The Most Difficult Animal To See...

Memories of past safaris are rekindled easily on my current trip...

Cheetahs are sleek, amazingly fast and powerful. I imagine that capturing a defenseless impala or wildebeest will be easy for the three cheetah males we track in the Savuti area of Botswana. We stalk them much like they stalk their prey. Knowing only that they were seen in the area yesterday, the open land rover patrols several kilometers of a dried up channel, the perfect hunting ground for cheetahs. All afternoon, binoculars scan the raised banks, stopping to examine termite mounds carefully as Tony Reumerman, our Wilderness Safaris guide, has explained that cheetahs favor the vantage point of these structures.

The light begins to change to golden and the cats show themselves.


The coalition of three males move down the channel at a relaxed pace. They look hungry with mouths slightly open and bellies obviously empty.



A small herd of wildebeest grazes at the widest point in the river of grass. The brothers stop, interested in the proximity of the "made by committee" animals. They separate and watch.

Crouched, ears back, their muscles show a slight twitch of anticipation.


I think of Pico, my cat, and the similarity of the hunter’s stance. The difference being that Pico relies heavily on the can opener rather than the moles she toys with in the backyard.

One by one, they begin to approach the herd with agonizing slowness. First, they move along the edge of the channel and then, creep closer through the grass.

I am not sure how I will feel when the cheetahs kill but I have developed a kinship with these brothers after hearing their story. They move up and down the Savuti channel avoiding lion activity and sometimes loosing their prey to the hyenas that also call the area home. One of the brothers limps, perhaps from an encounter with a lion or hyena, and clearly couldn’t survive on his own.

I am rooting for the brothers as they approach the wildebeest – until I suspect that they will single out a youngster born only months before in the spring. Suddenly, with incredible speed, they sprint toward their prey. The herd only becomes aware of the danger when the cats are almost upon them. It seems hopeless and I am not sure I can watch.

Late afternoon into the twilight is my favorite time of day on safari. While I hate for the days to end, it is the part of day I wish would stretch out, extend, and last forever.


First, the late afternoon light is golden and it enriches the colors of the African landscape and turns the dry season air to gold dust.


Then, there are the sunsets, always different, always spectacular.


The animals begin to get active – either heading for a drink and out of harms way, or coming out into the safety of the dark to forage or hunt. Either getting up or bedding down, everyone is doing something.


Tanzanian parks require safari activities cease by dark and so, this year, we race to make it back to camp each evening. Something of interest to photograph or to watch always delays us.



In Tarangire, the road to camp runs along the edge of a lush swamp. Each night we watch the moon rise as elephants take one last drink


or have a mud bath at water’s edge.


Trees take on a different shape as birds choose a roosting spot. When vultures roost, it looks eerily like Halloween. This year, open billed storks roosting look more like Saturday morning cartoons.


Heckyl and Jeckyll


Over the years, as I have ticked off “most wanted” sightings from my list, cheetahs remain, for since that first trip to Africa and the remarkable hunting scene; I have only had one other brief glimpse of a cheetah.

Now, in the fading light, with only moments before our curfew, we come upon two cheetahs flanking the road back to Oliver's Camp. Despite the hour, we stop and it is easy to see the cats are alert; they look ready to hunt.

I think back to the cheetahs in Botswana and visualize the hunt again in my mind. Three cheetahs against a small herd of wildebeests with several young in their midst -- seems like bad odds for the wildebeests. Nature evens the playing field with funny curved horns, tricks and agility. The wildebeests scatter, some run in circles, some run behind the cheetahs. In the dust they kick up, I can’t distinguish the adults from the young, the young from the cheetahs. That is the point, I realize, as I watch in amazement as out of the dust, a phalanx of adult wildebeests forms to march on their attackers and separate them from the rest of the herd.


Score one for the wildebeests but the brothers go hungry. How many times do they try and fail?



In Tarangire, I want to follow this pair of cats to their hunt just like I followed the Botswana cheetahs. I want to see if their luck or skill is better. The park rules and we move on to camp.

Murky twilight is perfect for hunting however, not for photography. Before dinner, I check my photos of the pair and see only unrecognizable blur. Fortunately, Jill Snyder's luck (and skill!) was better and she captured this wonderful image of one of bothers in truly difficult lighting conditions.



Hopes of getting a better look at this pair of cheetah are gone -- we are off to the Serengeti the next day. With its vast plains, the Serengeti also provides prime hunting grounds for cheetah and my search begins anew.

Every time a kopje comes into view I scan it hopefully as the elevation provides a great survey position for cats.


