Trip report: Limpopo-Lipadi 5-9 February 2015

I just returned from 4 days at Limpopo-Lipadi Private Game and Wilderness Reserve, together with 5 crazy passionate nature loving people - what a pleasure to spend time in the African bush with these good friends!

Black-faced Waxbill

Limpopo-Lipadi Private Game and Wilderness Reserve is a shareholder owned reserve in the Tuli Block, Botswana - and truly a magical place, and one of my favourite places in Africa.  If you would like to become part of the Limpopo-Lipadi family, please email them at enquiries@limpopo-lipadi.org

Selemo, a young female leopard we came across on the beautiful Swartsloot

This is a report on the few days spent at Limpopo-Lipadi.

Reptiles

Black Mamba (Mogorosi River)

February is always good for snakes, and Limpopo-Lipadi didn't disappoint.
The first snake sighting was as we parked our vehicles at unit 6.  We spotted a Western Yellow-bellied Sand Snake.  Luckily they are harmless, and a very beautiful snake indeed.

Mozambique Spitting Cobra (Northern Plains)

Our next snake was a large black mamba, uncharacteristically very relaxed.  We spotted the snake on the Mogorosi-river road, not far from the Mogorosi waterhole.  It was relaxing next to the road, and then crossed the road slowly directly in front of us!  That night we also came across a Mozambique spitting cobra on the Northern plains.

The following day saw us photographing birds at Kloppers waterhole, when Francois (one of the guests) spotted a young African Rock Python in the tree above the waterhole!  It was an excruciatingly hot day, so maybe the python went for a swim to cool down a bit.  As we were spending time with the python, another Western Yellow-bellied Sand Snake made it's appearance as well.

African Rock Python (Kloppers waterhole)

Western Yellow-bellied Sand Snake (Kloppers waterhole)

Not often you get to see 5 snakes in 3 days!

A quick visit to Lipadi Hill produced a very curious Common Flat Lizard.

Common Flat Lizard (Lipadi Hill)

Birds:

Little Bee-eater

The definite birding highlight was catching up with 2 Three-banded Coursers!  This was my 2nd sighting of Three-banded Courser on the Southern Plains.  I would like to think that this could be a reliable spot to see these elusive birds!

Three-banded Courser

Bronze-winged Courser

Temminck's Courser

Bronze-winged coursers were abundant in the dry Mopani woodland, and we also stumbled across a family of Temminck's Coursers.

We had 2 sightings of Grey-headed Kingfisher, my favourite kingfisher.  The cobalt blue feathers are such a pretty sight.

Greyheaded Kingfisher

Other birds worth mentioning is Dusky lark x2, Collared Sunbird, Tropical Boubou, Icterine Warbler (at the large leadwood east of Mogorosi waterhole), Shikra, Black-chested Snake Eagle, Barred Wren-Warbler, Lesser Honeyguide, Grey Tit-Flycather, Ashy Flycatcher, White-backed Vulture, Southern Carmine Bee-eaters, Common House Martin, Swallow-tailed Bee-eaters, Spotted Eagle Owl, and a few nightjar species including Square-tailed Nightjar to name just a few.  There are such a diversity of habitat ranging from Acacia woodland, Riparian forest, plains, mountain, Broadleaf Woodland - so the list goes on.

Barred Wren-Warbler

Square-tailed Nightjar

Spotted Eagle Owl

Mammals:

Limpopo-Lipadi have become synonymous with African Wild Dog and Leopard, and didn't disappoint.

African Wild Dog (North of Cabbage dam)

While stopping for a Grey-headed Bushshrike just north of Cabbage dam, Marissa (a guest) spotted 6 African Wild Dogs in the sandy riverbed below the bushshrike!  We were able to spend some time with this pack the rest of the afternoon, until they took off into the bushes just before sunset.

After enjoying the African sunset at Cabbage dam, we returned back to camp via the southern plains, where we added Bat-eared Foxes, Porcupine (4 individuals together!), and a single Brown Hyena to our list for the day.

