Leopards, Mambas and Mud

Leopard sightings are always shared around the lunch or dinner table here at CCF. People see them on the way out to feed the cheetahs that are in the more remote enclosures or when they are out on the reserve checking one thing or another. I knew enough not to expect to see a leopard while here but I hoped that with four months to spend at CCF I might get lucky and see one.

One way to get out on the reserve is to volunteer to help on different projects. Lately I have been helping on Mondays with collecting the memory cards from the camera traps located around CCF at the different water holes. It is a great way to get out and now that I know the routine I can actually be helpful.

Just as we pulled into our last camera trap site of the day last week we spotted a leopard moving away from the water hole. We caught two good glimpses of it and then it disappeared. We watched for it in the area as we checked the camera, collected the card and changed the batteries. We stuck together when we took measurements on the size of the water hole just to be on the safe side. I saw my first leopard exactly one month after arriving in Africa. One week later, at the same site we watched a black mamba snake emerge from the water, slither out onto the bank and disappear into the grass. The snake was not very big around but was somewhere around 2 meters in length. My first leopard and first venomous snake sighted at the same location just one week apart.

This week I have been fortunate enough to also go out on two night drives with a visiting scientist, Kristine. She has been studying Caracals (a medium sized wild cat) in South Africa for the past three years and knows a tremendous amount about African wildlife. I learned quickly that she is always up for an adventure. On our first adventure together we took her land rover, crammed six people in and headed out to explore. Before we had traveled three kilometers we spotted a leopard off to the side of the road. I was able to keep the spotlight on it or just to the side of it as we watched it move through the tall grass. It was behaving like it wanted to cross the road so we turned off the car and stayed quiet. Sure enough it came out of the grass and moved across the road where we watched it for several more minutes until it disappeared. Two leopard sightings in one week!

The night drive continued with views of Oryx herds, Red Hartebeest, Springbok and Steenbok. Then we had another great sighting of an Aardwolf.  This nocturnal, hyena type animal is not very common. In fact, until last month I did not even know they existed. They are usually seen at a distance but we were close enough to get good looks and could see the hyena shape along with the dark stripes that run down the side of the body. Aardwolves feed almost entirely on termites and can eat 250,000 a night.

After spotting the Aardwolf we headed for home but at the last minute decided to take a quick detour to one of the watering holes to see what might be hanging out there. It turned out to be a longer trip than expected when we became stuck in a mud hole and had to spend 90 minutes or more in knee deep mud, in the dark, digging and pushing ourselves out. This also had to be done barefoot as the mud kept sucking off our shoes. Admittedly thoughts of cobras and black mambas passed through my mind. With six of us floundering around and making noise I was not so concerned about leopards. After lots of digging, laying down a carpet of tree branches, pushing and strategizing we managed to get ourselves out and head home. 

Two nights later Kristine and I decided to go out again taking three others with us. Just a km or two past our previous leopard spotting site we saw something on the edge of the road. When we got up to it we could see it was a leopard cub. The first feeling was absolute excitement followed by wondering just where the mother might be. Then we spotted her too. At that point we did put our windows up a bit as she was not far away and we knew that a female leopard with two cubs had been seen on camera trap photos. We were lucky enough to watch the adult leopard for several minutes as it sat in the grass watching us before moving farther back from the road. We did not see a second cub but that spotting made four leopards in one week for me. Really kind of unheard of even here. It is nice to be the new person on the block who is envied because of her luck with leopard sightings.

My fellow adventurer, Kristine, has returned to South Africa now but Jim will be arriving here in just four days and I know he is always up for an adventure too.

Red Hartebeest