December 2008 : Grumeti Reserves, Tanzania

As the sun sets on 2008 we would like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

2008 was an incredible year for game viewing and the trend continues here at Singita Grumeti – each year just gets better than the previous one. It is so encouraging to see more and more game becoming more habituated to the cars and better distributed throughout the concession – a far cry from the empty plains and skittish game of just 5 years ago. My 5 favourite and most memorable pictures of 2008 are to the right.

 

The Abundant Herds

The dictionary defines abundant as abounding with, rich or plentiful and the plains this month were certainly full of abundant herds of game. The biggest herds were zebra, Thomson’s gazelle and topi but a massive group of nearly 350 eland and a single herd of 450 buffalo also impressed. Difficult to capture the enormous herds with pictures - imagine driving for 2-3 through thousands of animals ...

 

Guide Trainig Continues

The 4 trainee guides continued this month and one of the topics on the agenda was amphibians.

Frogs are one of my favourite subjects and highlights in December included noting a first record for the concession – a tiny Sharp-nosed Reed Frog (Hyperolius acuticeps). It is a very pretty little green frog with 2 white stripes down his back.  The other photo is of a very common and very noisy Hyperolius gladilcolor - Peter’s Reed Frog.

We also spent some time camping out west, on the beautiful and wide open Kawanga plains. These plains were packed to the brim with huge herds of zebra and topi. Not only was the game viewing memorable down there but the open plains are prone to the odd large rain storm. This one pictured to the right arrived quite quickly and engulfed the camp with strong winds and sheets of rain. Luckily we all survived the 60mm of rain in about 45 minutes and we dried out pretty quickly!

Seen here with a large old set of buffalo horns are Arnold and Addas.

 

The New Cubs

Nothing gets safari goers oohing & aahing quite like baby animals and the rains have ensured a seasonal birthing peak of a wide variety of species.

Young warthogs, zebra, baboons, elephants and impala, amoung a multitude of others, dot the plains. This young giraffe calf seen near Sasakwa was estimated to be only one day old, it’s tiny horns still folded back onto the head, it’s wobbly little legs carrying it unsteadily along.

It is little cubs though that are everybody’s favourite and the third Butamtam pride lioness, not seen for about a month or so, has remerged onto the plains with 3 little cubs in tow.

These little fur balls, estimated to be bewteen 2–3 months old, were spotted regularly and we hope that they survive the next few months, usually quite a tough time for young lions.

 

The Lions

The lions of Grumeti certainly loved the last month of 2008 as they seldom had to venture too far for food. Life inside the buffet of food was fairly easy for them.

The majority of the lion viewing was provided by the new Nayasarori pride (seen for the first time last month) and the stalwart Butamtam pride. Combine this with sightings of the small pride of 4 down at Boundary Pan and the lioness and cubs mentioned on the previous page and we had days where a choice of no fewer than 4 different lion sightings were on offer. These days were pretty special as no less than a total of 24 individual lions could be seen.

As the pride structures settle and territories are established we can expect to see even more lions next year.

 

The Birds

To conclude this month’s journal we finish with our feathered friends.

December will be remembered as not only an abundant month for the mammals but some interesting birds have been seen as well. First records for the concession include Black bishop, Red Tailed shrike, Yellow Backed Weaver and it was the first time any of us have ever seen a Spotted Redshank (top photo to the right)

The second record for the concession of the uncommon Spekes weaver is also noted.

The kori bustards, at nearly 20 kg the heaviest flying bird in Africa, have been displaying during December - quite a show. The males, already an impressive bird, really get going this time of year. They balloon out their neck feathers and raise their tails upwards and strut around the savanna like they own the place. Now, if you’re a female kori bustard, you find this chin up, chest out, back straight kind of thing quite simply irresistible…

Continuing on the breeding theme the village weavers have been hard at work in colonies throughout the concession, building their beautifully woven nests at the end of thin branches.

The bottom image on the right is of a martial eagle taking off.

It is with much excitement that we look forward to a wonderful 2009 here at Singita. If the game viewing trends continue we will be sure to have another bumper year!

This entry was sumbitted by Lee Fuller
All the photographs were taken on location by Lee Fuller
Singita Grumeti Reserves
31 December 2008