Bug Game Hunting

Namibia

bug game hunting

TA

Steve and Ann Toon are UK-based wildlife photographers and journalists with a specialist interest in wildlife, conservation issues and southern Africa. They are regular contributors to Travel Africa.

Dancing spiders and sidewinder snakes, tok tokkie beetles and goggle-eyed chameleons – Namibia’s arid landscapes come to life when Steve and Ann Toon follow in the tracks of some spellbinding secret wildlife...

Namaqua chameleon These fast-moving critters can see in both directions at once and change colour according to mood and conditions. They are normally dark in the morning to help them warm up and lighter later on in the day to reflect the heat.

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e wait until the heat dies down a little before heading out across the vast sandy plains of the Namib desert. A small band of nervous pioneers, stuffed with cake and coffee, eagerly clutching our bags of trail-mix and continually double-checking the water bottles balanced in our backpacks, fall into line behind Sebastiaan Kazimbu, our guide for the next three days.

We’re trekking at a leisurely pace on a trail through the NamibRand reserve in southern Namibia. At more than 200,000ha, it is one of southern Africa’s largest private reserves. But this walking safari is definitely not about ticking off your classic ‘big and hairies’. We’re hoping to get closer to the fascinating little critters that usually get overlooked on safari – the stuff you don’t realise exists until you marvel at it up close.

As the low sun paints the desert’s customary pastels with the vibrant orange the colour of Irn Bru, we trudge inexpertly through the sand, seemingly collecting a tonne of it in each and every shoe. Suddenly Sebastiaan darts to the ground and starts grubbing in the sand. He’s just, very deftly, caught hold of our first secret desert star by its spindly, long legs – limbs perfect for running across super-heated sand. It’s a tok tokkie beetle, the trail’s namesake and the first of many different tok tokkie species we meet during our trek. There are about 200 species all told in Namibia, and some 20 make their home here in the arid dunes. Their name comes from the ‘tokking’ sound when they bump their rear end on the sand to attract a mate. We lean in for a closer look. This one’s the wonderfully

named ‘waxy darkling beetle’. It looks just like it’s wearing stone-washed denim, until Sebastiaan wets its carapace and it instantly turns dark indigo.

Watched from a distance by a chilled and rather curious male oryx, we study the delicate train tracks tok tokkie beetles make when jaywalking around these dunes. Once you start looking at the sand this forensically you see that the dunes are etched everywhere with tracks and trails, criss-crossing each other like busy commuter traffic: pinprick prints of a diminutive mouse; sinuous ripples of a sidewinding snake; escape tunnels of the golden mole, excavated while swimming under the sand like a mini Michael Phelps; a scorpion’s purposeful tracks; and on and on...

We learn how to distinguish fresh tracks from older ones, where sand grains gradually soften before eventually erasing the imprint. Sebastiaan calls evidence of the daily comings and goings when the dunes get written over with new scrawl, the ‘Namib Times’. Only he’s much more skilled at reading this newspaper than we’ll ever be, quickly spotting the stories written by the likes of a horned adder, a dune lark (endemic to the region) and even a male leopard who had been walking ahead of us on the trail just a few hours earlier.

If you thought deserts were, well, deserted, you’d certainly be forced to think again after this. We found sections of it busier than a DIY superstore on a bank holiday, with hyperactive bulldozer beetles furiously

We’re hoping to get closer to the fascinating little critters that usually get overlooked on safari – the stuff you don’t realise exists until you marvel at it up close

Autumn 2013 Travel Africa 65

Namibia digging in the sand, carpenter bees buzz-sawing away, and shovel-snouted lizards manoeuvring across the dunes with feet alternately lifted to escape the fierce heat. There was even a sandpaper bush with sticky, rasping leaves to complete the analogy.

Although its inhabitants are rather frenetically active, you don’t have to be –the trail covers less than 10km each day, so it is not the preserve of serious walkers. There are also frequent stops to observe the flora and fauna. But it is hot and there is a fair bit of dune-yomping to give your calves a good workout. Our little tip: don’t be in a rush to take the lead. The best way up a steep dune face, we found, is to plant your feet quickly in the fast disappearing ‘steps’ created by the person ahead of you, using them like a staircase.