Odirile, a young male seen at Tholo dam

Regarding leopard, we were privileged to spend close to 3 hours with a very relaxed young male (Odirile, the son of Maya) resting on Tholo Dam wall one afternoon.  The next morning we went to Tholo dam again just after sunrise, where we were surprised to find another leopard there drinking water, this time a very large male!  He was a bit more skittish and retreated to the bush behind the dam wall.

Our best leopard sighting however was on our last game drive, in the golden light of early morning, on the magical Swartsloot, where we spotted a known female (Selemo, +-2 years old), sitting quietly on a termite mound.  She then stood up and decided to walk in the road in front of us.  She was extremely relaxed, and what a blessing spending some quality time with such an amazing animal.  Unfortunately she moved into the bushes soon thereafter, but the 5 minutes spent with her in the golden light of morning is something to remember for sure.

Selemo, the young female we came across on Swartsloot

We don't get to spend a lot of quality time with Spotted Hyena at Limpopo-Lipadi, but this time was very different.  We were enjoying sundowners at Mbuzi waterhole, sitting quietly in the hide on the last afternoon.  We could hear the baboons alarm calling in the distance, a sure sign that a predator is mobile.  We waited in anticipation, and out came a Spotted Hyena.  The hyena had a drink at the waterhole in front of us, had a quick stand off with a blue wildebeest, and then moved to the area behind the hide.  There the hyena started with it's characteristic whooping calls, which echoed through the hide... His clan members replied in the distance, and we enjoyed the magical experience...
The next morning we had a quick stop at Mbuzi, where we caught up with a single spotted hyena again.

Spotted Hyena (Mbuzi waterhole)

The mammal sighting of the weekend must go to the Aardwolf, a very secretive nocturnal mammal. We spotted a young individual at his den on the Middle Plains - and spent some time with him where his curious nature made him stick his head up from his den every few minutes!

Aardwolf (Middle Plains)

We also had a sighting of a Thick-tailed Bushbaby at Langope, a first sighting for me on the reserve.
Mogorosi waterhole also delivered a first for me on the reserve in the form of 2 bush pigs!

Thick-tailed Bushbaby

General game included the usuals such as impala, kudu, giraffe, zebra, warthog, eland, Small spotted Genet, etc.  We unfortunately didn't see any elephants - although we saw their evidence all over.

Swallow-tailed bee-eater (juv)

What is truly magical about Limpopo-Lipadi, is the fact that we only spotted another game drive vehicle on 2 occassions!  And that despite the camp being fully booked!

Anton


All photos Copyright Anton Kruger

Exciting month for Limpopo-Lipadi Leopard Identification Project

It has been an exciting couple of months regarding the leopards of Limpopo-Lipadi.

One special story is about a male leopard, known as Odirile.  Odirile was first seen, together with his mother (Maya) on the access road in September 2013.  Subsequently, he was again photographed at Tholo dam in February 2014, this time as a young solitary male.  He was photographed end of October again, close to Two Cribs waterhole, and he is now a beautiful, big male leopard – even having the courage to stalk a kudu bull! 

Then there was the excitement of spotting another unidentified leopard early in November, drinking at the Shareholder’s gate waterhole.  He is a young male, and his name will be Thabo – meaning “Joy”!

On the 24^th of November 2014 I had an amazing sighting at Rock plate, south of Mogorosi waterhole.  We actually stopped to have a look at a Giant plated lizard, when Delia, one of our guests spotted a leopard!  We moved closer, and found out that there were in fact 2 leopards, a male and a female.   What a sight to be in the presence of this totally relaxed mating couple, in perfect afternoon light on the open rocks of Rock plate.  We were able to spend time with them until nightfall.  After returning to camp, and going through our photos, we were able to confirm that the male was Maanyi, and the female the beautiful Maya!  So be on the look-out for Maya’s cubs and send through your photos if you are lucky enough to spot them!  Maya’s territory is between Mogorosi waterhole, and Tholo dam / Access road to the south.

On 27 November 2014 we had another special sighting, this time very close to camp, on Hunter’s Way.  Just after 5AM Felix Reinders (a guest of us), spotted a leopard sitting quietly watching us.  After spending some time watching her (it turned out to be a fairly skittish female, called Limpadi), we heard her making soft calls… She was calling her two +-8month old cubs!  We spent the next 4 hours with the 2 cubs, with Limpadi the mother probably watching us from somewhere in the thick raisin bushes!  The one cub entertained us thoroughly – stalking and chasing after an impala, and later playing with his cousin, the leopard tortoise! The other cub had a shy personality, and was keeping an eye on us through the vegetation.

