South Africa, Part III

Cheetah paw

     Welcome to Hoedspruit (pronounced "hood-sprite"), they said; you're likely tired after the long flight so settle in, maybe take a nap, have some dinner, they said.  We'll see you at 6 tomorrow morning to feed the cheetahs.  Wait, what?  Did they just say 6 as in 6AM?  But by 6:30 the next morning we were hands deep in meat, all 7 of us churning away as if we were rejected pastry chefs now being punished and put on meat duty.  Each of the larger cheetahs would need over 5 lbs. of raw meat in their bowl, with each batch carefully weighed and topped with exact measurements of powdered nutrients and water.  Mix thoroughly, they said; cheetahs are very picky; if they find even one unmixed pebble-sized chunk of powder in the bowl then they will reject it entirely.  So back we went, mixing as if we were making meatloaves for a crowd.  They needed 60 bowls   SIXTY!  Did I mention that this is done every morning?  The cheetahs have to eat.  

Meat for the cheetahs

    We were now interns, students both figuratively and literally (5 of the group were college students in their 20s, my wife and I being just a tad older) here for an 11-day education in working with endangered species...sables, rhinos, a leopard, some 60 cheetahs and others I can't quite remember.  We were at the Hoedspruit Endangered Species Center.  To be clear, this was not a zoo or an animal showcase, for while the Center currently had 60+ cheetahs, they had also rewild-ed and released nearly 200 others.  Their goal was not only to help protect and rehabilitate the variety of species there, but to methodically track and preserve their genetic diversity as well, an important detail since Dr. Peter Rogers, the renowned wildlife vet who continues to help and advise the Center, estimates that the genetic pool for both rhinos and cheetahs is down to somewhere just about 3% because of such limited numbers still in the wild.  Working with both Dr. Rogers and others, the Center now procures special formulations for many of its animals...the vultures, on the other hand, appeared to be doing fine.

Prepping meals for the cheetahs

     One couldn't help but notice the bins full of chopped bones and bits of fur (or something), as if Hannibal Lecter was waiting in the next room.  But we would soon discover that the vultures would be "fed" right after the cheetahs.  And I should clarify that our feeding the cheetahs as such consisted of the guides making sure no cheetahs were present in the enclosure where we would be placing the bowls of meat, then us quickly placing 2 or 3 or 4 bowls down and just as quickly backing up, making sure that the gate was now closed and locked.  Only then would the double-trap doors be opened and the cheetahs allowed in.  These were and are still wild animals, a fact made clear when you saw the speed of the cheetahs entering the area (where we once stood) and their eating giving meaning to the term "devour."  Out in the wild, cheetahs are low man on the totem pole, their "kill" often limited to just a quick few swallows before they are chased off by either a lion or a pack of hyenas.  Watching the cheetahs eat so ravenously, it was easy to see that they hadn't lost this thought.

Vultures' feeding station

     Then we were off to dump the bins of bones and meat into the vulture boneyard, the vultures circling overhead as the truck approached the area.  They pick up the smell in the updraft (the circling in the sky) but also have keen eyesight, a fact each of us remembered as we watched them arrive by the hundreds to try and swoop down for a scrap or two.  In the background sat a few dozen marabou storks, the "undertaker" birds nicknamed for their appearance but seemingly second fiddle here among their more well-known brethren.  It may sound odd but to see hundreds of vultures circling overhead, then descend down as if a pack of wild dogs, is a moment to remember.  This was Africa after all; and for us first timers spotting that first wild zebra or giraffe and yes, vulture, was a childlike thrill.

    We had embarked on a condensed version (11 days vs. the normal 21 day program) of what HESC called The African Wildlife Experience,** a chance to work with and learn about wildlife in the area: the difference between nocturnal and diurnal predators (cheetahs hunt both in the night and the day); to learn the difference between a horn and an antler (they're on entirely different species) and a thorn and a spine (both hurt if you sit or step on one); to find that leopards are solitary and that cheetahs cannot retract their claws; and that pangolin scales and rhino horns share the same material as our fingernails and toenails (yes, cut rhino horns will grow back in much the same manner); to find that a baby rhino whines just like a human baby when waiting for its "bottle," and that a cheetah's purr is as loud as its body size (both the rhino and cheetah sounds are truly amazing).  We would see and hear all that we expected, including finding out that walking in "the bush" is itself an education in that a certain tree's sap can make you sick even if you burn it for firewood, or that certain cacti can do the same and prove far worse than any bug bite you may encounter (as in hospital worse).  This was the wild and for us city slickers, we quickly discovered that we basically knew nothing.  But the people we were with, and the course they were teaching, now they knew a lot...if we were willing to listen. 

