“Notice the small things. The rewards are inversely proportional,” actress Liz Vassey said. This couldn’t be truer than in the African bush. I often find myself frustrated when fellow safari-goers are fixated on one thing only: the Big Five. To reap the rewards of the wilderness, our focus should shift to the less outwardly impressive creatures, such as the scrub hare, mongoose or chameleon. The sight of a buffalo is enthralling in itself, yet it becomes more intriguing when we recognise the symbiotic relationship between it and the red-billed oxpeckers feeding on insects in its matted fur.
Safari ignites in me an irrepressible desire to learn, and one of life’s great joys is to strive to understand wildlife behaviour. Every animal has a story. Where we may ogle at a greater kudu and think how pretty it looks on the sun-kissed savannah, a guide will point out its broken horn, a sign of a vicious battle for dominance. Similarly, he will tell the tale behind an angry gash in a bull elephant’s trunk, or explain that a troop of baboons exploding into a cacophony of alarm calls may signify a leopard prowling close by. We must look beneath the surface and observe all the animals, large and small, as living creatures struggling for survival in a thrilling ecosystem.
My recent trip to Botswana to witness a ‘new’ zebra migration between Chobe National Park and the Nxai and Makgadikgadi pans reiterated my prior sentiments. The ‘mere’ Burchell’s zebra had me spellbound by its beauty and behaviour. The relentless heat of ‘suicide month’ was almost unbearable, and I wondered how anything could survive the seasonal drought, even the nomadic zebra? But, miraculously, they do. To read about their odyssey, turn to page 58.