Tag Archives: grasslands

Mfolosi Day Trip

This time we must remember to take photos, Dad! Especially one of us in a recognisable place – a nice backdrop. Right, Jess.

Lots of eles, including one herd heading north in a long straggling line through the bush, crossing in front of us twice, thanks to a dogleg in the road. I counted fifty, but Jess, who hadn’t counted, said, No Dad, there were about fifteen! So I said OK there were forty. Luckily I took a video of one of the batches moving past – added below.

We give eles lots of room, as Jess is very cautious of them. Even at a good hundred metres a few of the young males gave us the Hey! Watch Yourself! ear shake.

Lots and LOTS of warthogs, all happily covered in mud. One sounder had longer crests/manes than usual – and light, like blonde – looked like Rod Stewart as a quintuplet. Seven square-lipped rhino; One mama with a small calf crossed right in front of us – no photo!

Surprisingly, a number of birds considering the stiff breeze that blew all day. We considered taking lunch in the car, but Sontuli picnic site is sheltered, so we used the last available table. Good to see a number of people having lunch there, parking an assortment of very capable and well-modified 4X4 vehicles with raised suspension and knobbly tyres next to the Fiat Unos that keep them humble.

Another photo missed by staring-in-awesome-wonder was a gathering of vultures on a wide sandy beach on a bend in the Black Mfolosi River, sunning and sand-bathing. Joined by Woolly-necked Storks, Pied Crows, Blacksmith Lapwing and Yellow-billed Kites.

– same stretch of river, different visit –

Also saw buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, giraffe banging heads, baboon, impala, nyala and kudu (only one); Went on a detour in search of cheetah, sent by an excited lady on her own in a bakkie who said we couldn’t miss them. The spot she thought the group of four cats would obligingly wait for us was about twenty minutes away. But Jess wanted to go so of course we did. The friendly lady hadn’t nailed them down so they’d felt free to wander off. Still, nice drive on a road we don’t usually use as it’s an entrance route from the western Gengeni gate which we have only exited twice to explore the interesting Ulundi to Melmoth road.

More birds seen and heard: Tawny-flanked Prinia, Green-winged Pytilia, Fork-tailed Drongo, Fiscal Shrike ‘hangman,’ Black, Ashy & Dusky Flycatchers; Rattling Cisticola, Rufous-naped Lark, Brubru, Chinspot Batis, Klaas’ Cuckoo, Indian Myna at the Nyalazi gate, Greater Honeyguide, Scimitarbill, Black-crowned Tchagra, Brown-hooded Kingfisher, Blue & lipstick Waxbills, Village Weaver; Emerald-spotted Wood, Cape Turtle & Red-eyed Doves; Crested Francolin, Bateleur, Cattle Egret, Gorgeous & Orange-breasted Bushshrike; Dark-capped Bulbul, Yellow-bellied Greenbul, Yellow-fronted Canary, Mocking Cliff Chat, Burchell’s Coucal, Speckled Mousebird, Egyptian Goose, African Hoopoe, Hadeda Ibis, Pied Wagtail, Redbilled Oxpecker, Petronia, Cape glossy Starling, White=throated Swallow;

Note to self: Rather get Jess to take the selfies and ussies! And remember the backdrop/background!

– Mfolosi Ele Procession –

Scottburgh Nature Reserve

T.C. Robertson Nature Reserve is situated on the right bank of the Mpambanyoni River close to its mouth into the sparkling Indian Ocean. Part of Scottburgh townlands, it is about 60ha in extent. Established in 1989 and named after should-be-more-famous South African author, ecologist and soil and grassland conservationist Dr. Thomas Chalmers Robertson.

TC Robertson (15 September 1907 – 11 January 1989) was an extraordinarily gifted man – accomplished journalist, gifted raconteur, ardent naturalist from boyhood, war correspondent, and Jan Smuts’s anti-Nazi propagandist during World War II. His most significant work lay in his lifelong mission to save southern Africa’s soil and grasses, and for this he sacrificed any ideas of personal ambition.

TC was widely known during his lifetime as South Africa’s doyen of soil conservation and was regarded by many, including some of the best brains in the world, as a genius. Yet many South Africans today know little or nothing about him. This is partly because he was little concerned with self-promotion and put off writing his autobiography despite many requests to do so. He wrote insatiably, but not about himself. His passion was the land. He was driven by three things: his mission to save the soil, his insatiable quest for knowledge, and his equally insatiable hedonism.

He was of the intrepid, cavaliering stuff of which romantic heroes are made, a born musketeer, and a man with an enormous capacity for friendship. Outspoken, witty and able to hold an audience in the palm of his hand, he was immensely private when it came to his deepest feelings, sorrows, fears and any inadequacies he might have felt; his passion, his total commitment, was for his mission: saving the soil, conserving the land.