     Night drives showed us a different view, a darkness scary to us but likely more so to animals not wanting to be prey.  We learned that hippos --considered one of the most feared creatures in all of Africa-- have skin so sensitive to the sun that they remained in the water for nearly 60% of the day; and giraffes have basically the same number of neck vertebrae as humans.  We learned (and saw in front of us on the ground) snakes far deadlier than the black mamba or the puff adder.  Here in the wild we were back in kindergarten, rookies at the mercy of the guides we were with as well as to the land.  And surprisingly shopping was equally eye-opening, the prices being about the same as in Mexico (a nice steak dinner in Kruger ran about $7.50, a loaded burger about $5); and my favorite scotch (who knew South Africa even carried scotch?) was half --HALF-- the price of what it was the the UK or the US.  How was that possible?  

    Everyone was friendly, from the workers jammed 5 deep in the back of a pickup truck (unemployment remains about 40% so those workers were probably happy to be, well, working), to the butchers (we noticed that both biltong and braai are traditional dishes), even the vendors pushing their bags of what were likely stolen macadamia nuts (poachers of nuts find it nearly as lucrative as that of animals).  And best of all, no bugs!  Okay maybe a solo mosquito or a single red velvet ant (which is actually a wasp) but nowhere near enough to require bug spray (we left ours there) or even malaria pills (a toss-up but we discovered that none of the workers there took them).  Water from the tap was delicious (our LifeStraw fears dashed), and the traditional Afrikaan food the same.  

Our rondoval; outside the fence on the right was "the wild."

    We were in rondavels, traditional bare-bones thatched-roof huts with two beds, a ceiling fan/light, and an outlet.  Perfect.  Bathrooms were a short walk away, as was the kitchen.  And at night a rousing campfire kept guests warm (and was used for cooking most of the time, either for grilling or for cooking in Dutch ovens).  Temps were a pleasant 80F in the day and a cool 60F at night (thus sitting around the fire proved a nightly affair).  We were here in winter, South Africa being on the southern side of the equator so the seasons are flipped. June here equals winter there.  But it also means a chance to look up at a completely new sky...out here the stars blazed away in pride, an occasional shooting star passing by with some regularity.  The Southern Cross, the constellations (of which I know about 2) now completely foreign.  After a day of learning and seeing something new, we would sit by the fire and wonder, what could be better?...and then we'd hear a Cape buffalo or maybe a leopard (said to be around the area) crunching the branches just outside our area, as in just 50 feet away (the encampment is surrounded by electrified fencing, another thing you don't want to touch).  Oh, we did find (and the chef graciously let back into the brush) a pesky poisonous scorpion in the woodpile...

    We were all fortunate, not only us as rookie wildlife "interns" but for the Center as a whole; our condensed visit was put together by Professor Jeff Fadiman, a Fulbright scholar who not only had studied Africa for nearly 60 years, but remains the only white person to be named an elder of the Meru tribe.  He wanted others to know Africa before it was gone, and the 9 of us were lucky enough to actually respond and show up.  His afternoon and nightly lectures on the animals, practices and problems of Africa both past and present only added to our Africa-awe experience...in the next post, I hope to present a bit of what we learned about how the Big 5 falls far short of what you may have expected (no giraffes, no cheetahs, and no millions of migrating wildebeest).    

Professor Jeff Fadiman and Dr. Peter Rogers

*Another couple would join us for a few excursions but didn't stay in the rondovals in the camp.

**The Wildlife Experience is just now gearing back up and being modified, so keep checking back.  It will prove well worth the wait, especially if this would be your first adventure in Africa.