The shy cub was in fact identified as being Thabo!  The other cub will be named Olebile, meaning “he is watching”.  Thank you Felix Reinders for naming the cub.

We are looking forward to many more sightings of these new additions to the Limpopo-Lipadi leopard family in the next decade or so!

About the Limpopo-Lipadi Leopard Identification Project:

  

I don’t think anybody actually knows how the project got under way, but here is the story!

I have an immense passion (maybe bordering on an obsession rather) for the bush, wildlife and the birds of Southern Africa.  Staying in Pretoria, not to far from the African bush, I have the opportunity to spend time with nature on a regular basis.  When on a trip (day-trip or extended), I keep a journal of all my sightings.

So back in June 2010, I had my first sighting of a magical Limpopo-Lipadi leopard north of Zanzibar Dam.  As he was very relaxed, I was able to make some notes in my journal regarding his specific spot pattern especially on his face.  For more than a year, and 6 leopard sightings later – I made similar sketches in my journal of the individual leopards seen at Limpopo-Lipadi.  I realized that this process of identifying different leopards gave a unique emotional connection with the individuals, and on the other side, doing it on my own - the process was very restricted and slow. 

That is when I contacted Magnus Hird, a fellow shareholder with similar passions.  We then started sharing images and started working on a database.  Soon we were receiving photos from like-minded shareholders, and our database grew exponentially. 

In September 2013 Magnus and I met at Limpopo-Lipadi, and in an attempt to get more shareholder involvement, we started the “Limpopo-Lipadi Leopard Identification Project” Facebook Page.  Please search it on Facebook and like the page.  There is an album for each individual leopard as well, so you can also enjoy the process of identifying a leopard! 

Another way to identify leopards on your own, is to make use of the “Tracking the Wild” website and Applications for Android/Mac.  An identikit was also set up on their page.

Now, a bit more than 4 years down the line, we have identified 23 different individual leopards – and that is only the area south of Black Rock, as we haven’t captured any usable photos of leopards in the Northern section of the Reserve.  We are starting to understand their individual territories, and the family trees are starting to take shape!  

We need your help, get involved!

If you are lucky enough to get a decent photo of a leopard on the Reserve, please do the following:

1.     Email the photo to: lipadileopards@gmail.com

2.     Include:

a.     The date

b.     Location

c.      Male / female if possible

If it is an unidentified individual, you will have the opportunity to name the individual, not often you get to name a wild leopard!

Limpopo-Lipadi is one of the most reliable places to find leopard, and if you happen to find one, please approach them with respect and patience.  Eventually they will see game drive vehicles as part of their environment, and we will have years of wonderful leopard viewing to follow!

Thank you

Kind regards

Anton Kruger

All photos Copyright Anton Kruger, except where mentioned otherwise

The most amazing Etosha morning drive ever!

Every now and then, you get one of those days - one of those days that everything works together - and turns out to be a day you will never forget.  The morning of 2 October 2014 (which also happen to be me and Renate's 5th anniversary) was one of those days.  This blog post is an account of our amazing morning game drive on 2 October 2014, at Halali (Etosha National Park).

We were spending 9 nights in Etosha National Park, with great friends (Tiaan & Catherine de Wit, Felix & Delia Reinders and Cilliers & Kotie Enslin).

As a ritual, me and Felix would sit the evening before and do our planning for the following morning's game drive.  As we already spent a few days in the area we were able to spot some patterns in the local wildlife's movements, so the planning was an exciting time of preparation.  The previous day we noticed that all the herbivores headed down to the waterholes just after 10 o'clock, and that there were 3 female lions hanging around the Sueda - Salvadora - Charitsaub trilogy of waterholes to the south-west of Halali Camp.  We witnessed the lions ambushing their prey from the grass surrounding Salvadora waterhole - and saw them fail at an attempted hunt.  (see photos).

