Zimbabwe Wild Dogs

Category: Uncategorized, Wild Dogs, zimbabwe | Date: Nov 18 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

We recently had an incredible sighting of the wild dogs in the Bedford Pack.  Misheck and I went out to find the dogs in order to download the GPS collar on the pack.  It was a stifflingly hot day, and given the strength and direction of the collar signals we guessed we’d find the dogs under a large baobab tree we could see ahead of us.  Getting close enough however meant going in on foot…   

Fortunately the wind was in our favour and the ground was bare, which allowed us to creep up on them undetected.  They were all sound asleep and didn’t notice us even when we were right up next to them!  We approached from behind the baobab and I was less than a meter from the closest dog when I took these photos. 

How’s this for a carpet of wild dogs?!

The pups were closest to the tree and were all in an interlinking pile of tails, paws, ears and fur….

What a privilege to see this.

Rosemary

Tags: African Wild Dogs, bedford pack, zimbabwe

3 responses so far

Category: Wild Dogs | Date: Sep 13 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

Just a very quick post to show you some pictures of African wild dog puppies at play.  These are pups from the first litter of the Bedford Pack; just over 3 months old when these photos were taken.  Sadly one of the litter disappeaered a few months ago, but the remaining 11 are still doing well.

Rosemary

Tags: African Wild Dogs, wild dog photos, wild dog puppies, zimbabawe

2 responses so far

Category: Wild Dogs, zimbabwe | Date: Sep 12 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

I just wanted to send out another huge thank you from all of us at the wild dog team for all recent donations.  Rueben is extremely grateful for the milk powder I have bought him for his baby - when he next goes home, I’ll ask him to take some photos of the baby and his family for you all to see. 

Other donations to the project have also been very gratefully received and you can rest assured they are being put to maximum benefit here in the field, helping to conserve the amazing wild dogs.

Thank you all so much for your support,

Rosemary

Tags: African Wild Dogs, wild dog pups, zimbabwe

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Category: Wild Dogs, poaching, zimbabwe | Date: Jun 07 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks, 

I’m sad to report we’ve lost another one of the dogs to snaring.  The scouts found the carcass during an ambush of some well-known commercial poachers on one of the conservancy properties.  It was still fresh enough for us to identify it as one of the adult males from the Mapari pack.  Ironically, he was actually called ‘Snare’, having escaped from a snare before, although he still bore the scar around his neck.  This time round he wasn’t so lucky: he was caught around both his back legs and - from the destruction of the vegetation around where he was caught - must have died a very slow and painful death.  Poor dog.  He was only 3 years old as well.

His carcass was hidden under a bush:

The good news is that they at least caught some of the poachers, and cleared 98 snares from the area.  Unfortunately it was too late for a few impala as well who were also caught in these snares.

We took the carcass back to the car and have taken the skull for measurements, and other samples for genetic analysis.  Only time will tell what impact this tragedy will have on the denning of the pack this year.

Rosemary

Tags: African Wild Dogs, dead wild dog, snaring, zimbabwe

2 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized, Wild Dogs | Date: Apr 07 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

Just wanted to post a few pictures of our new wild dog pack.  They are a very charismatic group, and very relaxed around vehicles which makes for wonderful viewing opportunities…

These photos were given to me by a guest who saw the dogs at a kudu kill

Such wondeful animals!

Rosemary

Tags: African Wild Dogs, new pack, wild dog photos, zimbabwe

2 responses so far

Category: Wild Dogs | Date: Mar 05 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

I found the Mapari pack yesterday, for once in a very open area, so managed to get some great views of them.  I spent a long time with them, both in the morning and in the evening just before they went hunting.  A couple of the adults were getting very frisky and I wonder if this will be the next alpha pair (the previous alpha female was killed in a snare). Such a privilege to watch this kind of behaviour…

Then in the evening, the pups were the playful ones - two of them spent about 5 minutes holding onto each others tails and going round and round in circles - it was so funny I actually cried laughing!

The Mapari pack still has all six adults but only 8 pups now: unfortunately 2 are missing - Dudu and Trinity.  Pups of that age shouldn’t leave the pack for any reason, so unfortunately I suspect they have been killed, but you never know and if I’ve learnt anything by working with wild dogs it’s that you can never predict anything!  I’ll let you know if we see either of them again, but in the meantime, we have the 6 adults and Loopy, Biscuit, Milo, Roxy, Macbeth, Simba, Twinspot and Mishmash.

