In August 2016 I went on a wildlife volunteer programme done through Wildlife Act
www.wildlifeact.com. I spent two weeks at Mkuze Game reserve in northern Kwa-Zulu Natal. I traveled down from Johannesburg and was met by a young man who to be our team leader. Our group consisted of an English girl, two french girls, a french guy and myself. Our days consisted of waking up at around 04.00 doing a morning session of tracking via telemetry of key species and then observing activity and and doing counts. The main species we focused on was wild dog, which one of my favourite animals.
Day 1: We tracked a pack of wild dogs that were denning up in some mountains. Getting to the area was quite tough and uncomfortable in the open top bukkie. We made a sighting of three moving along the boarder fence and actually got underneath the fence.
The afternoon session saw us track down a pair of male cheetahs. It was quite dark when we spotted the two cheetahs but we were quite lucky when the two boys walked up past the car. On our way home we had a brief sighting of lions.
Day 2: Morning session, we tracked a pack of 3 wild dogs, we tracked them down in a dry pan after having made a kill.
Afternoon session, we tracked the pack of denning wild dogs with no luck but we did come across a lone cheetah waking up from an afternoon snooze.
Day3: Morning session, we found the pack of 3 wild dogs sleeping beside the road. They were disturbed by people beginning work on the roads and then came across a male elephant who was wondering around near the camp.
Afternoon session, we tracked both the wild dogs and cheetahs but did not find either. What we did come across was the same male elephant that we met earlier in the day. it was dusk and the sun had already gone down. Our young guide turned down the car lights as the elephant was in the road. after a few minutes of the elephant happily being in the road and not keen to move. the guide turned on the car lights, which the elephant took particular exception to and began to move quickly towards the car. the guide tried his best to put the car into reverse but could get the car into gear. Luckily the car was on a slop so we free wheeled down the road and tried to go back into a side road so that we could move away going forward. The problem came when the back of the bukkie got caught and the wheels spun without traction leaving us stuck. We quickly jumped out the car and begun digging enough sand out that the wheels would get traction, within a 3 minutes the elephant came charging down the road. We quickly jumped back into the bukkie and got a low as possible. The guide called out low and calm to the elephant "easy big fella, easy!" The elephant stopped 4 meters from the car head up ears flapping. He then stepped in two steps towards my side of the car. Again the guide called out to the elephant; if I extended my arm out I could touch this huge creature. The elephant then calmed and walked away into the bush. I couldn't believe what had just happened, I felt that my time on the earth had expired, but it was not the case. Below is the open top car we used.
Day 4: Morning session: We tracked the denning pack with no luck but saw a pack of heyna's first thing in the morning on a carcass.
Afternoon session: looked for pack of 3 wild dogs with no sighting.
Day 5: Morning session, we spent the morning looking for two wild dogs that escaped the park but saw nothing.
Day 6: Tracked wild dogs with no sighting but saw a pride of lions deep in the thicket.
Afternoon session, tracked cheetah with no sighting.
Day 7: Morning session, tracked wild dogs where the two packs met. We discovered a family thick tailed bushbabies in the cactus outside our humble accommodation.
Afternoon session, female lion and in the evening a leopard and white tailed mongoose.
Day 8: Morning session, fantastic sighting of the denning pack of wild dogs, 11 dogs on the road.
We also had another not a close encounter with an elephant and calf.
Day 9: Both session tracked wild dog with no sightings.
Day 10: Morning session we just missed a lion sighting and the car broke down in the afternoon.
Day 11: Morning session, did not happen due to the car but we took a relaxed drive.
Afternoon session we tracked cheetah with no luck.
Day 12: Morning session, tracked wild dog with no luck but saw 3 hyena and a rock python.
Afternoon session, we tracked lions but had no luck but saw a drift of bush pigsjust before getting into camp.
Day 13: morning session track and found the pack of 3 wild dogs .
All in all the experience was great, I saw 4 animals I had never seen before. Strangely enough in 2 weeks we didn't see any rhino and only two lots of elephants.
It was hard work but I highly recommend it to any young animal lovers.
