The males have tiny little horns. (Click the pic to zoom.) They typically live in pairs in heavy underbrush, and they are the only antelope that bury their dung. They got their name "steen" (which means "stone" in Dutch) because sometimes when an attacker is close, the little antelope will curl into a ball like a stone to camouflage itself, letting one ear stand up and sway, as if blowing in the wind, to confuse the attacker by blending into the surroundings.
On our second day at Selinda (our first full day of game drives) we followed six wild dogs around. We found them in the morning, where they rested in piles.
We learned then that they were one of the most endangered animals on the continent, in part because they are very social and diseases easily spread amongst them. We were told there are about 5,000 remaining.
Steve, our guide and driver, said he loved to track and watch the wild dogs, because they're full of action. They have an especially efficient hunt success rate of 80%, owing to their pack hunting approach. They win with endurance. One dog will start the hunt and get the prey running, then when that lead dog is tired, another dog will come from behind to take up the charge, forcing the prey to continue at high speed - relentlessly trailing their prey in a group, nipping from behind, until shock and exhaustion sets in.
Though we didn't see this in action, we were told that the dogs are also experts at confusing prey at night, by seeming to be everywhere at once, making noises and being in the right position to corral an animal then finally closing in as a group.
In any event, as advertised, they were very fun to track. Unlike some other animals, they didn't care about the truck at all. We followed them very closely, which was great, because they are beautiful.
Their strategy was very simple: A) fan out over an area, mostly in sight of one another B) roust anything that might be around, then C) give chase, and D) eat.
After about 90 minutes of following them on the afternoon drive, we could tell they were hungry. They had been hunting since morning, but all their bellies were thin. We were in an open area far from our camp, and we rousted a steenbuck by pure accident. It took off like an auburn bullet, and one of the dogs gave chase.
Steve put the pedal to the medal to follow the action, but we were too slow. He was pissed, and we circled back to try to figure where they had gone. He couldn't believe it.
Finally, after four or five minutes of searching, we caught up with them. They had made the kill.
We didn't get a shot of it, but as we drove up, we saw one chewing on the hip joint of the steenbuck. Three of the dogs ate the entire animal in five minutes! Oh, I should have said, three of the dogs ate the *entire* animal in *five minutes*! Innards, skull, hooves, pelvis, legs... everything! It was ridiculous.
(It's a good strategy to eat everything very fast, because you never know if there's another carnivore - like the hyenas with the leopard's impala the night before - nearby who'll move in to take what's yours.)
The two that ate the most needed to rest for a moment afterwards.
It seemed like two ate the lion's share and one other dog ate a little. An average steenbuck weighs about 25lbs, so the two that ate most probably each ate about 10lbs in five minutes.
If you look closely at the last pic, you can see which bloody-muzzled dogs had the good fortune to help make the steenbuck disappear. The rest of the dogs were eager to continue the hunt, but they led us to a place where we got stuck in the mud, so we had to turn around.
PS
We were lucky enough to see two different dog packs on our trip. The orange-and-white dog that you see far above (third pic of the post) was actually from our third camp, Vumbura.
She had been part of a pack of 16 or 18 dogs that the guides called the Golden Pack, because many of the dogs had inherited orange/gold coloring. Somehow though, she had split off, and she was one of only three dogs - herself and two darker males. She was the best hunter of the group, sitting in the water then rolling in sage brush to cover her smell before setting off to find prey.
PPS
It was winter during our trip. That meant, it got cold at night (down near freezing a couple nights), but more importantly, there were essentially no bugs! We took Malarone to prevent contracting malaria, but I think in total, Linda, Sue and I got only seven bug bites among us.
No comments:
Post a Comment