Back soon,

Rosemary

Tags: African Wild Dogs, conservation, hunting, playing, zimbabwe

3 responses so far

Category: Wild Dogs, poaching, zimbabwe | Date: Nov 29 2008 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Dear everyone,

We spent two long days trying hard to desnare the snared pup in the Maera pack.

The first day we departed at 5.30am and using telemetry found the pack at exactly the same spot where a dry river crosses the dirt road where they had been resting the morning before. Graeme, who is qualified to dart and immobilize wildlife, joined Rosemary, Misheck and Roy. In low-range four-wheel drive, we approached them ridiculously slowly in the vehicle after pausing to prepare the tranquilizer dart. We halted every time they looked edgy or stood up; nonetheless as we got towards darting range—which is a mere 25 metres for wild dogs owing to their small size and thin skin—the Wild Dogs moved off through the trees. They moved off casually and slowly, not alarmed, but it was clear that we were disturbing them.

We were able to follow them the short distance to the next water-hole where we waited several hours, mingling two strategies—one being to approach the dogs using the vehicle, moving infinitesimally towards them and hoping not to drive them away before we got into range—and the other being to park in the shade by the edge of the water and wait, darting gun at the ready, for them to come down to the water to bathe and drink. That first day, the dogs came down several times to drink and bathe but the injured pup was not always among them, and not always within range. However, there was one moment when we had a perfect shot, and the dart apparently hit the pup squarely and discharged the drugs.

When this happened, the pup was clearly given a fright and the pop from the darting gun alarmed the rest of the pack, too. It felt like a shame to breach the trust we had built slowly accustoming them to the vehicle and staying absolutely motionless while they cautiously approached the water. However, we were trying to help. What a strange kind of hunting this was: for it is hunting indeed, in all respects except one—that we were trying to save a life rather than take one. And arguably our task was more difficult than hunting to kill, because we had to shoot one particular individual out of a whole pack, not any suitable individual—and we had to be in very close range, because to shoot further requires a higher velocity and can do much more damage to the animal.

When the dart struck the pup, he and the rest of the pack scattered. Assuming the dart had discharged into the pup and it would shortly be immobilized, we started a timer and split up on foot to comb the area and find the sleeping pup. We would have to be quick, because in the intense heat, an immobilized animal’s temperature will sky-rocket, and it will die rapidly from overheating, being unable to regulate its own temperature by panting, moving to the shade, etc.

The minutes ticked past and the sun beat down on us; we fanned out and circled around and could find no sleeping pup. When we reconvened, however, Misheck surprisingly reported that he had just seen the pack with the snared pup moving around and wide awake. Clearly, for some strange reason, the darting hadn’t worked—most likely, the drugs had discharged into bone rather than muscle, and so not resulted in immobilization. (The dart had clearly hit the pup—we found its hair on the needle—and the drugs had been discharged.)

We spent more time trying to follow the dogs to find another opportunity for a darting shot, but they were constantly on the move in inaccessible thick Mopane woods, and we were reluctant to further stress them.

Instead, we met again early next morning for a second attempt. This time, the pack had moved. We followed the radio signal and spotted them moving along a road toward another water-hole. Almost as we arrived, the pack killed two young warthogs—we heard them squealing and saw the Wild Dogs eating excitedly. I was glad to know that the injured pup would be eating today, although tried not to think about how hard it would be for him to swallow. He is growing every day, and that snare must cut every day a little deeper and a little tighter, squeezing the life slowly out of him as his body tries to develop.

We slowed to our ridiculous crawl and crept closer; again, as we neared the water-hole the pack moved off a short distance out of sight. We parked under a tree at the water’s edge and waited.

Hours passed, and the sun shifted, and we were no longer in the shade. After a long time, the dogs approached the water and came to bathe and drink. Cindy, as usual, was the first to enter—she apparently loves the water and has a particular taste for bathing. Others will follow her down, some more boldly than others: and some barely seemed to approach it at all—possibly naturally more timid individuals, possibly put off by our presence. Unfortunately, the snared pup is among the more timid.

However, he eventually came down to drink, and I was relieved to see him immerse is lower jaw and lap the water—water that will help keep him alive a little longer, as would the meat he’d eaten earlier. When he stood up and turned sideways, Graeme took a shot—it was a long shot, and difficult to see whether it had struck home. It turned out to have hit the ground and bounced. The pack scattered again, but moved off only a few dozen metres, staying in the vicinity of the water-hole.

Here’s a picture of them resting affectionately in the shade. They often lie touching each other. Here you can see one Wild Dog is resting its head and paw on the back of one of its friends. At one point several of them did this in a kind of chain of body-pillows, but I couldn’t get a picture of it!

