Tanzania's Southern Circuit: Selous, Ruaha, Katavi and more - August-September 2015

[Marks]

Awesome pictures throughout, but this...

 

 

...is just fantastic! What an amazing moment to capture. Imagine being a lion cub confronted with that face.

 

The yoga lion and elephant sundowner are nice, too.

[twaffle]

Thank you again for a masterful recount of your most recent trip. I love the humour throughout the writing, the superb photos and the way you can instil lots of information without patronising the rest of us. Masterful!

[elefromoz]

Love the "re-arranged" Zebra rump, pretty impressive repair and healing, no sutures, no antibiotics, nature is truly amazing. The "horrible" Lesser Kudu photo looks similar, no much better actually, than most of mine. @@Marks is right, not how we imagine mothers love, poor little baby will have nightmares.

[FlyTraveler]

Another great trip report with superb photography (as always), @@Safaridude! Thanks for sharing the beauty of Selous and Ruaha with us, I am enjoying this report very much, as usual! Looking forward to seeing the "Katavi and more" parts...

[ZaminOz]

<sigh> @@Safaridude ... as usual I am totally in awe at your photos and sightings, thanks again for sharing them with us!

[Safaridude]

@@Marks

 

Somehow, watching it live, it didn't seem mum was being aggressive. It was a loving snarl (?)

[Safaridude]

@@twaffle

 

Darn, I was trying to be patronizing!

 

Thank you.

[Safaridude]

@@elefromoz

 

I have never seen so many zebras with lion claw injuries on their rumps than at Ruaha. This observation is consistent with that of my previous trip in 2010. I wonder why...

 

Here is one from 2010… unlikely to heal...

 

[twaffle]

I've seen many injuries where bones and tendons are showing that have amazingly healed even without veterinary assistance. If proud flesh grows it can fill the empty spaces but will leave terrible scaring. The worst issue is infection of course, but even that is often prevented by the advent of maggots, disgusting as they are. I suppose the high prevalence of lions in Ruaha leads to more incidences of these 'near miss' injuries. If bones are broken, well all bets are off.

 

If I were the zebra, I'd prefer a quick lion despatch rather than a slow deterioration from infection. Ah nature.

[Zim Girl]

@@Safaridude

 

Brilliant TR so far, stunning photos and interesting descriptions as usual.

Up to Ruaha and absolutely love the picture of the lioness snarling at the cub.

[Bush dog]

Concerning zebras with lion claw injuries, this picture was taken October last year, in the Ruaha

[Kitsafari]

How did i miss this?! i'm still not too late to the party, and what a party it is - with delicious nuggets of information and sumptuous photos. I too love the baboon and sausage pillow,and the lion cub play.

[Safaridude]

@@Kitsafari

 

Welcome to the party!

[Safaridude]

Katavi National Park

 

Our difficulty with leopard so far on this safari is exorcised immediately after we land at the Ikuu airstrip mid-morning. Romano (camp guide) and Kevin (driver) lead us straight to an unknown but accommodating female resting on a sausage tree. Because she is continually shifting her position on the tree, so, too, must we on the ground, in order to get into position for photos. The vehicle movement is hardly noticeable; I am able to photograph even with the engine on. I am in a Maruti Gypsy MG413W, a tiny but uber-comfortable petrol vehicle from Katavi Wildlife Camp. Though I absolutely loved and gushed about Nomad’s Chada Camp at the time of my first visit to Katavi, the Wildlife Camp gets the call this time largely on a whim. The fact that you can, from the comfort of your tent, view animals coming to the edge of the Katisunga Plain to graze and water was perhaps the deciding factor. The Maruti would be an unforeseen bonus. It drives as smoothly as an electric golf cart and with very little noise. The only downside is its size. Each of the two rows of seats could probably hold two adults comfortably, but probably not so if one has had a big meal (ok, ok, it’s not that small…).