Robert, our guide, hears there is a cheetah in the area and we search, driving back and forth along the plain. It is a male, we are told. He has eaten recently and is resting from his exertions in tall grass hidden from our view. We look for the smallest sign of movement. His tail flips to chase flies trying to land on the blood still clinging in places to his fur. The motion gives him away and we drive closer.


He is beautiful. Healthy and regal, he feeds easily on the herds of wildebeest traveling through the area as they migrate to the northern plains in search of fertile grasslands. In this photo by Carl Zanoni, he has captured “The Hunter” perfectly.


Yet, as he rolls on the ground, it is hard to imagine a killer.


A group of wildebeest move close to his resting spot; he forgets he has just eaten and instinct takes over. He begins to stalk them and I think he will hunt. His full belly brushes the ground perhaps reminding him he is full and slow.


He decides to just watch.

The fate of the cheetah brothers in Botswana? They finally make a kill. We get word the next morning. A night of keeping the wildebeests on edge wearies the herd and the cats succeed in separating out one of the young. They made their kill less than a kilometer from camp.


Thanks to Jill and Carl for letting me share their photos. The best part of a photography based trip is the chance to meet and learn from other photographers. More of Jill’s photos can be seen at http://www.photosbyjilles.com/, the site for Jill E. Snyder Photography.

The most difficult animal to see...
...is the one you haven't seen.
Cheetahs remain near the top of my list.

Photographic Memories

Going through my pictures of Africa is like reading a journal. I recall the smell of the air, the morning chill and the thrill of a flash of color in the corner of my eye signaling a bird that might be one I have never seen before. Looking at this year's photos sends me back to past trips to renew and remember. My memories are filled with anecdotes, tales of the bush and of the animals.



Great guides tell little stories of the land, the people and the animals to fill the waiting that is a safari.



As I sit by a bend in the river watching for the herd of elephants that frequently come to drink at this time of day, the stories come out quite naturally. Robert, our guide in the Serengeti, rambles that the horned group of impala drinking are a bachelor herd all either too young or too old to earn and keep their own harem. Once a buck gains control of a herd, their reward is short-lived. They will spend so much time keeping other males away and expelling, from the herd, the maturing male offspring of the harem, they won’t have time to eat.

Within three months, they grow too weak to defend their territory and are overthrown to join a bachelor herd, and, hopefully, regain their strength to fight their way back to power.

The ellies arrive and I watch the interactions of the family group.

The guide explains that the tusked bull elephant that shakes his head at us is really just a preteen testing his prowess...

and it will soon be time for him to strike out on his own with the other bulls. The real power rests with the matriarch of the group. Intelligent creatures, aren’t they?

Moving on to another area, I learn that Dikdik’s are monogamous, living together in pairs rather than in herds. If you see one dikdik, there is likely to be another close by. Amazingly, they don’t need water to survive and will the stay in the same territory for as long as it remains safe and the vegetation is adequate. Bush suburbia.


So, when I look at my photos, they are more than the animals within them – I hear their stories, picture their antics, wonder at their fate.

Birds have been Africa’s surprise gift to me beginning with my first guide, Tony Reumerman of Wilderness Safaris. He has a way of sharing his knowledge of these creatures that sparks my interest to know more.

Now, after several years, one of the things I most look forward to on any trip, is finding a few new bird species.

Thinking about great guides and past sightings prompted me to add a post to last year's chronicle which even has sound effects along with a comedic kingfisher sequence. http://wild-eyed-cam.blogspot.com/2007/09/caped-crusader-and-kingfishers-dinner_28.html

With each new trip, I meet different guides. The constant is that the longer they have guided, the more they seem to appreciate the diversity and complexity of birdlife and that the better the guides appreciate the avian inhabitants of their world more.

I am delighted to find that Njano, our local guide in Tarangire, has a special knowledge of birds having worked earlier in his career with avian researchers. To capture birds for banding, researchers set up thin nets in roosting areas. When the sun comes up, the birds naturally try to leave the roost and fly into the net. One of Njano’s jobs was to go out early in the morning to band the birds before they had been in the net too long. His knowledge goes beyond what guide books can teach.

In Tarangire we keep seeing Secretary birds beginning the mating rituals of nest building and courtship. Named for the pen like quills that adorn their crowns, they perform elaborately.

A new one for me --the Yellow Necked Spurfowl -- so ugly, he's cute.

Fish Eagles are abundant. Similar to our Bald Eagle in looks and origin, they always make me think about how closely we are all related despite seemingly overwhelming distances.

An African Wood Hoopoe content to pose.

