11pm finds this hippo feeding along a narrow strip of savanna bordered by forest and lagoon. Rarely do hippos leave the water during daylight hours, for the heat and sun can lead to dehydration.
It must be difficult and tiring for them to carry their weight when they spend so much time wallowing nearly weightless in the lagoons and rivers. This particular individual was more than 2.5 meters in length and 1.5 meters in height, weighing perhaps in the range of 1500 to 2000 kilograms.
Wednesday I was fortunate to go for a walk with the visiting circus from Holland. Giel, Piet and Jan Pier came into the forest with me to check my camera trap. It had been raining heavily the previous day so all animal tracks were washed away, except those that were made earlier in the day. We came across many tracks of sitatunga, monkeys, and a family of elephants seemed to be foraging in circles around us.
Giel takes a picture of a picture being taken, as Jan Pier and Piet look out for crocodiles.
We heard several birds we were able to identify: the red-chested cuckoo, black-casqued hornbill, woodland kingfisher, and the bulbul. Troops of monkeys scrambled through the trees as we approached. The rumble of thunder brought suspense to our walk and by the time we returned to the car, rain had moved in to add yet another layer to the Gabon experience.
On a Thursday morning of the previous week, a large male sitatunga passed through the dappled morning shadows along a riverbank.
24 hours, 22 minutes and 27 seconds after we visit the camera trap, a mother elephant with two juveniles come to look at the river. The littlest elephant is lost in the shuffle.
I can hear reptiles scurrying into the undergrowth as I walk along the sand track, their bouncing, erratic rustle sounding different than the constant swish of a snake. This particular Plated lizard I discovered hanging upside-down in a clump of grass, looking dead. I have no idea what happened, and knelt down for a closer look. Carefully picking it out of the grasses, I noticed it was still warm and supple, still breathing rapidly. Carrying it to a nearby patch of sandy earth, I set it down and it laid motionless. After a few pictures, I tried to move it under the shade of a low branch, and it burst to life, sprinting back to forest cover in a spray of sand.
Gabon plated lizard, Gerrhosaurus nigrolineatus
I see Plated lizards often, sunning along the edges of savannas. More often, I hear them as they run for cover at my approach. At 30-plus centimeters, most of which is tail, and very short legs, they sometimes resemble a snake as they race noisily through thick grass for cover. Plated lizards are indigenous reptiles here, unlike the Agama lizards thought to have arrived in the 1970′s, hitching a ride in West African fishing boats.
I have been moving my camera to different locations and was privileged to receive another visit by the band of gorillas. This is likely the same family of gorillas encountered earlier, though the numbers have increased to fourteen, including an additional silverback.
They passed by just before sunset, when the forest is on the edge of darkness. Though there was still ambient light from the evening sky, the camera has gone into infra-red mode, and the flash helps illuminate the deep shadows of the twilight forest. The gorillas now appear to have left the area, for I have seen no recent sign. Perhaps they need to be on the move, searching for ripening fruits and fresh plants.
An early morning procession of elephants file past the rain-splattered lens of a camera trap. The tusks of forest elephants curve inward to make it easier to maneuver through thick forest cover.
The elephants, sititungas, monkeys, and duikers still leave their footprints in the sand. We will see what else calls this forest home in the coming weeks. I am still hoping for a glimpse of the leopard.
I dismissed it as a leaf hanging dead in a branch behind the house, though Lisa continued to study the gray and black pear-sized shape hanging from a tree in the garden. Leaving the patio for a closer look, we discovered we had a bat visitor.
The sleepy creature eyed us inquisitively
as we approached, did some sniffing with its oversized nose, then yawned, rubbed its face into a folded wing and closed its eyes. Moving slowly so as not to alarm our guest, we were able to get within a meter for an incredible close look at something we usually see only as a streaking silhouette above the trees in the night sky. Striking white epaulettes contrasted with a black V set into a grizzle of gray fur on its back. Framed by black folded wings, it hung motionless from an elegant pair if sinewy black legs. We are not sure what kind of bat has come to roost. We are hoping to find a bat expert who can give this one a name.
It is Christmas eve, and I am bicycling along a laterite track to check on my camera trap. It has been in place for a week since my last visit. The extreme heat and humidity shortens the battery life, making it advisable to freshen the batteries at regular intervals.
Concealing my bike behind a mess of vegetation, I notice a set of hippo tracks heading along the sandy path bordering some inundated forest. I lose the tracks abruptly as they turn off to a lagoon. Now a set of elephant tracks appear, so fresh I can see the detail from the soles of its feet where they press into the sand. Monkeys have crossed the track everywhere, and I hear moustached monkeys in the trees as they chip out their warning calls, scuttling through the branches on my left. Butterflies dazzle across the track in flashes of blue and purple and black and white. 200 meters into the sand track, I come to a patch of disturbed ground. Sand has been dug and thrown from the track; it appears something has been running off down the trail. As I continue, I begin to see a wide flat footprint here, and a set of knuckle-prints there, suggesting that a gorilla has been moving quickly along the path. It looks like several, perhaps a small band of gorillas have passed this way, very recently. So recently, in fact, I am feeling a little nervous, and I strain to hear every rustle and crack in the bush. With a few hundred meters to walk before reaching my camera, I can only hope that the gorillas have continued along the path ahead, and that the camera was ready to capture their passing.
