Mission Impossible! An epic road trip in search of some of South Africa’s rarest mammals

[kittykat23uk]

53 minutes ago, Towlersonsafari said:

I do love a dung beetle @kittykat23uk do you think they were a male and female as some species stay together " during the rolling process"  when we saw them in the kruger our San Parks guide suggested that was what was happening-although I have no idea how one tells a Mr D. Beetle from a Mrs D Beetle!

i do hope you saw lots of rare mammals during your trip to make up for the annoying guide!

 

Oh I am not sure about this

[ice]

I have only read bits and pieces of this report but can't help but notice that a lot of negative comments are directed towards the guide, Mel. However, from what I understand I am not sure he is the (sole) one to blame. After all (again, from what I understand) he was hired by this company in Upington. Since @kittykat23ukseems to have clearly voiced her expectations in written form, imho it was up to the people she booked with to hire somebody who was suitable for the job. 

[kittykat23uk]

 

@ice you are correct. The responsibility for booking this guide lies with the tour company.

 

This is why I directed all communication about my concerns to the safari company. 

 

The guide told me that the safari company had originally planned to hand us over at Swellendam to another guide. But he was apparently let down. He said he reluctantly agreed to take on the whole job.

 

The safari company did not alert us to any issues with the guide before we arrived.  The guide led me to believe that he and the owner were friends, but the safari company contradicted this when I complained and said that he found this guide through  viator.

 

Having checked his profile on that site our guide clearly markets himself as a general Cape Town and surrounds tour guide (for which he seems well-suited). There is nothing in that profile that would suggest that he had any of the qualities needed for a wildlife guide of the calibre that we were led to believe would be provided for our tour.

 

Having said this, the safari company had just recently employed him to lead a similar long (and by our guide's own admission, disastrous) trip looking for flowers. So he was not in the best frame of mind from the offset. 

 

Unfortunately,  as I said in my opening remarks,  we ended up caught in the middle of this dispute between the two parties. 

 

The safari company was seemingly on the same page with what we had paid for regarding the meals and the itinerary but the guide disputed that he had been properly briefed. 

 

I trusted that the accommodation for the guide had been taken care of. Most of the bookings I received ahead of time showed at least a camping spot had been booked and I didn't query this, because  it seemed quite appropriate to me that the guide would camp.

 

The safari company told me that the guide had agreed to sleep in his bus on the days where only camping spots or no accommodation was booked.

 

Perhaps he did, but he certainly didn't stick to this arrangement and he became more and more angry with the safari company for putting him in this position. We did sympathise with this situation and I did ask the safari company to sort it out with the guide but he was not at all helpful, just reiterated that the guide could take care of himself. 

 

 

[ice]

thanks for claryfying, that's pretty much what I had guessed - I'm amazed, though that the safari company had gotten good reviews

[penolva]

I meant I would probably been less patient than you and demanded the tour company replaced him. I do understand your dilemma ?

[kittykat23uk]

Well that's exactly what I did. But that couldn't be arranged until we got to Upington and we still had a week before we'd get there. But I am getting ahead of myself!

[Dave Williams]

I'm lapping up every scrap of information as we are due  to visit Cape Town for the first time in July and I'm starting to panic thinking I won't have enough time to see what you have !

As for your "guide" , you can hardly call him that if he keeps getting lost and not bothering to get out of the car, there again you can't call him a "driver" either as his motoring skills are questionable at best.

 

[kittykat23uk]

3 hours ago, Dave Williams said:

I'm lapping up every scrap of information as we are due  to visit Cape Town for the first time in July and I'm starting to panic thinking I won't have enough time to see what you have !

As for your "guide" , you can hardly call him that if he keeps getting lost and not bothering to get out of the car, there again you can't call him a "driver" either as his motoring skills are questionable at best.

 

 

Hmmm. What should I call him then

 

As for the cape,  there is way more to do than we had time for, even if we hadn't lost so much time. Mum would have happily spent a day just at Kirstenbosch,  and I still didn't get to look for the rockjumper or visit some of the other birding sites that I was hoping to get to.  Plus we needed to build in some contingency because of the weather-dependant  nature of a lot of the activities. 