We waited 8 hours at that water-hole for chances to dart the injured pup. Much later, the pack came down to drink again, but unfortunately the snared pup did not come to the water. One adult barked pointedly in our direction. The signal was so clear that it was unmistakable—he was saying to us, ‘Go away! Push off! Give us some space!’

Although we were as quiet as we could and sat still or almost still for hours on end, our presence was certainly keeping animals from their much-needed drinks. We saw Warthogs and Wildebeest come within sight but stay away because they saw and smelt us. It’s highly likely other creatures wanted to drink too, which we never saw.

One adult male warthog was the only mammal other than the Wild Dogs which dared to come to the waterhole while we were there. He was a beautiful specimen—if Warthogs can be beautiful—and showed all the quiet, solid confidence of a strong male. He wasn’t fazed by the Wild Dogs who were drinking not far along the shore, despite the fact that they’d killed two of his kin at the same spot hours before—possibly his own children. At one point, one of the Wild Dogs showed interest in him and began to stalk along the shore towards him. He simply grunted and charged at the Wild Dogs, who scattered without leaving. Then he went back to his spot to continue drinking.

In the picture, the warthog male has just charged towards with wild dogs which have scattered–the ones you can see are looking nervous and clumping together. At the end of the charge, the warthog just stood there and stared towards them. I was impressed at his fearlessness.

He was more concerned about us, but only showed this by taking his time and keeping an eye on us, rather than by any nervous caution. He drank slowly, and then stood motionless by the water’s edge for a long time. I could tell that he wanted to wallow, but was calmly assessing the situation. He eventually turned round and lay down in the shallows. Ah, that cool water! Were the water-hole less attended by possible predators, I’m sure he would have rolled in the mud.

All day a Hamerkop waded in the water-hole, stalking elegantly like a heron, darting its beak to catch insects and once, a frog. I was amazed to watch it washing its food—I wasn’t aware that birds do things like that. The frog was wiggling, and so the Hamerkop slammed it repeatedly against the ground to kill it properly. It would stop wriggling temporarily, and the Hamerkop would move back to the water, rinse the frog in the water, and then attempt to swallow it again. It would wriggle again, and the Hamerkop would repeat this procedure, always washing the frog before every attempt to swallow it, presumably to remove the sand that got stuck all over the frog when it was being bashed on the ground. Once the Hamerkop swallowed the frog while it was still wriggling, but then quickly regurgitated it and continued bashing and then washing the frog until the frog was finally properly dead. Then it washed it one more time and swallowed it whole. Shortly after that, the Hamerkop took a rest, perching on a dead branch nearby and emitting one satisfied white dropping onto the dirt away from the water.

The Wild Dogs were totally disinterested in the Hamerkop, which showed no fear of them, as you can see in this picture.

As it neared dusk, we could see the dogs still resting a hundred metres away through the trees. We decided to try approaching them instead. We drove through thick brush, squeezing between trunks and squashing small trees, wincing at the damage the woody vegetation would be doing to the underside of the vehicle.  Although they all got up as we got close, Graeme did manage to loose another shot at the pup, but in the thick vegetation, it also missed.

It was getting dark, and we were finally stumped. Disappointed, we drove home as the stars came out. We would have to wait for another opportunity when Graeme is available and the Maera pack are in a suitable location—and with luck the snared pup will still be alive, and we can have another go at saving its life. In the meantime, although the wound is nasty and the pup is clearly weakened, it can still keep up with the pack and is still eating and drinking—so there is hope yet.

Yours exhausted,

Roy

Tags: African Wild Dogs, darting, de-snaring, Hamerkop, poaching, snare, snare injury, snared pup, warthog, water hole, Wild Dogs, wildlife immobilization, zimbabwe

2 responses so far

Category: Random, Uncategorized, Wild Dogs | Date: Nov 12 2008 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi guys,

We have found spoor of the Nyarushanga Pack, a less-known pack in the West of the Conservancy which we don’t have a radio-collar for, so we rarely see them except during the denning season, but it’s good to know they’re still around.

We also have good news from a data-collection perspective: the missing piece of the GPS collar that we recovered from the poacher’s house has been handed in, and should hopefully be brought to our house today. We are hoping this is the piece with the data on it…It should have logged the movements of the collared dog, Sandy, which can help us get a sense of home range size and core areas for the Mapari pack.

