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Photos courtesy of Mosetlha Bush Camp A dusty-red road leads me through Marico bushveld deeper into the 750 square kilometers large wilderness of the Madikwe Game Reserve – the 4th largest reserve in SouthAfrica, home to 350 bird and 66 mammal species, some 4 hours’ drive from Johannesburg. And on the road, an elephant rules it.
The history of Tembe Elephant Park in SouthAfrica is a slightly unusual one. But it wasn’t founded to serve as a refuge for human refugees, but animal ones, specifically elephants. And elephants are always overwhelming anyway. Tembe Elephant Park is a mosaic of savannah and forest.
A dusty-red road leads me through Marico bushveld deeper into the 750 square kilometers large wilderness of the Madikwe Game Reserve – the 4th largest reserve in SouthAfrica, home to 350 bird and 66 mammal species, some 4 hours’ drive from Johannesburg. Two young bull elephants slowly walk along the road in front of us.
They are not necessarily the biggest African animals, but represented those that were considered a real hunter’s worthy prey or “game” – the African Elephant, Cape Buffalo, Black Rhinoceros, Leopard and king of the jungle, the Lion (which of course doesn’t inhabit jungle but savanna!).
Madikwe , in SouthAfrica, wasn’t a site of importance before it came into existence. And so SouthAfrica’s fifth largest park came to be (it’s worth remembering that its largest park, Kruger, is the size of Israel) on marginal land that no one in particular could do much with. But they are very cute!
The wonderful family Meropidae contains 27 dazzling species, of which Africa is endowed with no less than 20 species, the balance occurring across Asia and with one as far afield as Australia. Carmine bee-eaters occur throughout most of Subsaharan Africa, and many populations migrate widely post breeding.
mi (almost exactly the same size as Indiana), it is one of the smaller provinces of SouthAfrica, but is the second most densely populated with over 10 million inhabitants. The famous Verreaux family who made several expeditions into the province through the 1820’s and 1830’s procuring specimens for rich collectors.
I’m a big fan of the antelopes, a group that is most commonly associated with Africa but which also occurs in Asia and, if you stretch the term to be cladistically meaningful, Europe and North America. By this I mean applying the term antelope to cover all of the family Bovidae, which would include the sheep, goats and ox.
Pafuri lies in the northernmost part of the Kruger National Park and is described as “some of the most potentially productive birding territory in SouthAfrica” on the SANParks website. A slightly more surprising threat for the vultures comes from elephants. Elephants destroy the trees the vultures live and nest in.
Take an example, Tembe Elephant Park in SouthAfrica. And don’t forget that Africa’s population continues to grow, putting more and more pressure on the land and many eyes watch the remaining wild spaces asking why the animals should have them and not hungry families.
Ethiopia, a landlocked country situated in the Horn of Africa, has firmly established itself as one of Africa’s top birding destinations. Its great diversity of habitats hosts an incredible bird count of over 900 species, including Africa’s 2nd highest list of endemics and near-endemics (after SouthAfrica).
I’ll never forget my introduction to the mammals of Kruger National Park, SouthAfrica. We –participants of the ABA SouthAfrica Safari—were on a small plane when one Lori Conrad looked out the window and screamed, “There are elephants down there!” and everyone ran to Lori’s side of the plane.
The one bird I did not see here, however, was the Bateleur Eagle … One highlight in the area is the Saddle-billed Stork , likely to be the tallest species in the stork family. Another member of the stork family, the African Openbill , looks like it is could benefit from a good orthodontist. And sadly, it is listed as Endangered.
They occur in three biogeographic regions; the Neotropic, Afrotropic and Indo-Malaya ecozones, basically tropical South and Central America, Africasouth of the Sahara and tropical Asia. The diminutive Tinkerbirds are Africa’s smallest barbets, depicted here is Red-fronted Tinkerbird photographed at Lalibela, Ethiopia.
… Tags: south-africa , Spotted Dikkop , stone curlews , thick-knees • Camping tents - Check out our pop up tents , family tents , and more! Elephants Eye Mar 19th, 2011 at 7:34 am I vote for night-plover. A multi-part trip report from Cape Town can be found at Redgannet, March 2011. Go check it out!
I had spent several holidays with my family in the USA in the 1980′s and then worked in Maine during the summer of 1985-beware the poison ivy and the snapping turtles! We have never been to SouthAfrica, but it is a lovely book to look at and dream!
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