THERAINYSEASON

As you know, cats (except for tigers, and fishing cats) don’t like to be wet, so I was a bit dismayed when I discovered that we were visiting during the long rainy season I could just imagine myself, all sticky fur and muddy feet. Steaming too, since it is also quite hot during this season of the year. If my humans felt any foreboding, they didn’t show it. And quickly we all learned just how lucky we were to be visiting during this time of year. Actually, though it was by accident, we couldn’t have planned it any better!

The rains over the Serengeti had really only started about 3 or 4 days before we arrived. They were a bit late and the Tanzanians had begun to worry. Ronald told us that he had been in the Serengeti about a week before he met our group and that the grasses were brown and dead The great herds of wildebeest and zebras were wandering about confusedly, dashing forward if they saw a dark cloud ahead of them, dashing back again if they thought they smelled rain. Ronald and the animals looked so relieved by the time we arrived because the rains had already produced green shoots out of the dry earth and brought new leaves to the bushes and trees Both the short grass and the long grass was growing rapidly, assuring the new wildebeest babies a good supply of milk since their mothers would be eating nutritious food again.

The Serengeti skies are dramatic and vast so many clouds scudding across the deep blue. Just as the plains seem to go on forever, so the skies appear to have no horizon. When the rain clouds begin to form, the skies become moodier and more dramatic. In one arc of sky there will be towering thunderheads, gray and threatening. At the same time, another arc of sky will still be blue and sunny. Then a tremendous rainfall will be seen in another arc with the rains pelting down against charcoal-colored and purplish backdrops. Sometime that rain will reach where you are but most times it did not. We seemed able to dodge the big storms by running parallel to the black clouds. The temperatures would drop immediately if we became more closely hemmed in by the storm clouds and occasionally we would have to close the tops of the range rovers to avoid being drowned in a gushing rain.

The animals did not seek shelter when it began to pour down on them. The hoof stock seemed to be invigorated by the rains and the big cats just sat it out, even with the rain running in rivulets down their faces and backs. Most herd animals would turn their backs to a driving rain to avoid having their eyes pelted This actually provided the predators with a good prospect of sneaking up behind the herd and snatching an unwary creature for an easy meal.

Because the soil on the plains is clayey, the rains quickly begin to puddle in the road ruts, depressions and holes in the grasslands as well as in the natural water catchment areas, like ponds, rivers, lakes, streams and swamps Soon the land can be quite swampy and vehicles can easily become mired in the greasy mud. The tires spin uselessly unable to gain any traction in the slippery mess. Even when the trucks are moving along, they slurp and slew about, “dancing” in the mud. The conditions make for tough driving and bumpy sideways riding But the joy among the animals and the thirst of the land make the rainy season a delight to experience!

Thegreatmigration

All this rain and the animals who follow it and delight in the new growth the rain produces coalesce to form one of the greatest natural spectacles anyone could hope to see—the annual migration of the wildebeest and the zebras. These creatures actually are moving in a circular route the entire year. They are walking constantly, following the growth of the grasses. The entire cycle covers about 800 miles and takes about one year to complete. It is the strange looking wildebeest (also known as gnu) who makes up the most numerous animals on the Serengeti. He is a crazily constructed creature for sure long face, great beard below his chin, small horns in proportion to his body, deep and broad shoulders, very slim waist, and narrow hips that do not accord at all with his large shoulder girdle. He has a wispy mane and whippy tail, with some dark streaks on his sides. Altogether a not very attractive creature. But he is tough! Not only must he walk all those miles continuously, he has to ford tumultuous rivers, stumbling and crashing down steep river banks into the gaping crocodile jaws waiting for him He must also be constantly on the alert for the predators who dog his every step, usually from the rear—lions, cheetah, hyenas, wild dogs, leopards.

The rainy season brings on the incredible phenomenon of baby wildebeest being dropped at the rate of 8000 a day in the space of about 3 weeks. Equally hard to believe is the fact that these little creatures must be ready to run with mother at her speed within 15 minutes of their birth! There are usually about 1.8 millions wildebeest in the Serengeti ecosystem at all times. Those babies must learn their own mother’s scent immediately because if they become separated from her no other female will adopt that baby The little lost baby will quickly become some predator’s meal for the day. Nature does feed on nature and the predators need to eat just as do the grazer and browsers. Nonetheless, even with that rationalization, it is difficult to watch a little one wander helplessly about, calling fruitlessly to its lost mother. My humans all said they would not be able to be objective field observers since they would want to save everything.

The wildebeest have poor eyes but excellent senses of smell so they need a “guide/fellow traveler” to join them on the great migration and in the excellent eyesight of the zebra, they found the perfect travel companion. Because their eyes are so good, zebras typically lead the migrating herds The zebras and the wildebeest migrate together on the long 800 mile yearly walk. Other independent animals (separate from the migrators) appear among the huge herds of wildebeest and zebras but do not continue on the long march. The plains are covered with black forms as the millions of animals mysteriously appear after a rain shower. They play a hide and seek game with the tourists because of their ability to follow the rains. One day your game drive takes you through the herds which stretch to the horizon on every side and the next day the migratory animals will have disappeared completely from that same area. They walk in long straggling lines following each other fairly closely. Staying near each other is a protective behavior since the large “block” of animals can appear to a predator as one really large creature!

