Interesting African Wildlife

Aphodius sphacelatus

The recent rains here have stimulated a sudden increase in the number of creepy crawlies flying about, some are pretty cool such as the preying mantis but there is one bug, a member of the dung beetle family (Aphodius sphacelatus) that is the biggest argument for atheism yet, because there is no way a merciful god would create such an horrendously annoying abomination of nature!!!

Why are they so bad I hear you ask? Well, they are small enough to slip through the tiniest of holes and can get through the fly screens on our windows. So when the sunsets and you turn a light on you are immediatly surrounded by THOUSANDS of the horrible lil buggers!!!!!!!! You can't watch TV, you can't turn a light on to read a book and most depressingly you can't make a cup of tea!!!!!

I HATE THEM, I HATE THEM, I HATE THEM!!!!!!!!!

The Boskop Dogs

As mentioned in a previous blog we currently have 3 dogs residing with us at Boskop, which is also a dog retirement/rehabilitation centre. So let me start with 10 year old Tyger (see below), who is enjoying her retirement after many years as one of our livestock guarding dog programme's breeding females. Giving birth to 0ver 50 puppies has taken its toll on Tyger's body and she no longer has the energy she once had but she still enjoys a good roll in the grass, especially when its raining. She is a great big love bug and laps up any attention given to her.

Next we have Timone who has had a troubled life. Unfortunately Timone was very poorly treated by the farmer he was donated to as a puppy. He was extremely underfed and beaten. He was therefore taken away from the farmer when CCF staff checked on him. Timone's bad start in life still affects him as he always appears nervous when approached and has strange behaviours including spinning around in a circle numerous times before sitting down. He also has poorly formed legs due to his malnourisment. However, Timone now gets lots of loving attention here at Boskop and when he gets to know and trust you he can be very affectionate.

Finaly we have Boskop's newest resident, Spots, a great big 1 year old who still acts very much like a puppy! Spots was donated to CCF by the SPOTS foundation in the Netherlands, hence his name. Spots was intended to be our new breeding male, unfortunately though Spots has had nothing but health problems since arriving and its now thought that his immune system doesn't work properly (we are still waiting on some test results). Regardless of the test results it appears Spots will remain at Boskop where he is very happy, he loves playing with Tyger but has learnt to stay away from Timone who finds Spots' juvenile behaviour a little bit tiresome at times! Spots has LOTS of energy and is constantly seeking attention and when he doesn't get it he finds other things to do to entertain himself such as finding and chewing various objects he finds around the house, both myself and Kate have had pairs of flip flops destroyed by Spots who has a particular fondeness for them. Spots had great fun last week when he was being chased by three of us all around Boskop after sneaking in the house and running away with one of my brand new flip flops! Fortunatley we managed to catch him and no damage was done, but with Spots around you always have to be on your toes!

So those are the current Boskop dogs, another reason why living at Boskop is so great!

Bellebenno Feeding

My Other Blog

Not too long ago I wrote most of the cheetah storys we send to people who sponsor a cheetah and apparently people think i'm a good writer, so i was asked to write a blog for CCF's page on wildlifedirect.org. I've done 5 now so feel free to check them out!

http://cheetahconservation.wildlifedirect.org/

The Boskop Leopard

My only previous sighting of a wild leopard was back in 2003 when I was in Kruger National Park South Africa and that lasted for about 2 seconds as it soon vanished into the bush. Since then I have spent a total of 10 months in Africa and even spent 24 hours in a hide at a waterhole, smack bang in prime leopard terratory and still had not seen one.

However, that all changed 2 days ago when low and behold as we were driving back home to Boskop what was sitting right beside the road on a dirt mound? Only a flipping gorgeous leopard thats what! I brought the car to a screeching halt with Kate's screams of LEEEEOPARDDDDSTOPPPPP! In my ears and to our amazement it just stayed where it was. We watched each other for a good 10 minutes, before it eventufly lost interest in us and dissapeard into the bush. It was AMAZING and well worth the wait!

Its not the first time a leopard has been seen in this area recently and I heard a leopard growling whilst lying in bed the other week. so it seems Boskop has its own resident leopard! Brilliant!

Happy New Year!

Usually I hate going out on New Years eve as I hate the pressure of having fun that is forced upon you!! However, this year was different as I had a chance to escape CCF and have a night out in otjiwarongo and ended up having a great time!!!



I was joined by Kate, John and Party Animal Groovy Gunther! We spent most of the night in an afrikaana's bar and I was merry enough to even have a bit of a boogie to some very strange afrikaans pop tunes! We also ended up at a somewhat under-attended pop concert where to my delight one of my fave namibian bands were playing, Onyoka! Hardly anyone was there but we enjoyed ourselfs!!

I would have stayed in town longer but unfortunately I don't really get days off at the mo and had to be up at 7 in the morning :(

Lets hope 2009 is a good one!