Dogs
On the morning of my birthday I was out of the gate as soon as it opened. The first order of business was to watch the sun rise over the Letaba river. I drove a little distance on the H1-6. As mentioned earlier I had the wonderful Ground Hornbill sighting. It was very overcast, and I realised I would not see a proper sunrise. I then turned around to go back to the dirt road as I wanted to do the little loops next to the river. That is when I received the best gift very early on my birthday.
A fabulous wild dog sighting of about 10 minutes all to myself! I turned onto the dirt road past the turn of to the day visitor’s area outside Letaba and saw this weird looking “log” ahead of me that looked just like a wild dog. Then I realised it was a dog! There were 12 of them, and they were just lying next to the road. Due to the overcast conditions it was a little too dark for the best photos, but it was just so awesome to have the dogs almost within touching distance.
The one dog was a lot blacker than the others, and I affectionately called him “Darth Vader”.
It was so special to have these beautiful animals right next to the car.
Two of the dogs shared a couple of kisses. After about 10 minutes the one suddenly jumped up, they were all off in a flash. They turned right towards the camp gate and for a few seconds I thought they were going to run into the camp. Just before the gate they swerved left into the bush. Sadly, no-one was leaving camp at that moment to enjoy this sighting. I patrolled the road for a little while, but they did not make an appearance again. I could not have asked for a better birthday present!
Duck
I saw quite a few Knob-billed ducks. The first sighting was at a very full Nsemani Dam.
The next day I found a pair in a tree on the Sweni road where they were enjoying the early morning sunlight.
At the Nwanetsi waterhole I found a few more males and females.
The only other ducks I saw were White-faced Whistling Ducks. There were a few at Nsemani dam and next to the Letaba River.
Next up: E is for ….