Month: December 2011

Hi all!

Here at the Vuyani Safari Lodge we would like to wish everybody a Merry and Happy Festive Season!!

Lately we have had a fantastic sighting of the Lions. One of the females gave birth to a baby lion a couple of months ago. This time we were not able to find the youngster but had a really nice up close and personal sighting with the remaining sub adult male and the two girls.

After a long trip back from O R Tambo international. We settled down for a nice dinner back at the Lodge. Erich decided to head out and see if he could find the lions to maybe do a late night drive for our guests.

It wasn’t long before Erich called back and said that he had managed to find them and Jacques should bring the guests out to have a look.

The lions were in an open area enjoying the cool evening air. The sighting turned out great with them lying close to the game viewer in a complete state of relaxation. Perfect African safari …

On our afternoon safari Jacques and I set out to look for the Lions when Carlene, our chef, radioed in that she saw an Elephant bull on her way to drop off the staff. We quickly changed our route and set out to relocate the big animal. On our way to where she had spotted the big bull we found fresh tracks of the whole herd and followed them to a Sickle bush thicket were we found them relaxed and feeding. The young Elephants were very playful, bumping heads, jumping on each other’s backs and chasing every member of the herd in circles. We spent almost 40 minutes with the herd until the matriarch decided it was time to move on. One by one they crossed the road greeting us in turn before disappearing into the thick bush. What an awesome encounter!

Erich Jamneck

Thanks to Junho Park for supplying the Photos!

Once again, an awesome sighting that blew our mind. As the whole country is getting a lot of rain these days, we are not allowing it to dampen our moods out on Safari. Myself and Kris had taken out Kelly and Elizabeth for their first safari at Vuyani. They had told us they would really like to see some cats, so we had our work cut out for us. And we searched high and low for these elusive cats. It was a nice cool cloudy afternoon when we stopped for our sundowners, by then we had seen some beautiful sightings of giraffe and other plains game.
After sundowners we did all we could to find a cat and it paid off! As we headed back towards the lodge we crossed through an open plain, and just ahead of us a young male leopard crossed the road in front of us. We all nearly jumped out of our seats with excitement. We kept the spot light on the leopard and followed him across the plain; He had a very proud look about him and clearly wasn’t bothered by us following him. The off roading following the leopard was just as exciting. He eventually heard a noise in the bush and darted off to go and see what it was and we then lost his visual and then let him be the proud leopard he is meant to be. We then headed back to the lodge to have a nice cold beer to celebrate our wonderful sighting of the elusive leopard. For anyone on an African safari, this is an unforgettable highlight, and even for seasoned rangers, it is very far from an every day common sighting!

Recently on Morning Safari we were lucky enough to bump into a family of 7 Bush Pigs then later on a Sow with her single piglet. She appeared very round so I suspect she was quite far pregnant and close to giving birth.

Bush Pigs are predominantly nocturnal animals and are omnivorous feeding on all sorts of plant material, carrion and sometimes even killing and eating small rodents, snakes and other vertebrates.

They will reach around 50 to 90 cm in height and up to 1.5M in length, weighing up to 115KG. The gestation period (pregnancy period) is about 120 days giving birth to up to 6 piglets. They will reach sexual maturity at just under 2 years and have a life expectancy of around 20 years.

I was unable to get any shots of them so have included this picture from the internet.

Take Care and Season Greetings
Quinton Chick – Lodge Manager and Head Ranger