[Peter Connan]

14 hours ago, kittykat23uk said:

We had no choice in the matter. We would have been left without a guide. 

 

I suspect that would have been preferable. After all, you knew where you wanted to go. I am sure anybody with a map could have done better?

[kittykat23uk]

3 hours ago, Peter Connan said:

 

I suspect that would have been preferable. After all, you knew where you wanted to go. I am sure anybody with a map could have done better?

 

Probably so, but I haven't driven a car in years and I would not want to have my mum drive us around either. This is exactly why the two of us chose to go with a tailor made tour in the first place. 

[kittykat23uk]

21/09/17 Karoo National Park

 

It was a long drive to Karoo National Park, we left at 06:00 and drove through the scenic Grootswartberg Mountain Catchment Area towards Beaufort West. This would be a geologist’s field day!   The Swartberg mountains (black mountain in Afrikaans) are a mountain range in the Western Cape province of South Africa. It is composed of two main mountain chains running roughly east-west along the northern edge of the semi-arid Little Karoo. To the north of the range lies the other large semi-arid area in South Africa, the Great Karoo. Most of the Swartberg Mountains are above 2000 m high, making them the tallest mountains in the Western Cape. It is also one of the longest, spanning some 230 km from south of Laingsburg in the west to between Willowmore and Uniondale in the east. Geologically, these mountains are part of the Cape Fold Belt.

 

20170921_111552 Grootswartberg Mountain Catchment Area by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

The Greater Swartberg is located to the east, with the dividing line between the two ranges being the Gouritz River, which cuts a gorge directly through the range with the Tierberg (Leopard Mountain) at 2132 m being the highest. These mountains are home to the Cango Caves in the exposed limestone basement rocks exposed by upliftment along a 300 km fault line that runs along the southern flank of the Swartberg ranges. These are the most famous subterranean system in South Africa, located just north of Oudtshoorn.

 

 

20170921_111654 Grootswartberg Mountain Catchment Area by Jo Dale, on Flickr

Our route took us through the spectacular Meiringspoort pass. Until the first pass was cut, these mountains were virtually insurmountable, and cut the Great Karoo off from the Little Karoo and from the coast. John Molteno, Beaufort West businessman (and later Prime Minister) first surveyed the range for a pass with Andrew Bain, Thomas Bain. They rode out from Beaufort West on horseback, in 1854, for a week-long ride to traverse the range and plan the routes.

 

 

20170921_112055 Meiringspoort Waterfall by Jo Dale, on Flickr

The pass was cut and the route completed in only 223 working days, comprising one of the era's most extraordinary feats of engineering. It was also a huge economic step for the interior of the Cape Colony. For example, by 1870, an eighth of the country's wool exports passed through the Meiringspoort.

 

 

20170921_112136 Meiringspoort Waterfall by Jo Dale, on Flickr

The Meiringspoort provides paved road transit through the Swartberg range, using the route largely carved by a river. The poort connects the town of De Rust in the south, with the town of Klaarstroom in the north. It also offers a spectacular drive through incredible rock formations.

 

 

20170921_112158 Scenery by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

20170921_112538 Meiringspoort Waterfall by Jo Dale, on Flickr

Edited June 21, 2018 by kittykat23uk

[kittykat23uk]

We arrived at Karoo National Park at around 13:30. The Karoo National Park was founded in 1979. This semi-desert area covers an area of 750 square kilometres (290 sq mi). The Nuweveld portion of the Great Escarpment runs through the Park. It is therefore partly in the Lower Karoo, at about 850 m above sea level, and partly in the Upper Karoo at over 1300 m altitude.

 

There are two main game viewing drives that do not require a four-wheel drive vehicle: the one to the east remains on the “Lammertjiesleegte” plains of the Lower Karoo; the other is the 49 km long circular route to the west which ascends the Klipspringer Pass on to the plateau (Upper Karoo), and eventually returns to the plains at the "Doornhoek" picnic site at the western extremity of the loop. From there it follows a south-easterly course across the plains to the beginning of the Klipspringer Pass, near the camp site and chalets. At the top of the Klipspringer Pass the Rooivalle View Point presents a magnificent panorama of the Lower Karoo.