And this is the year of the ostrich! While I had seen a number of ostrich in Namibia, and a few sprinkled throughout other places in Africa, they love Tanzania.

For once, grass in the right place, at the right time.

And this is Njano, our guide from TrueAfrica. Special thanks to you!

Gnu Gnights

Our stay in the northern Serengeti by the Mara River is planned to witness the wildebeest migration. Over one million of these gentle, but funny looking animals must cross the Mara in a perpetual migratory pattern to follow the fertile grasslands. Approaching Sayari camp from the air, however, the thousands of dark spots dotting the landscape look insignificant and dwarfed by the vast Serengeti plains.

From the airstrip to camp, a line of wildebeests gallop across the dirt roadway we travel, halting our progress. These gangly beasts, and all animals, have the right of way in the park.

So, not to worry, right? But the galloping line keeps coming, mostly single file, sometimes by twos or threes. We sit and wait. When the line began, it didn’t occur to me to try to count how many go by, like cars on a freight train. I wish I had.

Spotting a small break in the herd, we leave the place where our paths intersect and make our way to camp. In my mind, I may have thought, “ah, so these are the wildebeests that we have come to photograph...“ How incomplete was my picture of the herds gathering near the banks of the Mara River.

Night Visitors
After dinner that night, my first at Sayari, I had the obligatory camp safety lecture which, unlike the airline spiel at the commencement of a flight, I always listen to. I received the usual caution to expect nighttime visitors. Likely ungulates grazing near camp but, where there are grazers, there are predators.

Night visitors for me, in the past, have run the gamut from hippos to centipedes. Elephant and leopard have graced the surrounds of my tent. A lion has roared RIGHT OUTSIDE and a genet and mice have visited me inside.

Hippos generally make the most noise, grunting and chortling as they munch their way through camp. Elephants can rank right up there as they pull down small trees to sate their appetites. The most thrilling night walker is the lion as the close up sound of his roar reverberates through your whole being; your heart stops and you wonder if it is okay to breath.

Bright yellow earplugs insure that I sleep through nighttime visitations; I rely on the kindness of my roommate to wake me for really exciting stuff. This night, clattering inside the tent and a strange lowing coming from outside brings me to consciousness. Tent poles shake on impact as something hits the side of the tent replicating the clatter that first wakened me. Lowing seems to come from all around. I creep from bed and stand by the thin curtain that covers the screened tent wall – all that is between me and whatever is out there. I hesitate before I pull back the curtain, uncertain of what I will see and more, of what might see me.

The tent shakes again and I draw back the curtain just a bit. Soft light from the almost full moon glistens off the shiny coats of the hundreds of wildebeests that surround our tent. Heads down and oblivious to the camp’s presence, they simply go where there is grass. They can’t eat the tent, so, except for the absent minded bumps while on their way to the next clump of grass, they leave us alone.

I watch as they mingle in the huge plain in front of our tent . Intermixed in the crowd, I see a zebra or two. The low mooing reminds me of a huge herd of cattle and the clattering effect of the occasional bumps to our tent replicates the sounds of cow bells. Finally, I lay back down falling asleep to their bass song. Will this group cross tomorrow? My alarm sounds at 5am and the silence tells me they have moved on in the night.

We are out early the next morning, stopping at times to photograph the sunrise, an impressive trail of safari ants, a Thompson’s gazelle. Totally involved in the gazelle, a familiar sound makes me look to the back, then to the sides.

I am surrounded by wildebeests and they cover the vista as far as I see. I begin to get a sense of the magnitude of what is to come.

Two groups that make up part of the one million migrating wildebeest are converging on the river at the same time. But they don’t just come to the river and cross. The Mara river runs swiftly and is strewn with rocks on which fat crocodiles await the weaker swimmers. Steep banks mean a long drop into the rapid currents. It is with great reluctance that they begin the crossing and, I am told, it sometimes takes several days of milling about, scouring the surrounding plains to be sure there is no source of food on this side of the river before the first wildebeest will cross which, in turn, spurs the rest of the herd to action.

A half million zebras and tommies (Thompson’s gazelles) accompany the wildebeests finding safety in the masses making this trek. Weakened by the dwindling food supply and the pressure to keep up with the herd, there are always a contingent of tired wildebeest that are prime targets for predators. What cheetah mother with hungry cubs to feed wouldn’t opt for a weak gnu rather than risk the perils of a serious chase with a gazelle?



We watch them mill about, moving this way or that, sometimes with purpose, sometimes aimlessly. The closer they get to the river, the more insistent, the more impatient their calls. Something spooks them and a large group stampedes away from the river.
I wonder how long we will have to wait for a crossing.


