Archive for March, 2008
(Plenty of wild dogs) Howzit guys, We are still going strong. One day last week, Reuben and Misheck found two packs in the same day! People have really been great with calling in their sightings recently. I guess they can hear us on the radio when we’re following up their reports, and so know they aren’t wasting their time. It is a huge help to have all those extra eyes out there for us.
I am moving to a house in the north today, which will help with getting to the dog sightings quicker. I’ll warn you in advance then, that my blogs may not be as frequent as before as I won’t have internet access there. Fear not though, Peter will be able to fill you in if I can’t. A new member of our team, Rosemary, arrives from the UK next week as the project manager. She has already done much for the project, securing funding for VHF and GPS collars, among other things. No doubt she’ll be pressganged into writing a few blogs too, including an introduction. Sarai zvakanaka, Mike
Howzit everyone, Well, the run of luck continues. We (meaning Reuben and Misheck) found another pack today. I’ve managed to match up one individual, so I’m hazarding a guess that this is the ‘Bridges’ Pack. One more located!
Yesterday, I went to the south of the conservancy on my own, to try to locate the Mavericks Pack. As one of them is collared, I thought I would be able to pick them up quite easily. I thought wrong. I’d driven around and climbed several small hills but I still couldn’t recieve their signal. Thanks to those of you who made the effort to vote on the new pack’s name. Humani it is then. Who says there won’t be a fair election in Zimbabwe this year?! Sarai zvakanka, Mike
Howzit guys, Can you believe it? A ZWD blog that isn’t about failure, hoping to find the dogs next week, unsuitable weather conditions, or other feeble excuses. Yes, we have actually found dogs… for three days in a row! Ok, it’s all the same pack, but it’s the one we’ve been looking for for weeks. We had been patrolling their area for ages but we just couldn’t find spoor. As we were just about to stop using that route, we found some. Then came the rain, which didn’t help, but a few days later we picked them up again. The first time, they were lying up in tyre-and-paintwork-punishing mopane scrub and we couldn’t get to them in the car. We tried to get close on foot but they always saw us before we saw them. Yesterday, we found them resting in the shade, on a bank of the Mokore River. They were on the opposite side of the river, but this gave us a better view of them. The coat patterns matched those from older photos, which confirms this as the Jacana Pack.
This morning, I received a radio call telling me that they had just been seen around the same area. With Reuben and Misheck searching for packs elsewhere, I set out on my own, hoping the dogs hadn’t gone too far as I doubted an attempt at tracking would be successful. By luck, they were visible from the road, lying around a pan. The area was open and so I could drive closer to them. I kept my distance at first, to let them get used to the vehicle, before creeping closer in a wide zig-zag (a direct approach normally unnerves them).
Only two days left to vote before a name is decided for the new pack. It looks like ‘Humani’ is winning hands down so far. Sorry for that, Reuben! Sarai zvakanaka, Mike
Howzit guys, Hmmm, I see that our blog’s comment sections have been targeted by spammers. I’ll continue purging their ever-so-interesting comments whenever I can. Not much happening on the dog front at the moment. I hope this doesn’t keep up, or I’ll be forced to regale (read as: bore) you with off-topic stories of previous experiences in Africa. We have had a light smattering of rain over the past few days. This usually stops the dogs from ranging too far (they don’t like the wet grass) but it also obscures or erases their tracks. We were hoping they would use the roads more but, if they are, they aren’t the roads we’re looking on.
The scouts have just moved base, slightly ahead of schedule, to the ranch in the north and I plan to follow them as soon as my accommodation there is ready. We’ve managed to get our hands on a motorbike, which means we can search different areas simultaneously, greatly increasing our coverage. We still need to decide the name for the new pack. I am using ‘Humani’, after the ranch they inhabit, but Reuben wants to be more specific and suggests ‘Gomo’, the ChiShona word for hill/mountain, as he says they prefer to frequent that habitat. Sarai zvakanaka, Mike
Howzit guys, Don’t worry, we’re back. We’ve just had a few days off but now we’re all ready and raring to go. It’s bizarre how we can spend days searching for the dogs without even seeing one pawprint, and then we find some without even trying.