The failed attempt at Salvadora the previous day

In our planning, we knew that the 3 lionesses were hungry - so the centre of our planning process was to be at the trilogy of waterholes at 10h00.  That gave us about 3 hours of game drive before we got there.

As we are all suffering from leopardophilia, we decided to head for the woodland area towards the south-east enroute to Goas waterhole early morning.  Thereafter we will try our luck for leopard at Nuamses waterhole, after heading to the plains closer to the pan in the hope of stumbling across cheetah on our way to the 3 waterholes where we expect some lion action! This was the plan........and my oh my.......!!!!!

So, we are out of the gates as soon as they opened, the morning of 2 October 2014, full of expectation, heading through the woodland towards Goas waterhole.  After about 10 minutes we stumbled across 2 hyenas, but Felix decided to move on, we are anticipating a leopard after all!  After about 5 minutes we received a sms from Felix: "Leopard!" We left the hyenas there and immediately rushed towards Felix a few kilometers ahead, to find a beautiful male leopard strolling through the woodland to our right.  We followed him for about 10 minutes, whereafter he disappeared into the deeper bushes.

The leopard close to Goas

We then moved on towards Nuamses waterhole a bit further south - where another awesome sighting awaited us.  There we found a mating pair of lions, "slap bang" in the middle of the parking area of the waterhole!  They were extremely relaxed, until a breeding herd of elephants arrived for a drink at the waterhole... What a morning so far, it is only 8h00 and we already saw hyena, leopard, lions mating and a breeding herd of elephants disturbing the lions!

Nuamses mating couple

Watching the herd of elephants arriving at Nuamses waterhole

Lioness at Nuamses waterhole

Elephants disturbing the lions at Nuamses

We decided to make a quick stop again at Halali to celebrate our sightings with an ice cream - and make a quick stop at the rest room as we were anticipating a long wait at the waterholes between 10h00 and 13h00!

So, we are off again.
Arriving at Rietfontein, could you believe it - CHEETAH! It was relaxing next to the waterhole, had a drink after a few minutes and moved off.  It was the first and only cheetah for the trip, and what a beaut!

Cheetah at Rietfontein waterhole

We headed on towards the 3 spectacular waterholes to see if the lions were in town, but without getting too far we spotted a splendid female leopard relaxing in a small Mopane tree, right next to the road! Could today get any better?  As it was 9h30 in the morning, the temperatures starting soaring, and the shade of the overlanding truck was just to inviting for the leopard - as she jumped out of the tree, and guess what, came to lie in the shade of the overlanding truck, about 3meters away from us! Crazy relaxed!  The only way the tourists were able to get a view of her was by attaching a GoPro camera to a stick and filming the leopard in the shade behind the truck!  After a crowd started to form, we decided to move on...

Leopard close to Rietfontein

In the shade of the truck!

A quick stop at Salvadora (where we saw the unsuccessful hunt the previous day) revealed no lions, so we knew they must be at Charitsaub / Sueda.  We saw the plains game still grazing lazily quite a distance away, but knew they would come for a drink as the African sun started to bake the earth. Arriving at Charitsaub, a quick scan through the grasses surrounding the waterhole revealed the same 3 lionesses as yesterday, starting their ambush yet again!  At about 10h20 the herd of wildebeest started moving in...and we knew...LET THE ACTION BEGIN!

The lions waited a while, until a whole bunch of wildebeest were in the middle of the waterhole, before striking with an immense rush of speed! Chaos!! Wildebeest running everywhere.  Splashing water. The lions focussed on one target, and we thought this was it, as the lions were closing the gap on the wildebeest.  When less than a meter away, the lioness went for the strike / trip....but she missed!! Oh no!  When looking at the photos, you can see the lioness missed by a few centimeters, and you cannot believe that the wildebeest got away!  Lucky for the wildebeest though...

Peace at Charitsaub waterhole

No more peace at Charitsaub!

She missed by a few centimeters, and the wildebeest got away

The embarrased lionesses

After the attack all the plains game decided to rather go and drink at Salvadora waterhole, leaving the embarrassed lions behind...

We had all these amazing sightings between 7h00 - 12h00, 5 hours of Etosha magic, at it's best, and this on our 5th anniversary to top it all!

Blessings

Anton Kruger


All photos Copyright Anton Kruger