 

The middle portion of the park, to the west of the Klipspringer Pass circular route, was off limits to us but is easily accessible in 4x4 vehicles, and covers an extensive area, with rewarding game viewing opportunities.

 

An important point to note about the national parks in South Africa, check in seems to universally be after 14:00. This is really a bit later than one would ideally like, it would be nice to get checked in at lunch time in order to relax for a while before starting a PM game drive. 

 

I had hoped we might do a night drive here but when I contacted the park I was advised that they did not have a working vehicle, so night drives were not available for the time we were there. This was a shame, because a number of the mammals I was hoping to see were nocturnal. The Karoo National Park holds springbok, gemsbok (or Oryx), Cape mountain zebra, Cape buffalo, red hartebeest, black rhinoceros, eland, kudu, klipspringer, bat-eared foxes, black-backed jackal, ostriches, and, since fairly recently, lions. It also has the greatest number of tortoise species of any park in the world - five in total. The endangered riverine rabbit has been successfully resettled here. A large number of Verreaux's eagles have nests on the cliffs of the Escarpment. Martial eagles, booted eagles and the shy Cape eagle-owl are other raptors that can be seen in the Park.

 

Our first sighting at the entrance was a nice big Leopard Tortoise and then our first Red Hartebeest, (another lifer) that was sleeping.  

 

P9210685 Leopard Tortoise by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210694 Leopard Tortoise by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

Over the course of the afternoon, we tried Klipspringer Pass without success and we didn’t cover the full loop as our guide had concerns about the suitability of the minibus on this mountain pass. We then drove the Potlekkertjie loop, we saw very little on this loop and after a while our guide started to complain that we were just wasting petrol being out there, so we turned back and spent the rest of the afternoon trying the Lammertjiesleegte loop.

 

P9210748 Gemsbok by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

Over the course of those two loops we had further sightings of Cape Mountain Zebra, including one with a tiny foal,Springbok  and our first sightings of Kudu, Vervet Monkeys, and, a species I was really looking forward to seeing, the majestic Gemsbok (Oryx). A few birds were also in evidence, Karoo Chat, more Ostrich and at a bird hide displaying Southern Masked Weaver.  

 

P9210754 Kudu by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210784 Springbok by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210794 Leopard Tortoise by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210831 Vervet Monkey by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210845 Red Hartebeest by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210881 Red Hartebeest by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210883 Cape Mountain Zebra by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210888 Cape Mountain Zebra by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210910 Cape Mountain Zebra by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210941 Cape Mountain Zebra by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210954 Cape Mountain Zebra by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9210965 Gemsbok by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9211012 Ostrich by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

 

P9211021 Ostrich by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9211038 Red Hartebeest by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9211058 Red Hartebeest by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9211103 Kudu by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9211153 Southern Masked Weaver by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

To save costs of eating out, we suggested that our guide might like to cook for us, since we had a kitchen and plenty of food in the bus. But he decided to take us to the restaurant for dinner instead, (with the inevitable results that we had come to expect). I had the game pie, which was quite tasty. 

Edited June 21, 2018 by kittykat23uk

[kittykat23uk]

22/09/17 Karoo National Park to Riverine Rabbit Retreat

 

We once again took the Klipspringer Pass looking for it’s namesake. We caught sight of a Black-backed Jackal making its way up the cliffside and then I spotted two distant Klipspringer foraging with a troop of Chacma Baboons. We turned around before we should have because another gentleman we spoke to later advised us that he’d sighted one right by the road just after the place where we’d turned back.

 

P9220047 Red Hartebeest by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220102 Black-backed Jackal by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220045 Chalets by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220047 Chalets by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220048 Chalets by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220050 Chalets by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220133 Giant millipede by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220147 Fiscal Flycatcher by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220163 Rock Martins by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220201 Common Fiscal by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220270 Red Hartebeest by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220298 Springbok by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

 

20170922_091303 Scenery by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

We then took breakfast whilst watching a Red Hartebeest at the waterhole, in front of the restaurant. I had a stack of delicious pancakes. On the way out we drove the Lammertjiesleegte loop, seeing the same as the previous day.