No public monument of bronze or stone commemorates his achievements. His epitaph is written in the soil of southern Africa, whispered by the grasses and leaves, murmured by the streams, and engraved indelibly on the hearts of all who knew him; plus in a small evergreen sanctuary on the banks of a subtropical river estuary on the south coast of KwaZulu Natal. Among the great men our country has produced, he was truly one of the greatest.

  • Paraphrased from author Shirley Bell – who wrote his biography, The Happy Warrior: The Story of TC Robertson 2005 ISBN 978-0-620-33255-2

Birds seen on a short visit today 08:30 to 10:30 – Sunbirds, Amethyst, Collared, Olive; Weavers, Eastern Golden, Spectacled, Dark-backed; Mannikins, Bronze, Red-backed; Square-tailed Drongo; Flycatchers, Black, Dusky; Grey Waxbill; Lesser Honeyguide; Barbets, White-eared, Black-collared; Yellow-rumped Tinkerbird; Yellow-bellied Greenbul; Dark-capped Bulbul; Yellow-eyed Canary; Cape White-Eye; Hadeda; Geese, Egyptian, Spur-wing; Blacksmith Lapwing; Hamerkop; Little Egret; Black Sawwing; Black-bellied Starling; Red-capped Robin-Chat; Purple-crested Turaco; Grey-headed Sparrow; Doves, Red-eyed, Tambourine; Speckled Mousebird; Darter; Cape Wagtail; Heard: African Firefinch; Fish Eagle; Natal Spurfowl.

Hadn’t seen a Barringtonia racemosa in a while. They were blooming beautifully.

We ‘all want to preserve nature,’ right? I was the only person there those two hours on a perfect Sunday morning! Even Jess declined, ‘There’s TV to watch, Dad!’ Damn!

One bakkie did drive in and out. The manager, who stopped for a chat. He seems enthusiastic about changes he has brought in the five months he has run the show. Low attendance is a challenge. Next Sunday there’s a flea market, 37 stalls booked.

~~oo0oo~~

Mfolosi

Useful to top up your salt intake every so often by sticking your tongue in your nostril. Must practice that.

Mpila camp’s ‘safari tents’ are great. Comfy with all modcons, own kitchen and en-suite semi-outdoor bathroom. It’s walled in with reeds, like the kitchen wall you see here, but only to shoulder height – above that, it’s open to the outdoors under the big canvas roof. It’s a treat. A Purple-banded Sunbird sang to me as I showered. No pictures.

While photographing these ‘acacia’ flowers (must get the real name – maybe Senegalia?) this biggish weevil or snout beetle dropped into my hand. I’ll ask iNaturalist.org to identify both the plant and its weevil. Otherwise it would be like I saw no weevil.

There you go! iNaturalist.org says it’s a Foppish Weevil Polyclaeis equestris. Is it English then? Kidding!

– a Wahlberg’s Eagle and a Yellow-billed Kite share a perch –

A slender mongoose made a breakfast appearance at a waterhole. If anything was nesting in there, they were egg and toast, as she inspected every nook and cranny.

Driving along, an oft-heard sound and a not-often-seen sighting:

https://videopress.com/v/BPxE9wk7?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&preloadContent=metadata
– a very obliging Black Cuckoo calls ‘I’m So Sick!’ –

At the hide (must add the name – Bhejane?) I saw the lovely Mocking Cliff Chat, Lesser Striped Swallows, Village Weavers building nests and a Hadeda Ibis pulling down their new nests around its nest! A Diederik Cuckoo was calling, probably waiting to get into those weaver nests. This hide looks out over a waterfall – dry today:

At another waterhole a bird flew past as my little Canon snapped a 3-shot burst:

I took a new route home, exiting the Cengeni gate in the south-west of the park and heading for Ulundi, Melmoth and Eshowe. Right outside the gate exiting the Umfolozi Big Five Game Reserve there’s this puzzling sign:

– or turn around and go back fifty metres! –

I asked the man at the gate, How far to Ulundi? 37km. I asked him, And how is the road? and he got all coy, hummed and hah’d a bit, then blurted, “but it is a tar road.” It wasn’t too bad. A fairly normal look-sharp neglected tar road as we’re used to.

If I still had Marguerite Poland’s book on the isiZulu descriptive names of Nguni cattle I’d tell you how this beast on the way to Ulundi would be described:

– something like ‘she lifts her black dress to cross the river, revealing her white petticoat’ –

I’ll go back to Mfolosi. Soon, though. Before it also loses all its grasslands to bush encroachment.

~~o00o~~