A number of other interesting things have happened recently including Rueben finding the rarely-seen Pangolin between our house and his. This attracted a small crowd because this animal is so rarely seen. No-one present had seen one before.

It curls up in a scaly ball when threatened:

And can easily be picked up….even the local policeman dropped by for the occasion:

But it got tired of pretending to be scared of us and unfurled to wander away:

Then later that day when we were looking for the Bedford Pack, I met the legendary Greater Honey-Guide, a famous bird for its unique and wonderful behaviour. It evolved a special mutualistic relationship with people, in which, when it finds wild honey, it will come and find a human and attract his or her attention. Then it will lead you to the honey so you can smoke out the bees, on the understanding that you will share some of the honey (and bee larvae) with the Honey-Guide. Well, the one I met was trying to lead me to some honey, but sadly we were on other business and I wasn’t able to follow it! Here is a picture of the Honey-Guide who was inviting me to a possible feast.

On the way home, just a couple of hundred metres from our house, we found the fresh drag marks of a leopard pulling away an impala it had killed. We followed them a short distance to find a mostly uneaten impala ewe with its unborn foetus lying cold against a rock nearby. By the next day, both were entirely eaten. Below is Rueben following the drag marks.

Living in the bush produces so many interesting stories!

All the best,

Roy

Tags: African Wild Dogs, GPS collar, Greater Honeyguide, Honeyguide, Leopard, Pangolin, pangolin pictures, Wild Dogs, zimbabwe

6 responses so far

Category: Wild Dogs | Date: Nov 11 2008 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi guys,

Rueben and I picked up a signal from the Bedford Pack soon after we’d found their spoor along a dirt road. We drove in the appropriate direction, dodging pairs of temperamental bull elephants on the way, until the signal was coming from a place we could not drive to, and so got out and walked off through the thick bush, keeping our eyes open. A scrambling sound on one of the granite kopjes (small hills) to our right made me swing around, and I caught a glimpse of something that wasn’t an antelope furrily scampering away. Leopard, I wondered? However, it turned out to be the unassuming Rock Hyrax…

Rueben walks FAST through the bush, and I had trouble keeping up with him. This is what you see walking behind him (when you catch up):

However, we walked all the way to another road, where we found the Bedford Pack’s tracks, running along the road. So we returned to the vehicle and pursued them again hoping they’d stay close to the road this time.

Rueben banged on the roof, and I braked quickly. “Do you see them?” he asked, but I could not. He is excellent at spotting animals, and it’s helped by the fact that when we’re radio-tracking from the vehicle, he sits high up in the back, with a much better view than mine from the driving seat. Soon I could see the Bedford Pack retreating further down the road partially hidden by some long dry grass. We got close enough that Rueben counted 31 individuals present, the same number he’d counted previously. Although they were constantly on the move and hard to watch, they did seem to be hanging around a particular general area—which we soon explained:

Rueben spotted some vultures and we pulled over to investigate; Rueben seems to have a knack of walking directly towards what he’s looking for even if he doesn’t know where it is. Three minutes walk from the road, in a dry V-shaped gulley, with an audience of vultures spectating patiently, lay a female Kudu, her back end bloody but her eyes not yet misted over. Rueben found fresh Wild Dog spoor and estimated that the Kudu was killed less than two hours ago by members of the Bedford Pack. Here is a picture of it.

Her front half was still untouched, and Rueben suggested that a couple of dogs must have been hunting separately from the rest of the pack, and had eaten their fill before returning to fetch the rest of the pack.

We popped back to the vehicle to fetch some more equipment and returned. In the few moments we were gone, the kill had been dragged several feet away. Some animal must be very close by and probably watching us….We had a good look around, but saw nothing. Rueben suggested the vultures had done it, but then I found fresh canine marks in the Kudu’s neck that were not there before; the Wild Dogs must still have been close, around us.

From the fact that we counted the full pack present, it seems that all the Bedford Pack’s pups from this year are still alive and well, which is great news.

By the way, we’d love to hear from anyone reading this blog. You are invited to leave comments whenever you want!

See you later,

Roy

Tags: African Wild Dogs, Kudu, Kudu kill, radio tracking, telemetry, vultures, Wild Dog kills, wild dog pack, Wild Dogs, zimbabwe

4 responses so far

Category: Wild Dogs, zimbabwe | Date: Oct 31 2008 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Good morning!

We left at 6am this morning, Rueben and I, to look for the Maera pack. Once we reached appropriate territory, every couple of kilometres Rueben would call ‘woah’ from the back of the pickup, and I’d pull over while he lifted the radio antenna to scan 360 degrees for a signal from the collared dog in the Maera pack, Alphy, the alpha male.