 

We had been having trouble with the sliding door on the minibus which kept jamming so we stopped off in Beaufort West to try and get it resolved. I also took the opportunity to look for a spotlight, since neither the safari company nor our guide had managed to satisfactorily resolve my concerns on that score. We later found out that the Moolmans who own Dunedin Farm where the Retreat is located are stockists of a torch brand called O-light, so if anyone is visiting the area and is short of a decent spotlight there is that option to consider. Alas, I did not know this at the time.

 

The garage could only assist with a temporary fix on the door and eventually we were on our way again. The drive to Dunedin Farm took us along the border of the Karoo National Park and on the way I spotted two closer Klipspringer in the river bed who then deftly scaled the cliffs up the other side of the gorge.

 

P9220324 Klippspringer by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220345  Klipspringer by Jo Dale, on Flickr

Edited January 13, 2018 by kittykat23uk

[Tdgraves]

A waste of petrol? Isn’t that the definition of any game drive?

[Treepol]

@kittykat23uk thanks for this close-up look at Karoo NP, I'm looking forward to exploring this park in August.

[kittykat23uk]

2 hours ago, Treepol said:

@kittykat23uk thanks for this close-up look at Karoo NP, I'm looking forward to exploring this park in August.

 

If you are into the smaller mammals,  you should also consider visiting my next location... 

Edited January 13, 2018 by kittykat23uk

[KiwiGran]

Looking forward to hearing about Marrick Farm, we are booked for 3 nights there end of May. Have booked 2 night drives and a day drive, wondering what the situation is regarding tipping on these. Also booked for a full day in Mokala so looking forward to reading about your experience there. Sorry to hear about the guide, we were on the brink of booking Kalahari Safaris last year when we had to delay the trip because of a health problem.

[Ratdcoops]

Those Blue Cranes really are a beautiful bird.

[Atravelynn]

Wow, what a first entry.  So sorry about your Granddad.

 

On your safari, what a stressful situation.  Looking forward to those blue cranes.  I found them and they are rather surreal looking.  Your whole trip was a bit surreal.  The photos don't reveal the troubles you had.

 

 

 

 

Edited January 19, 2018 by Atravelynn

[kittykat23uk]

5 hours ago, KiwiGran said:

Looking forward to hearing about Marrick Farm, we are booked for 3 nights there end of May. Have booked 2 night drives and a day drive, wondering what the situation is regarding tipping on these. Also booked for a full day in Mokala so looking forward to reading about your experience there. Sorry to hear about the guide, we were on the brink of booking Kalahari Safaris last year when we had to delay the trip because of a health problem.

 

You had a lucky escape there! 

[kittykat23uk]

3 hours ago, Atravelynn said:

Wow, what a first entry.  So sorry about your Granddad.

 

On your safari, what a stressful situation.  Looking forward to those blue cranes.  I found them and they are rather surreal looking.  Your whole trip was a bit surreal.  The photos don't reveal the troubles you had.

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks @Atravelynn yeah the more I review our original correspondence with the company,  the more I realise they really did not deliver on any of their original promises. We were told we'd get a specialist wildlife guide and also use local experts for things like identifying the flowers at west coast. This didn't happen.  We were told we'd be in a 4x4 enclosed vehicle, this didn't happen. 

 

 

[Atravelynn]

Hope things pick up for Marrick.  For anybody that travels as much as you do, it's almost a given that a bad experience with company and guide is out there somewhere.  The goal is to not let it ruin your trip.  I think you have succeeded so far.  And you are alerting the rest of us.  Thanks!

[kittykat23uk]

Thanks @Atravelynn well the Marrick night drives were at least one part of the trip that was out of our guide's hands! 

 

 

[kittykat23uk]

We were starting to wonder if we’d got lost, but we couldn’t see how that was possible with the road being long and straight, so we pulled into the next farm to ask how close we were to Dunedin. It turned out it was a bit further up the road and sure enough we soon found a farm sporting a nifty little image of our main target, the critically endangered Riverine Rabbit.