 

An unknown but relaxed female

 

 

Maruti Gypsy King

 

 

 

There is nothing slick about Katavi Wildlife Camp, but it is a pleasant place and great value for money. Nick Greaves, who authored Hwange, Retreat of the Elephants and has a bit of George Adamson air going, manages the camp and wears several different hats – hosting, guiding, bartending, transporting, fixing things, etc. In fact, multi-tasking is the theme here. At lunch, a waiter (in full black and white waiter uniform) we have yet to meet says hello to Craig and me as if we are his long-lost friends. Upon closer examination, the waiter is none other than… our guide Romano! Right out of a Monty Python episode…

 

The dining area looks out to the Katisunga Plain

 

The activities from camp consist largely of game drives to the Ikuu area, the Katisunga Plain and the greater Lake Chada area. The Ikuu circuit is essentially a narrow river valley of the fast-evaporating Katuma River. The game road on this circuit sits lower than the surrounding ridges covered in vegetation. At any given bend, elephants or buffalos could surprise you by trudging down over the ridge. Impalas make a habit of forming a single file and one by one jumping across the road in front of the vehicle. And if you follow the stench, you will end up at one of the several hippo congregations. As the Katuma dissipates during the dry season, the remaining pools become mucks filled with hippos in, what has to be, misery. Les misérables lie motionless in the baking sun, the exposed upper parts surely to at some point become biltong, the submerged lower parts festering in the stew of mud and dung. It will only get worse until the first rains. Speeding away from the odious, we nearly pass right by a group of tree-climbing lions of the Chada Pride. These are my first ever tree-climbing lions, and we enjoy them right up until curfew.

 

Scenes from Ikuu

 

 

 

 

 

Almost passed right by

 

 

 

The Katuma River, as it disappears onto the Katisunga Plain

 

One would be remiss to not mention Ikuu’s famous estivating crocodiles. Deep into the dry season, some of the crocs at Ikuu and presumably other parts of Katavi quasi-burrow themselves into dry riverbed “caves”, slowing their metabolism until the rains replenish their habitat. Apparently, estivation differs from hibernation in that hibernation is brought on by lack of food, whereas estivation is brought on in order to wait out harsh climactic conditions. Not that I have seen any estivating crocodiles at Katavi, mind you. It just would be a shame to not use such a cool sounding word in this report.

 

The Katisunga Plain is a vast black cotton soil mbuga featuring stemmy, fibrous, unpalatable grass. Even after the burns, uniform patches of green shoots are only occasional. Small groups of topi and zebra graze whatever green grass there is. In the far western treeline across the plain, a line of dust stretches at least a kilometer: buffalo. By far largest buffalo herd I have ever seen, this herd is counted in thousands, not hundreds. An old, beaten-up male lion crosses the Katisunga. Formerly of the Katuma Pride, he is now eking out a solitary existence, explains Romano. The Katuma Pride itself is later found merely a stone’s throw from camp, with one of the lionesses draped over a sausage tree. If you think lions are skillful with trees, think again. The lioness descends while fashioning a couple of 180-degree turns (perhaps one of them was premeditated), hanging on for dear life as her claws groove a gridiron on the trunk. During the last moments of her descent, she offers a humiliated stare. Upon landing, the glance turns more imperious: nobody else needs to know about this, right?

 

​Topis and zebras on the Katisunga

 

​Zebras on the Katisunga

 

The former dominant male of the Katuma Pride

 

Getting down with a lot of difficulty

 

 

 

 

Edited October 22, 2015 by Safaridude

[Safaridude]

Lake Chada is a seasonal lake, but, when dry, it is simply an mbuga much like Katisunga. A road that runs north of Lake Chada is fringed with impressive borassus palms. An excursion a couple of hours east from there leads to Lake Paradise, which is teeming with zebras and buffalos this time of year. We forgo that opportunity and instead stay with a large herd of elephants slowly crossing Lake Chada toward us. The woodland fringing Lake Chada harbors a friendly young female leopard named Kitoto. Along with guests of three other vehicles, we admire her, she completely indifferent to the presence of gawkers, moving from one tree to another. We would come across Kitoto another day near Ikuu, asleep on a tree with her belly distended from gorging.