‘Abana signaw’, he would report in Shona, ‘no signal’. And we’d continue. Often while Rueben was scanning I’d jump out to have a quick look at the tracks of wildlife on the road. We saw tracks of Eland, Impala, Civet, Leopard, Tree Squirrel, Slender Mongoose, Aardwolf, Jackal, Zebra, Giraffe, Elephant, Guinea Fowl, Blue Waxbill, Yellow-Billed Hornbill, Black Rhino, African Buffalo, Blue Wildebeest, Small-Spotted Genet, Porcupine, Baboon, and African Wild Dog….those are just the ones I remember off the top of my head sitting here. Later we found tracks of White Rhino and Caracal. We were lucky enough to have actual sightings of a harem of Zebra, Wildebeest and a herd of Buffalo, too.

We climbed an old, empty concrete water-tank to gain height in the hope of picking up a signal. Inside, there was the greying skull of a poor monkey who had climbed in to get a drink long ago and been unable to get out. The whole place smelt of old death.

But ‘abana signaw,’ no signal.

We passed through thick elephant country; dense canopy forest of Mopane crowded with the signs of elephant: their barrel-like dung in the road in piles large enough that you feel the bumps as you drive over them, and massive branches broken off or whole trees pushed over as they fed; smaller branches stripped of nutritious bark with dextrous use of the trunk and mouth. Any moment we might put ourselves at risk by surprising a group of them at close quarters in the thick bush. But ‘abana ndzo’; we saw no elephants.

At one point we turned left at a crossroads and a short distance along the new road we stopped to check for a signal and, to my surprise, Rueben suddenly found one. He told me to turn around as our trajectory was wrong to find the dogs. As we drove back towards the crossroads, I saw something dark, long and large crossing the road, and I slowed to a halt; it was a White Rhino, and was soon followed by a second. Rueben asked me to approach them so that he could get a view; I got close in the car and one of them started to trot towards us to investigate, or warn us, but it didn’t come close. I reversed slightly to remove some branches from our view. Then as the rhinos moved away I saw someone running after them, crouching low and keen. I glanced back at Rueben, but he wasn’t there—he’d clearly jumped off the vehicle in hot pursuit of the Rhinos—luckily he knows what he’s doing as he spent years working in Rhino research before joining the Wild Dog project almost a decade ago.

A dustcloud appeared far down the road which turned out to be a group of Rhino-research scouts on their bicycles. Rueben had apparently heard on his radio that they were nearby and returned in a moment to show them the Rhino photos he’d just taken.

Back in the vehicle, we checked the Wild Dogs’ radio signal and resumed our pursuit; far down the straight road ahead there was a group of big dark things kicking up dust. Even with binoculars I couldn’t tell whether they were buffalo or wildebeest. Rueben thought that perhaps the Wild Dogs were there, harassing the beasts. I slowed as we neared them.

“Beneath that tall spring-green Mopane by the side of the road,” Rueben told me, “that’s where the Wild Dogs are.” I couldn’t see them, and neither could he, but it was the right direction for the signal and he seemed to have a hunch. Within seconds, at some hundred metres through vegetation, Rueben spotted the Wild Dogs, but they fled our approach.

Several hundred metres further on was a waterhole by the roadside, and there, our attention perked by strange wildebeest behaviour, we found the Wild Dogs again, only some 40 metres away in the feeble shade of a big Mopane just coming into leaf. As we arrived they were all on their feet, ears and noses in our direction, clearly wary. However, they relaxed a lot and more dogs came into view.

Four-ten (with the collar) and Harriet by the water-hole–

We counted 14, including 3 pups, which is the entire pack. We were able to watch them for some 15-20 minutes gaining a magnificent view and taking lots of useful photographs. Several of the adults including the alpha pair trotted to and fro, a touch unsettled by our presence, but many dogs stayed lying in the shade and several times came to the small water-hole to drink briefly, but mainly to roll about or lie in the murky water. A vulture sat in the tree above them. Alphy faced us sometimes and barked warningly. Eventually the pack moved away in a close unit heading East through the Mopane trees, one puppy trailing disractedly behind.

Cindy was loving it…

And others soon couldn’t resist…

This was a particularly good sighting, and more than enabled us to confirm again that the Maera pack is still together and all its members look fit and healthy. 

I hope all of you are too!

Roy

Tags: African Wild Dogs, conservation research, save valley conservancy, Wild Dogs, zimbabwe

2 responses so far