our way to Tshukudu dam in the hope to meet our giant friends there. Not too long and to our delight we saw a cloud of dust approaching.

In winter, if it is a big herd of animals, you only need to look for the dust cloud, it is so cool! It is a total giveaway that there is something on its way.

…and as quickly as they arrived they left again. Amazing! From the biggest to the smallest!

Time for our feathered friends:

I could never get enough of this one species, the Rollers!

This is a Purple Roller.

However, the cream of the crop is most probably the Lilac-breasted Roller with his amazing colors.

From the beauty to the undertakers of the bush, the Cape Vulture.

According to my opinion, the next two birds are most probably the friend of all guests, the Snake Eagles.

The Black-chested Snake Eagle.

The Brown Snake Eagle.

This one, with his curled beak, is a Pied Avocet

The next bird is one of the culprits that are more than likely to give you and your tracker a heart attack while on foot in the bush, the Double-banded Sandgrouse. Now why would I say that? You know they are very sneaky little creatures. They would wait until you are almost on top of them and then they will shot up in to the air, leaving you with the feeling of fear and grabbing your heart to try and calm it down. I am talking from experience, it happened a couple of times in my guiding career.

The next one speaks for itself, the Snouted Cobra

Staying with reptiles, the blue headed tree agama. They look so scary, but in actual fact they are so timid and harmless to humans. They are most probably more scared of us, than of what we are of them.

This is just one of those ones, the Zebra looked up and smiled to us for a snap away.

Since the park’s management tarred the main road going downhill, we started to see these little guys more and more. On the photo you can see them standing right next to the road, they are licking the salt and minerals off the road.

I have to say that we do stay in one of the best areas in the world! Just look at the sun set we had.

A moon rising, some people will call it a blood moon.

Good bye until next time

With winter time approaching you can start to see many more species coming through to the water hole at the lodge, as all the little water pans and wallows in the bush have dried up, our water whole at the lodge during the day we can find some of the following species like Baboons, Kudu, Impala, Zebra, Warthogs and many more species coming to have a drink. O yes and don’t forget the breeding herds of elephants that make frequent visits to the lodge at this time of the year.
Here are some more amazing pictures our camera trap has taken, over the last couple of days.

Whilst at dinner time when having dinner under the stars you may also have some activity at the water hole with herds of buffalo coming to visit.

Keep an eye out for some more amazing pictres from our camera trap!!!

The last couple of days, our camera trap at the main water hole at the lodge, has been capturing some great shots through the day and night.

On the 18/5/2013 we had a very nice herd of Cape Buffalo come to have a drink, while the guest where having High Tea befor the afternoon Game Drive.

The night of the 21/5/2013, the camera trap manager to catch a male Lion having a drink of water at the main lodges water hole at 1:01am while every one was sound asleep.

Very often during the course of the day will we find quite a few herds of elephants paying a visit to the water hole which keeps all guest very entertained through the day

The morning of the 23/5/2013, the camera trap captures Dwayne and Samuel, tracking around the water hole, trying to see if the lions had been there during the night, as we had tracks heading from one of the roads in the park to Madikwe Hills. Needless to say the camera trap had caught this lion 2 nights befor at the water hole

Not even 10min after Dwayne and Samuel where around the water hole, a very special animal to the park passed by the camera trap and we managed to get a glipce picture of this beautiful Brown Hyena passing by

This is the lagest Vulture found in Africa

If you have a look at the head and bill, it is extremely muscular there for they are most of the time the first ones to open a carcass. So after they had there fill, you will see the other vulture species will then dig in.

One of the Lenyalo’s

This was taken on a moring drive ad the sun just played right.

This time I decided to WOW you with a blog of some non-big 5 photos.

