Month: December 2010

Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a Prosperous New Year !

We had an awesome Christmas Day with the Warnock Family, which was ended off with a lovely Christmas Dinner with Gammon, Roast Lamb and all the other goodies that come with it.

The last week has been great with regular safari sightings of the Elephants, Lions and Rhinos.

Early Sunday morning I woke to find the Lions had killed a female giraffe just outside our staff residence. The lions were no where to be seen but they were definately still in the area close by. Hundreds of vultures were starting to gather in the trees around the carcass. None were coming down to feed however, as the lions were still somewhere close. There were tracks of the lions all over around the carcass. After checking up on the carcass a number of times during the day myself and the Warnock Family, who were on a Christmas safari holiday with us, eventually gained visual of the lions late that afternoon, spread full bellied in a dark thicket very close to the slain giraffe. After a long struggle to get a decent look at them, we decided it would be better to go in search of other wildlife and return after dark to see if the lions had come out for their Boxing Day dinner.

After a cold beer and a leg stretch we returned to the spot where the lions were to find four of them sprawled out in the middle of the road and one of the females feeding on the giraffe. Fantastic and Finally!!! a glimpse of them.

The sighting turned out to be great and we were able to get some great pics and video of them feeding and lazing about with enormous bellies. Forty-five minutes later we decided the smell of the rotting carcass and the multitudes of bugs been attracted to the spot light was enough and we headed back to the lodge for a nice dinner after this amazing safari game drive.

Regards,

Quinton and the Vuyani Safari Lodge team.

There are some more new arrivals in the form of young Wildebeest. Driving about we are starting to bump into more and more of them as well as loads of young Impala and Warthog.

We had a great lion sighting on a morning safari game drive 2 days ago, they were so lethargic from a meal they had obviously just finished prior to our arrival.

A visit back to the Eagle Owl nest revealed that the chicks are still growing at an enormous rate. One will see in the attached photographs that the older chick is the one behind and the younger in front. In the first photo the mother is keeping an eye os us while we are inspecting the nest. She has become quite relaxed about us being around by now though.

We also saw this huge Leopard Tortoise, the biggest I have ever seen in my life.

We are currently preparing the lodge for a large guest arrival, it is their first Christmas safari holidays !

Just a short update on what’s going on with the Eagle Owl chicks I discovered by accident last week during a safari game drive.
Well the second egg has hatched now and both chicks are growing at an alarming rate. They have almost doubled in size since I last saw them. The parents are doing a great job and are slowly starting to accept my presence around their nest. So I should be able to keep tabs on the two youngsters throughout their growing up.

Will keep you all posted !

We started the safari yesterday afternoon at around 16h30. Not long after we had left I received a call on the radio from our manager Yolande saying that a big snake outside Room 3’s window has been spotted. After consulting with all guests we turned the game viewer around and rushed back to the lodge to see what huge snake had decided to visit us while we were away. Arriving at the lodge I saw that there was a fairly big Snouted Cobra curled up outside the a guest’s window.

Using a broom, I attempted to coax the massive Cobra into our game drive cooler box. The serpent however had other ideas and blatantly refused to stay in the box. After a struggle of about five minutes accompanied by numerous hisses and snarls, I pinned the cobra’s head and grabbed a hold of him. At this point he feigned death and went into a completely relaxed state called Thanatosis (feigning death).

After allowing the guests to take close up photos and a brief explanation I gently put the snake into the cooler and closed the lid.

He then accompanied us on a 15 min safari until I felt that we were far enough away from the safari lodge to release him.
Cobras are territorial therefore if he was not released far enough away, there would be chance of a return visit.
We then opened the cooler and freed him to return to wild nature.