If you do start to fade at the end of a day’s desert slackpacking, there’s a ‘hidden’ camp waiting (it appears over a hill like a mirage when you’re least expecting it), with a three-course meal, welcome bucket shower and open-air ‘room’ laid out for you in the dunes. Here, reunited with your luggage, you can sleep out under the stars until Sebastiaan brings a mug of tea at sunrise.

If you don’t fancy walking, or are pressed for time on a busy itinerary, you can do guided taster tours into the dunes around Swakopmund on a half-day’s ‘little five’ safari in the Dorob National Park, where you’ll also be hunting for hidden desert creatures. These are great for meeting grumpy-looking chameleons and ETlookalike palmato geckos, and are an ideal introduction to the dunes for kids. We went out with established guide Tommy Collard, who was busy fitting some of the adult chameleons in the area with microchips. These

new tagging devices are primarily for research purposes, but it’s also hoped the project will help combat the illegal pet trade that sadly seems to be a growing problem.

Opposite: Bruno Nebe with We next headed into the famous dune fields of the porcupine caterpillar Namib Naukluft National Park with Willem Mutenga, an expert guide with Wilderness Safaris who run game drives on request to look for dune critters from its Little Kulala lodge. While everyone else in the area is dashing madly to get to Dead Vlei for the customary sunrise photo-call, we are going the opposite direction to a quiet, less-visited big dune where the wildlife is less disturbed. Within minutes we are peering at some Dancing white gerbil tracks. “This guy was very lady spider relaxed,” says Willem, the ostrich This cunning and ghostly feather in his hat bobbing. “His white spider cleverly crafts a tracks clearly show that he burrow in the sand out of silk wasn’t running away.” that looks for all the world like a knitted purse. It then closes Bug game hunting is the burrow with a silken trap addictive and we are soon door, which forms a hidden hitting paydirt: squiggly flap in the sand. patterns in the sand made Above: Hiking the Tok Tokkie trail

Left: The trap door of the dancing white lady spider

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Autumn 2013 Travel Africa 67

Namibia

by blown grasses, the fresh dung of scrub hares, the tracks of sidewinders, and territorial boundaries marked by male lizards. But the highlight, if you don’t count brilliant views of a sidewinding snake, is when Willem finds the nest of a dancing white lady spider.

The small mark in the sand looks just like a child has drawn a tiny sun there. He uses a thin blade of grass to lift the trapdoor of the spider’s lair. The size of a coin, it’s completely round, like a minuscule manhole cover disguised by sand grains. This ‘flap’ in the sand is an awesome bit of desert architecture and illustrates the neat desert adaptations some of these desert-dwellers require for survival. The resident spider – huge, white and hairy – is still at home. They’re said to have a painful bite that is mildly venomous, but Willem says they are not a problem and briefly pops it on his hand.

Leaving a game-viewing vehicle to examine, at close quarters, the evidence of who has been there before you definitely fires the imagination. If, like us, it makes you even more interested to fit the different pieces of the ecological jigsaw puzzle together, you might like to spend time with legendary Namibian guide and bug game hunter Bruno Nebe. Mundulea,

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Top left: Tok tokkie beetle

his private nature reserve, is in the Otavi Mountains a couple of hours’ drive from Etosha National Park.

We spent three nights at the simple, but original bush camp he has built here. With its blackened cooking pots, shelf of well-thumbed identification guides and desk filled with assorted skulls, fossils and stones, it is like walking into the field camp of a real-life Indiana Jones. If you do go, stay sharp. Bruno is nothing if not professorial and will quiz you mercilessly about all the stuff you’re seeing as you walk out with him.

Because you have to work the answers out, rather than being spoon-fed, you engage much more with your surroundings. And the information sticks with you.

We wake up to the alarm calls of francolins and the whistle of a pearl-spotted owl. “Let’s go for a ramble,” enthuses Bruno. There are fresh leopard tracks near to the camp waterhole (the cause of the francolins’ panic) and Bruno shows us the spot where the big cat enjoyed a dust bath in the night. There has also been a spotted hyena walking along the path.