For some reason I was intrigued by the moon. So I pulled my camera closer, grabbed my bean bag and positioned the lens to take a photo off the moon. At first I thought I would take a shot or 2, but then 13 shots later, I had my first moon shot! Proudly I gave myself a pat on the shoulder.
So here you can get to see the difference of three nights of the moon’s face. The moon is in the waxing phase which means that it is in the phase of becoming full moon. After full moon, it will be called waning. If there is no moon visible, it is called new moon (not the vampire and werewolf’s movie) and this is the time period where it then changes back to waxing. And so the cycle just keeps on changing.
Night 1

Night 2

Night 3

Night 4

I know I said that it is a non big 5 blog, so we can call these “spoor” (tracks). Spoor of a leopard tortoise “ha ha ha”, yes, a leopard tortoise, that’s right. You can see that the spoor is quite deep; the reason for this is because of the heavy shell it has to carry. These creatures hide themselves so well that we rarely see the spoor (just like the leopard spoor we are looking at her, however, we are not allowed to talk about the big 5 on this blog). The leopard tortoise got its name from the similar resemblance of patterns on its shell (similar to the actual leopard). A very interesting fact is that the dung of the leopard tortoise also looks remarkably similar to the dung of the actual leopard!

We stopped for a coffee break. Guess who pops his head up to surprise us? Not too close, not too far.

We had a lovely sunrise over the plains the one morning and we found this group of Springbok just enjoying soaking up the sun.

Someone needs to stay off the mushrooms a bit.

These guys you don’t see often. The Klipspringer, what a remarkably little antelope!

When we drive along dams, puddles or even rivers, we sometimes come across these white foam blobs in the trees.

A lot of guests have asked me what it might be. Well it is a nest belonging to the foam nest frog. It is a chemical reaction that forms when the male and female rubs there back legs together. She will lay the eggs in the nest and the male will then fertilize the eggs. That means that the eggs and tadpoles are safely secured from fish and birds that normally choose them as a delicatessen to snack on.

As we have just mentioned birds, let’s have a look at a couple of birds.

We can start off with the bird whose bird call is his name (in Afrikaans), the Hoep-hoep, and in English the African Hoopoe.

The Long-tailed Paradise Whydah.

…and the old wise one, the Spotted Eagle owl.

Not the best, but a hovering Black-shouldered Kite.

Southern Carmine Bee-eater.

One of the small doves in Madikwe, the Namaqua Dove, oh so pretty.

The Pale Chanting Goshawk.

Some of the bigger ones: here we have the Secretary bird on top of a sweet thorn’s crown, a very common spot where they prefer to build their nests.

And then an even bigger bird, the Kori Bustard, the heaviest flying bird in the world in between 14.5kg to 18kg.

For most people the Southern Yellow-billed Hornbill bears a resemblance to the Banana Beak in The Lion King. Or in Zazu’s own words: “It’s Mr. Banana Beak to you, fuzzy.”

Here we have the Duck with the most peculiar bill, the Knob-billed Duck or Comb Duck.

The Zebra is truly one of the most photogenic of all non-big 5 animals. Here in Madikwe we have plains zebra, also known as common zebra or Burchell’s zebra.

We located these Zebra at Nare hot spot while they were eating sand for the salt and minerals in the sand to supplement their diet.

Last but not least the Giraffe, the word that means “he who walks gracefully”.

We end with a gorgeous sunset in Madikwe, a sunset true to Africa…

Thanks to Sam and Johannes for a great five days at MH. Again a great way to end another South African adventure. A first selection of some of our photos. David and Ruth

Good day all, it is good to know that the blog is up and going. So the postings will start soon.

A bush greeting
Dwayne de Lange
Head Ranger

Dwayne

One last picture from our pre-Christmas trip. We were lucky enough to be in Madikwe when 2 cheetah from Pindah were released from the boma.

This was taken the day that they were released and feasted on a pre-prepared impala. Beautiful animals.

Do keep us updated on their progress! Hope all is well
Mark

Dwayne

One of the many highlights from our trip was when Sam and Johannes found the wild dog chasing a wildebeest down the eastern fence. That one got away, but a baby wasn’t so luck and we came upon the pack just after the kill.

An amazing sight.
Mark

Dwayne

I promised you a picture from our trip just before Christmas, but it didn’t work. Let’s hope for better luck this time.

This was taken in the afternoon of the male with one of his lionesses. So beautiful.

all the best
Mark

I have some nice pics last week of the Lenyala?s and Ketsometci females and there cubs.
Continue reading “We were spoiled this last week with the local pried.”