 

Dunedin Farm is run by Johan and Marietha with their two sons. We called at the farmhouse and the Moolman’s answered with welcoming smiles. Smiles, which soon turned to looks of concern and mild alarm when they looked past us towards our minibus. Some conversations were exchanged, and we were directed to the retreat, down a 5.5 KM track on the property.

 

Now it should be said that this place is a little off the beaten track. I know that, which is why I made a point of providing a very detailed set of site notes months in advance from Paul Carter who had previously done a recce to the area. As the safari company booked the accommodation, I had the expectation that he would have taken the opportunity to get the lay of the land. I also checked that the safari company had forwarded the site notes on to our guide and further checked with our guide in advance of our arrival that he was fully briefed on this section of the tour and prepared to conduct the night drives. Assurances were given all would be well. Nothing could have been further from the truth!!!!  

 

The problem was encountered with the drive to the Retreat. The track follows some fairly hilly ground up and down to the retreat, in addition, there are a number of large mounds that have been put into the road, like oversized speed bumps to help with drainage. Due to the low clearance and long wheelbase of the minibus, the vehicle barely made it over these hillocks. By the time we got to Riverine Rabbit Retreat, our guide’s nerves were frayed to breaking point and he refused to drive anywhere for our three night stay. I was absolutely devastated that we had been left in this terrible situation. The riverine rabbit was the whole central target for this tour, it’s what I’d built the tour around, and without any transport, how were we even going to be able to look for it? Let alone see it??

 

Johan, the owner could see how upset I was getting at the situation we were in and, like a knight in shining armour he came to our rescue, offering that his boys Manus and Hans-Willem would come back that evening and take us out to look for the rabbits and other wildlife. We were ever so grateful to Johan and his boys that they were going to get us out of such a tight spot and we thanked them profusely for their help.

 

With that settled, we got all our gear inside and settled in. The bedrooms at the Retreat are beautifully appointed with a different theme for each one. Of course, I bagsied the Riverine Rabbit room, hoping it would bring luck to our quest for the holy rabbit. It is a self catering property, so we brought supplies with us.

 

Last Chance to See?

One of the so-called “Impossible Five, alongside, Aardvark, Pangolin, Cape Mountain Leopard, and naturally occurring White Lion, the Riverine Rabbit (Bunolagus monticularis) is also known as the Bushman Rabbit is in real trouble. It has been classified as critically endangered and is listed as number 10 on the EDGE register of endangered mammal species (EDGE stands for Evolutionary Distinct, Globally Endangered), sandwiched between Sumatran Rhino at 9 and Black Rhino at 11.  

 

The order Lagomorpha contains two families, the Ochotonidae (pikas) and Leporidae (rabbits and hares). These families are thought to have diverged during the late Eocene, 35-38 million years ago. The Leporidae comprises two groups: the jackrabbits and hares of the genus Lepus, and the rabbits in the remaining ten genera. Recent molecular data indicates that most rabbit and hare genera arose from a single rapid diversification event during the Miocene (between 12 and 16 million years ago). Bunolagus monticularis is the sole species in the genus Bunolagus.

 

Predominantly a browser, feeding on wild flowers and leaves from the riparian vegetation found along seasonal rivers in the Karoo Desert. Grass is included in the diet during the wet season. The species is nocturnal, avoiding predators by spending its days resting in a form (a shallow scrape made in the soil under a bush). Individuals are solitary and have a polygamous mating system. Males and females maintain intrasexually exclusive home ranges, with male ranges overlapping those of the female. Unusually for rabbits, this species breeds very slowly, with females giving birth to only one or two young each year. Since they rarely live for more than three years, this means that only around four offspring are produced during each rabbit’s lifetime.

 

This rabbit lives in one of the few areas of the Karoo Desert suitable for conversion to agriculture, and as a result has lost virtually all its habitat to farming. Less than 250 individuals survive, and all occur on privately owned land where they come under further pressure from hunting, trapping, and predation by feral dogs and cats, roads are also a hazard. As an extremely slow breeder (for a rabbit), the species is finding it almost impossible to recover from these losses, and is in desperate need of conservation attention.