The other packs are as elusive as ever. We have received reports of sightings, but we are usually too far away and by the time we get there, it will be too late to begin tracking. As the sun gets higher, the shadows cast in prints diminishes and they cease to stand out, unless they are on really soft terrain. Sarai zvakanaka,
Howzit everyone, Wow! Do you guys have this blog on an RSS feed or something? My last post had a comment within three minutes and that was quickly followed by several more. Not that I’m complaining… This morning, we were just setting off to collect the guys’ pay and to get some supplies, when I thought I heard a dog calling nearby. No one else had heard it, so, thinking I was mistaken, we carried on.
I haven’t had any sightings for a few days now, which is very frustrating. I did see three cheetahs yesterday, which I was very happy about, having never seen any in the wild before. Sarai zvakanaka, Mike
Howzit guys, Thank you all very much for the kind words of support for the project. Yesterday morning, we found the pack that has been hanging around the area. They were extremely wary of the car, and we couldn’t get very close at all before they ran off. In the late afternoon we returned to the site and found them a few hundred metres away. After tacking very slowly towards them, and in spite of their early-warning vultures perched nearby, we got much closer and they seemed to be less worried about us than before. It may be that they felt less exposed and vulnerable, as they were lying in a patch of small but dense shrubs. We believe that this pack hasn’t been located while denning and so isn’t habituated to a vehicle, not as adults anyway. I also cannot find a match for their coat patterns in any photo records, so we think that this pack may have slipped below the radar. They could have always been mistakenly reported as the Jacana pack. An old, abandoned den was found a few years ago (approximately twenty kilometres south of here) that was never attributed to any of the recorded packs, so it could well be that it belonged to these guys.
Unfortunately, and most probably because part of their range appears to be in a resettled area, at least two of this pack are carrying snares. One has a neck wound, similar to the female we saw a few days ago, and one has a snare around the waist. Another dog was limping on the right foreleg, but we think that is just an injury picked up in day to day life. We tried to find the new pack again today, as I’d like them to get used to the car in case we have to dart, but our searching was to no avail. When we returned, we were informed that they were spotted last night, hunting to the west. We had spent the day looking further and further south. Thanks for the timely tip, lads. While we were out though, we saw four white rhinos in a group (or ‘crash’). Whenever we see a rhino, we take note of it’s location, any ear notches, etc. and report it to the conservator or his rhino scouts. This co-operation is reciprocated whenever they come across wild dogs (I hope).
I’ll post again in a few days. Sarai zvakanaka, Mike
Howzit again, I’m afraid I start with a very frustrating and sad story. We are still getting reports of dog sightings, but we haven’t had much luck following them up. Our normal procedure for trying to find the uncollared packs is to choose an area where dogs were recently seen and slowly drive the roads and walk around the nearby pans looking for tracks. We are still waiting for the break that we will get a call when the person has just seen the dogs, instead of hours or days later. We can then sprint over there and hopefully get a good sighting and some pics. From putting together the reports, we think that a new pack has formed in a previously wd-vacant area of the conservancy. This area is occupied by squatters and we suspect the snared dog may be from that pack, although I am still trying to match up her coat pattern to see if she is from the Jacana pack, as they also use this area. I hope I have happier news next time. Sarai zvakanaka, Mike
Howzit guys, The almost record rainfall we had earlier this season has caused an amazing explosion of vegetation. Unfortunately, the grass is now very high and thick, which really hinders our trackers. This, combined with a lack of recent information on the packs’ locations, makes finding the dogs extremely difficult. While we were watching the Maera pack resting a few days ago, one young upstart had had enough of our proximity and approached the vehicle. He started to make short, gruff barks while stomping both his front paws in our direction. This activity alerted the rest of the pack, but, apart from a few uncertain barks, they weren’t too bothered and just moved further away from us. We will have to keep an eye on this troublemaker! Currently, we only have one spare wheel, so any puncture means a hasty return to base, as I don’t want to risk being stranded in the bush should I get another. Fortunately, Antonio C has made a generous donation and I’m hoping that it will be used to buy another spare, which will really help with keeping the team going in the field. Thanks Antonio. Talking about being stranded, earlier this week I tried to cross the Msaize River in our new Ford Ranger and got it stuck. Unbeknowst to me, this had been witnessed and, much to my embarrassment, there was a small army of workers and a tractor on the scene almost immediately. The workshop manager then got in the Ranger and charged it across, no problem. Therefore, any donations of dignity or pride will also be gratefully received! Sarai zvakanaka, Mike |
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