Gnu Nights II – The Sequel

My award for most annoying night visitor goes to the mouse whose sharp little toenails skitter against the canvas of our tent during the first night at Oliver’s Camp in Tarangire. He runs laps inside the perimeter of the tent all night until a badly thrown boot convinces him to find a way out. His teeth marks leave evidence of the object of his desire and a deal with the little devil is struck with the sacrifice of our daily ration of lemongrass soap. Each night, the offering is left in the open air bathroom part of the tent and I sleep peacefully for the remainder of my stay. Cartoon visions of mouse with extended belly and soap bubbles belching forth from his mouth continually plague my roommate for the remainder of the trip.

The second night in Sayari, very tired, I fall into bed and asleep without my earplugs. Gentle lowing wakes me and I creep to the tent opening to see wildebeest and zebra grazing on what I have come to think of as my front lawn. Many more than last night.

Too tired to watch, I am back in bed and begin to drift off . Suddenly, the lowing is drowned out by the sound of stampeding hooves. The tent shakes violently as the herd crashes into the tent with force that knocks water bottles, toothbrushes and tin cups to the floor. But, before I register fear in my narcoleptic stupor, it is over. The spooked herd has moved on. My heart's pounding slows,and as I fall back to sleep, I wonder what spooked them – a flush in the night?

The Crossing
There are two types of safaris – the drive, drive, drive type where you drive and hope you and animal action will intersect randomly. And the sit and wait type where you find a likely spot – a watering hole, a likely river crossing spot, a plain where cheetah are known to hunt, and you wait for the action to happen. Given the option, always choose the latter! We miss a couple of crossings by being on the drive, drive, drive cycle and finally, on our second to the last day, with the hope of seeing a crossing fading, we demand that we wait it out.

Two herds have come together from opposite directions both previously seeming to have a purpose, a plan. Now, milling together by the steep river banks, the lowing becomes more insistent, more frantic. The mooing softens. A small group breaks away and moves downstream, a few lay down, conserving energy. There is no way to tell where, when or if, they will cross today but we settle down to wait.

Vultures begin to gather. If there is a crossing, some wildebeests won’t survive.

Each movement in the jeep causes a rustle that breaks the silence we try to keep. Nothing to say – we have been together for 10 days shooting everything but the crossing we have come so far to see. We’re tired – the days have been long with pre-dawn wake up calls and sleep broken by our nightly visitors. But the wait is good; it is our chance. Finally, the radio crackles – from down the river, a call from another guide, waiting as we are. It has begun.

The jeep careens to a place on the steep bank downriver from the spot the wildebeest have chosen to cross.

We spill from the jeep. My camera cord is stuck on the seat and it takes a moment to free. The lowing is loud, frantic. The dust from the herd clouds the air. I can see the herd but I can’t see my guides. Along the top of the bank, I see another guide from camp – I move toward him and the herd. The lowing is louder and I see the first of the struggling animals reaching the other side. I follow the swimming line back to this bank and watch with utter amazement as one after another thousands of wildebeests jump into the swiftly running Mara River.


Some launch themselves forward over the backs of other crossers,

some seek to descend the steep bank before entering the water.



A large portion of the herd come toward us as they put off the inevitable and look for a better place to begin the crossing. There is none.



I am struck by the strength of instinct, of migratory drive, of the drive for survival. As I watch one particularly spectacular leap into the river, I wonder when an action is no longer an act of instinct but an act of courage.

Some swim out, then turn back.



Once in the river, they swim with purpose losing some ground to the current but making it to the landing place. At times, a sense of fear pervades my consciousness yet, I am not in danger.



All except one in this crossing seems to make it to the rocks on the other side. A calf, born in February of this year, is too weak to fight the current. I see, but I can't watch. I try to block out the sounds of the mother calling to her struggling offspring from the bank.




Rocks offer no purchase in the torturous climb out of the river and up the opposite bank.



Once over the rocks, they swarm like ants up the far bank.



Legs wobble and shake with this final effort.



The exhaustion is visible as they pull themselves up the bank.



This three stage drama plays continuously for 40 minutes. Suddenly, the portion of the herd remaining on this side of the river stops and moves away from the bank. No more will cross for now; the herd will be split. The animals that crossed look back from the far bank expectantly, but after a few moments, move on to the yet ungrazed plains on the north side of the river.

We move on,too. I, as yet, am without the right words. Perhaps, without the right questions. I do know I am moved far beyond my expectations.