 

The Moolmans are active conservationists of the rabbits on their property, but even they couldn’t say how many occur there. There were researchers there the night before we arrived who had hoped to set up a drone to look for the rabbits, however it was too windy for them to proceed and we unfortunately didn’t get to meet them.

 

Literature will tell you that they are nocturnal, however recent research is showing them to be more crepuscular than strictly nocturnal. As a result, we hoped to go out an hour or so before sundown, however, due to an emergency with an abandoned lamb, the boys were a little later than they planned.

 

Nevertheless we made the most of our time with them. Riverine Rabbits are habitat specialists, occupying a very restricted niche. Living amongst the dense riparian vegetation along the seasonal rivers of the central and southern Karoo, they depend on the fine alluvial soil of the floodplains, the only soil in the area suitable for making stable burrows.

 

This habitat is to be found primarily about halfway back along the track to the entrance gate, beyond the wind pump, down a hill and just past the first white-posted gate coming from the Retreat (R1 in Paul’s site notes). With the gate to the back, looking to the left the rabbit’s habitat is identified by slightly taller and thicker bushes, interspersed with longer grasses along the dried up sandy riverbeds.

 

We pulled off the road in the bakkie and got out to search on foot, making our way around the thick scrubby bushes. Manus managed to get sight of one Riverine Rabbit as I came up behind him quickly. I managed to catch an all-too-brief glimpse of the head with its huge hare-like ears,  diagnostic dark brown stripe running from the corner of the mouth and across the cheek towards the base of the ear. No sooner had I got onto it then it hopped away, clearly showing it’s all brown woolly (not black and white) tail and thickly furred hind legs. According to Manus, Riverine Rabbits are slow and stupid. Well, not too slow or stupid to evade us it seemed! Whilst I was delighted to have seen it at all, I was sad that we were not able to relocate it, nor were we able to see any others.

 

riverine rabbit 3 by Jo Dale, on Flickr

Edited January 20, 2018 by kittykat23uk

[kittykat23uk]

The night however was still productive as soon after we saw the rabbit we had, according to Manus an even rarer sight for him, a tiny baby Porcupine with its mum. We spent a considerable amount of time watching this miniature wonder of a porcupine around their burrow, obtaining fabulous views! The baby was already developing the distinctive spines but they looked much thinner and more hair-like than its mum.

 

P9220374   Cape Porcupine by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220380 Cape Porcupine & Baby by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220382 Baby Cape Porcupine by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220392 Baby Cape Porcupine by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

Riverine rabbits are not the only Lagomorphs on this property as it boasts an impressive four species. We managed to see two of the other three, both the robust Scrub Hare and the slighter Cape Hare. This Cape Hare was demonstrating the difficulties lagomorphs have with the Jackal proof fencing, the poor thing struggled to get across into the field. It finally managed it after these shots were taken. It shows the diagnostic traits of the black stripe on the long pointed tail, graceful legs and hare-like appearance.  

 

Cape Hare by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220401 Cape Hare by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220403 Cape Hare by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

We also sighted two more porcupines, and a pair of distant bat-eared foxes- another lifer for me! Yet another lifer came as we returned to base spotting a Round-eared Sengi in a bush just by the gate at the retreat. Sadly it evaded my camera, despite my returning later to try and tempt it with some cheese. In hindsight, I’m not sure if sengis even eat cheese??

 

Paul also mentioned night roosting Long-tailed Serotine Bats in the outbuildings, and sure enough I located these later on after we said our thanks to the boys for helping us achieve our quest (well, me, Mum sadly didn’t get the rabbit but she was delighted to see the porcupines).

 

P9220408 Long-tailed Serotine by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

P9220410 Long-tailed Serotine by Jo Dale, on Flickr

 

After searching briefly and unsuccessfully for the fourth lagomorph species on the property, this being Hewitt’s Red Rock Rabbit, I finally called it a night at the urging of my mum.

 

 

Edited January 20, 2018 by kittykat23uk