Palmato gecko We deduce from his tracks These ice-cream-coloured geckos that he was probably carrying have huge fixed-lens eyes and something because of the no eyelids. To get moisture when twisting and turning. Bones they need it they sometimes from a carcase perhaps? allow fog to condense on their eyes and then lick off the water It is all about finding the droplets with their remarkable in the everyday, long tongues. whether it is a paper-wasp

Above: Crossing paths in the Namib’s dunes

Black scorpion Its petite pincers are a dangerous sign – this scorpion must rely on the poison in its thick tail to kill its prey. It moves by day on the dunes and gravel plains, unlike many other scorpions.

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Namibia Tok tokkie beetles Best known of the 200 or so species is the fog-basking, which gets moisture by allowing fog to condense on its back.

It then stands on its head so the water formed can trickle down to its mouth.

Sidewinder snake Smaller than you might think, this adder is one of the world’s smallest, reaching up to 30cm in length only. The sidewinding motion helps the snake move across the dune’s slip face where the sand is quite loose and also means there’s minimal body contact with the hot sand.

Plan your trip Getting there Air Namibia (www.airnamibia.com.na) has direct flights to and from Windhoek from Frankfurt. South African Airways (www.flysaa.com) and British Airways (www.ba.com) both link London to Windhoek via Johannesburg.

Visas Most travellers from Europe and North America do not require a visa to enter Namibia for holidays shorter than three months.

Books Bradt’s Namibia (4th ed, published January 2011), written

by Chris McIntyre, is a solid guidebook choice.

Find out more For Tok Tokkie Trails and Mundulea, contact Expert Africa (www.expertafrica.com). Tommy’s Tours & Safaris (www. tommys.iway.na) runOshakati living desert tours into the dunes from Ondangwa Skeleton Coast Swakopmund.

Opuwa Wilderness Safaris (www.wilderness-safaris. com) operate dune game drives on request from their Little Etosha Kulala lodge.

NP

Rundu Kaudom

Tsumeb

Sesfontein

Kamanjab Twyfelfontein Khorixas

Dorob NP

Tsumkwe

Otavi Mountains

Outjo

Terrace Bay

Grootfontein

Otavi Central Namibian Highliands

Otjiwarongo

Waterberg Plateau

Okonjima

mi Omaruru

e b D Henties Bay

Usakos

ser

Okahandja

Karibib

t

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When to visit Due to the dry climate it’s fine to visit all year round, although April and May bring fresher air.

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nest or a porcupine caterpillar. A bit of old kudu horn leads us to a discussion about Shovel-snouted stocking rates on the reserve, a ringlizard A true Priscilla Queen of the Desert, barked twig is an ecological mystery to this dancing lizard, sometimes be solved, and a set of old spring hare called the thermal dancing lizard, is burrows becomes a ‘who lives here?’ a cool customer because it lifts two game. Gradually we are building feet in the air at the same time as it swiftly moves across the hot sand towards a greater understanding of to minimise heat transfer the ecosystem as a whole. Bruno calls to the body. it ‘holistic’, a word he uses frequently, and which perfectly sums up his approach towards regenerating this land over the last dozen years, returning it back to nature, from the ground up.

“I’ve learned that interfering as little as possible is best,” he says. His keen tracking skills are the result of having a bushman as a nanny. Apparently his unorthodox babysitter used the same techniques Bruno now employs to inspire us. He continues to put us through our paces while talking tracks, turds and bones.

But it’s almost time to go. We are sitting by a sinkhole on Mundulea listening to Bruno’s tales of the hominid hand fossil he found on the reserve. He keeps its present location secret, but tells us it is about 12 million years old, which is young he says. He then drops a pebble down the hole. We hear it hit the side three Steve and Ann Toon times on the way down, but we don’t hear it make the travelled with Expert Africa bottom. That’s just the problem – after a trip like this (www.expertafrica.com) we’ll be leaving Namibia with a thirst as deep as this for Tok Tokkie Trails and sinkhole for yet more brilliant, intimate encounters.

Mundulea.

Windhoek

Swakopmund Walvis Bay

Rehboth

Namib Naukluft NP Sossusvlei (dunes)

SOUTH ATLANTIC OCEAN

Gobabis

Naukluft Mountains

Maltahohe

Aranos

Hardap Dam Mariental

Namib Rand NR

Lüderitz Aus

Sperrgebiet NP Fish River Canyon

Keetmanshoop

Naute Dam Grünau

Autumn 2013 Travel Africa 71 Karasburg

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