Moremi Game Hunters

The day started off early with each Jeep going in seperate directions into a differnt area of the park. We had driven through the Maani Forest on the edge of the Delta for about 30 minutes without seeing much when Mr. Fish got a call from Stanley in the other Jeep that they were watching wild dogs with a kill. I was the only one in our Jeep who had not seen wild dogs so Mr. Fish turned around and drove almost all the way back to camp before turning off to where the wild dogs were having their feast. It was so worth the trip back! It was a pack of about 15 dogs, many of them just pups who would eat and play while mom, who had gotten her fill, lay by the way just watching. It didn’t take long before the pack moved on to their next kill.

These are the animals we saw today:
Lilac Breasted Rolla - the state bird
Jackels - a black back and a side stripe
Water buck
Bateleur Eagle
Wattled Cranes - an endangered bird due to their nesting area drying
Dwarf Mongoose
Red breasted Karhaan - aka the suicide bird
Pied Kingfisher, Fish Eagle, Brown Snake Eagle
Wildebeest and Cape Buffalo
Ground Hornbills - aka turkey buzzards

We stopped by a pond and saw all of the following in the same area around the pond:
Gray heren, red Cormorant, Snowy egret, King fishers, 2 crocs roiling in the water, a Goliath Heron which had caught a fish and ate it, a herd of Lechwe, Saddle bill storks (male had red around its eyes and female has yellow eyes and both have black and white bodies), yellow billed stork, sacred Ibis, hommerboc, sandpiper, two white spoonbills, red billed teal duck, Egyptian goose and the blak umbrella egret. This last was interesting because it would spread its wing around to cover its head, creating a shadded area where fish would come thinking it was cover ad the bird would eat them!

We watched two Impala compete for rule over a group of females. We found an 18 foot crocodile basking next to white faced ducks. He won’t eat the ducks because they act as body guards. When danger approaches, they fly away so the croc knows to slip away too. A male croc can kill a Cape buffalo.

We had an amazing time watchig a group of 9 giraffs. Two of them appeared to be loving on each other, rubbing their necks together and circling their heads. Mr. Fish said this was two males fighting for dominance of the herd! Boy did we have it wrong!

During lunch, Stanley gave us some history on the Bantu peoples who populate all of the the Southern part of Africa.