A band of ten gorillas make their way along a sand track on December 23, 2013, shortly after sunset. The silverback male. apparently alerted to the camera position, stops momentarily for a closer look.
I have been fortunate today. The gorillas have crossed through the camera zone, and later when I have returned to Yenzi, I see that they were running in the dark of the previous evening well after sundown when they should have been in repose. Something must have alarmed them to be traveling in such haste and after dark, eyes reflecting back from the flash of infra-red illumination. It could have been a hunter, or people driving a vehicle nearby. Perhaps a leopard, or an angry elephant. A swarm of bees, or even a marching army of ants. Without something triggering the camera trap behind the gorillas, it is impossible to know what caused their exodus.
I count ten gorillas in total, including two females with infants riding their shoulders, a few juveniles, and a large silverback male bringing up the rear. The silverback hangs back momentarily, perhaps sensing the presence of the camera, before resuming his departure.
It must be the season for sand sharks. I am catching plenty. They seem to cluster around the lagoon breakthrough, and near the Terminal jetty. Bait-fishing puts a fish-bait or prawn close to the ocean floor where they like to feed.
The common guitar ray, Rhinobatos rhinobatos, also called sand shark. This bottom feeding fish is a ray with triangular head, two dorsal fins and long thick body.
Also called a guitar ray, they marginally resemble sharks. Two dorsal fins, a shark-like tail, and a large flattened triangular head describe this creature that lives on the ocean floor. Scavenging debris flushed out from the lagoons, they have jaws and small teeth under their head more like a ray than a shark.
And so on Tuesday, I had caught two early in the afternoon. The first, about 1.5 meters in length, fought aggressively for 15 minutes before I was able to pull it into the surf. They have a habit of running for 20 meters, then suctioning onto the sea floor, where it is very difficult to wrench them loose. When they are in the shallows, grabbing them by the tail is the best way to get them out of the surf to free the hook. I heard they were protected, therefore, releasing them is the plan. Grabbing the tail, I was pulling the first shark from the sea and lost my grip. A surprise wave washed in, giving the shark entry back into the water. Without warning, it proceeded to snap my line, taking with it both hook and lead-weight, for which both of us were not happy, to be sure.
A circle hook (top) and the more common j-hook. Circle hooks get swallowed less often by fish. Their design causes the hooking action to commence as the fish swims against the tension of line, and usually only when the hook shank is outside of the fish mouth.
The second, a smaller shark at less than a meter, came to shore easily, though it had unfortunately swallowed the hook. Circle hooks are recommended for bait-fishing, for they are rarely swallowed, setting into the corner of the fish’s mouth as it swims away under tension. While trying to work loose the hook, I managed to cut the line. I only hope the hook will eventually dissolve, or disappear into scar tissue.
I had had enough of sand sharks by this time, so put bait-fishing away and attached a spoon. Several casts into the late afternoon I hooked something enormous. It ran my line without effort as I hastily turned up the drag to try to tire the fish. It was like having a rope around a wild horse. It would run for forty meters, then sit until I cranked in enough line to bother it to run again. This went on for thirty minutes.
Battle with a sand shark.
photo courtesy Andrew Benc
My arm was aching, I braced the rod against drifted logs as I tried to tire the fish enough to get it into shore. Andrew Benc had arrived to fish the evening and came to assist, but until it was close enough, there was nothing he could do other than take a few pictures. Finally, after forever, it breached into the shallows, and to my dismay I saw it was another sand shark. It is unheard of that a sand shark will bite a spinning spoon, but I could now see that the spoon was impaled at the base of the dorsal fin. No wonder it was so aggressive. I had been riding it bare-back for thirty minutes. Andrew was able to pull the thrashing fish from the surf, where the spoon promptly fell from the dorsal fin. It was only line tension that kept the hook secure all along. It was the biggest sand shark either of us has seen. At nearly two meters in length, my estimate is that it weighed close to 45 kilos. I couldn’t lift it, both for being too long and for the fact that my arms were completely done in. I dragged the exhausted creature back into the breaking surf where it lunged back into the sea, its batting tail sending sea-spray through the air.
Big sand shark.
photo courtesy Andrew Benc
Our telephone is ringing at 6:20 this morning. Luanne is calling. Luanne’s house overlooks Lake Yenzi, and there is an elephant swimming in the lake. It is not that unusual, for the two males have been seen swimming together several times over the past few weeks. I decide to go have a look, so with camera over shoulder, I peddle my way to Luanne’s house.
This is an elephant that loves the water. He is rolling sideways, diving below the surface, blowing bubbles (from both ends), mostly just bobbing around.
I should be paying closer attention, for soon his brother pads across the garden, surprising those of us that have come to watch.
When approached by an elephant, always try to get something between yourself and the beast…
I am hoping his brother doesn’t notice me standing at the edge of the boat shed, but I can see when he makes eye contact, and then begins moving my way, requiring me to scramble to the back of the shed where I hope he will forget I am hiding. Soon his attention shifts to the lake and he turns to join his brother. They seem to play well together, wrestling with trunks, climbing onto each other, the click of ivory against ivory, the squeak of slick elephant skin punctuated by the gurgling, bubbling trunks.