 

Elephants crossing Lake Chada

 

Kitoto

 

 

 

With a distended belly

 

We spend two of the days, from late-morning on, parked under a shady tamarind tree at a waterhole called Kadibwe. Impala, warthog, giraffe and buffalo all come to water here, but our primary objective at Kadibwe is to see roan antelope. Our second day, around noon, just as everyone is about to doze off for a siesta, I turn my head and find that the clownish face of a large roan-colored antelope is staring at me from a surprisingly short distance. Detected and suddenly alarmed, she ejects a snort, performs a Peyton Manning pre-snap knee jerk and then disappears into the bush. For several minutes, there are no further signs of roan antelope. But Craig’s careful glassing finds several faces (black, white and roan) peering at us through the bushes. I have, on many occasions, “seen this movie before”, in which the comical peering faces turn and run, flashing nothing but their white bums. Not so today. 22 roan antelopes make careful and deliberate way to the other side of the waterhole away from us and begin to water. Some minutes later, the herd is joined by bwana, a magnificent bull with noticeably dark forelegs and chest.

 

Giraffe drinking at Kadibwe

 

The first one to approach the waterhole

 

Several minutes later, after going around us

 

 

Easily panicked

 

 

Here comes Bwana

 

 

Monitor lizard

 

It is worth noting that on two different occasions at Kadibwe, we are startled by a fast-moving, man-made structure – a large bus – on the main public road that cuts through the park. It turns out that the road is merely a couple of hundred meters from the waterhole, and vehicles on it are visible through the bushes. “There is no indigenous native population. There is nothing to indicate any human life other than camp staff and your party. This is as remote as a place can get.” So boasts a 1997 brochure featuring Nomad’s Katavi Tented Camp (the predecessor to the Chada Camp). Well, “The Times They Are A-Changin’”, and it is evident from the air – the settlements, the roads, the deforestation. But for now, on the ground at Ikuu, Katisunga, Chada or Kadibwe (as long as you look away from the direction of the main public road), one can remain oblivious to all that. For now, still, Katavi remains the remotest, wildest park in Tanzania.

 

 

 

Edited October 22, 2015 by Safaridude

[Safaridude]

By the way, I believe the Kadibwe waterhole was discovered by more than a decade ago...

Edited December 15, 2018 by Safaridude
Delete

[Julian]

Some great photos you have from Katavi Safaridude.

We only saw one leopard very briefly in Katavi and although we saw reasonable numbers of lions , none were tree-climbing.

[Bush dog]

Post #64 is so full of excellent pictures that I can't pick one in particular. I also like the blurred palms. How did you make that?

[Safaridude]

@@Bush dog

 

Thank you. The blurred palms… I just simply used a slow shutter speed and moved my camera up and down… somewhat violently to get the right effect… like the trees growing in front of your eyes.

Edited October 22, 2015 by Safaridude

[Safaridude]

@@Bush dog

 

By the way, I went through your TR on Selous again. Outstanding in every way. The bird photos are amazing.

[Zim Girl]

Stunning Roan pictures and I love the monitor lizard.

[Bush dog]

@@Bush dog

 

Thank you. The blurred palms… I just simply used a slow shutter speed and moved my camera up and down… somewhat violently to get the right effect… like the trees growing in front of your eyes.

Thanks a lot, that's what I thought!

[madaboutcheetah]

Simply brilliant!!! Enjoying this ...... and who would have thought? Maruti Gypsy in Tanzania!!!!

[Africalover]

Great to be back in Katavi, I think this beauty I had for my self last year is Kitoto. Good to see that she is doing well.

[Safaridude]

@@Africalover

 

That certainly is Kitoto. You can tell by the peculiar spot patterns just above her right eye.