Standing around among the migrating animals are giraffes, gazelles, impala, hartebeest, and topis, not to mention warthogs and all manner of birdlife. They coexist among the wildebeest and zebras and are also needful of the new grasses but they do not go along on the big migration. Ronald told us all how very lucky we were to be in Tanzania at this exact time because we had this magnificent experience of watching this astonishing panorama. It is very difficult to describe how many wildebeest were there, how black forms covered the grassy plain, how overwhelming the sheer number of animals we were observing. The gray-black creatures were fascinating to watch, especially the interactions between mothers and babies. But it was also interesting to see how even one zebra’s move away from the area would start a whole stream of wildebeest flowing over the plain! The wildebeest do trust the eyesight of those zebras.

Of course, the reason for this grand migration of animals is the alternating conditions of wet and dry seasons throughout their range. They must follow the rains because then there is sufficient food for these huge herds. When the rains disappear from an area, drought conditions develop pretty rapidly so the herds must follow the rains to find new pasturage and sufficient water to drink. This wet/dry alternation is a permanent feature of this ecosystem so the animals must move continuously.

During their long migratory marches, they face predation from other animals, injury, disease and human poaching as the people increase in number and encroach on the migratory route. It is a good thing that the wildebeest have a high fertility rate because they do need to repopulate significantly every year. Their wholesale calving in one short period is part of nature’s strategy in keeping their overall numbers stable This plethora of new life also keeps the predatory creatures alive and able to reproduce. And so the cycle continues seemingly endlessly and yet still so vulnerable to man and the alterations he has made to the habitat and continues to make.

Otheranimals

Our game drives and even our time spent in the campsites provided us with so many occasions to see the amazing variety of animals in East Africa. Each one is fascinating, endearing, attractive and so important in its position in the web of life. Of course, I admit that I was most interested in the felines, but I cannot dismiss the impact the other creatures had on me. So many of them I had never even imagined because I didn’t know they existed. I am not going to try to discuss each one individually because whole books can be written about them and have been. In the back of the journal I will try to recall the names of all of them in a list, but not here. Also, I am not going to mention all the birds we saw for the same reasons. Instead, I’ll just talk about some strange and wonderful things about some of the creatures that share the Serengeti ecosystem.

There are several species of hoofed animals which we saw quite frequently, among them gazelles, elands, topis, hartebeest, and giraffe. What were the differences and similarities in these creatures? What makes a gazelle a gazelle and not an antelope for instance? How are they defined as separate species? Which animals bear some evolutionary kinship with each other? After all, my primary reason for being here was to really understand the evolutionary kinship between myself and the other felines. So that meant I would be required to do a bit of research when I got home. And I did! Here are some of the results of my study.

WHATISANANTELOPE?

Antelope are grazing ruminant animals, with a four chambered stomach like a cow, and like cows, they chew cuds stored in the stomach in order to get as much nutrition as possible from the grasses and leaves they consume. All antelopes are kin to cows, sheep and goats, and are actually more closely related to those domestic animals than they are to each other! That’s a big surprise, isn’t it? The characteristic that separates them from deer is their permanent horns. All antelopes grow their horns but once in their lives. Deer, of course, lose their antlers annually and grow them back. There is only one species of deer on the African continent and we were not in his neighborhood. The Red Deer lives in the Atlas Mountains of the Northern part of Africa. That fact makes identifying antelope in Africa a mere snap of the claws—anything that looked like a deer was correctly labeled an antelope, no matter its body size, color, or its horn shape. We saw impala, three kinds of gazelles, wildebeests, hartebeests, topi, eland (largest of all antelopes), dik-dik, and waterbucks and all of them are antelopes. Remember that North America has only one native antelope the pronghorn who lives out west.

Othersurprisingkinships

Most people are disbelieving when they are told that the closest kin of an elephant is a creature called a hyrax. There are 4 types, Western & Eastern rock and tree hyraxes, Cape hyraxes, and tree hyraxes. All look much more like rodents than elephants They are small, furry all over, possessed of bright black eyes, and they scurry all over the place like squirrels and mice. They rarely get larger than a corgi dog (Recall Queen Elizabeth II and her favored dog). On this trip we saw only the Eastern Rock Hyrax. How can such a creature be kin to the largest land mammal? Here’s the answer the scientists give.

First and most important is the DNA evidence which strongly supports the hypothesis that elephants and hyraxes sprang from a common ancestor. To complicate matters, the evidence also suggests that these creatures are also kin to manatees. However, that means that elephants and manatees are probably kin too and that makes much more sense Other biological evidence that leads some scientists to postulate the relationship between hyrax and elephants are the following: they have similar toenails, sensitive pads on their feet, tusks (small ones in the case of hyrax), excellent hearing (doesn’t that seem a bit tendentious to you?

I have good hearing too), very well developed memories, high brain function, and similarly shaped bones. Are you convinced? Don’t know that I am like I say, we cats sport many of these characteristics and no one is postulating our kinship with elephants, manatees or hyrax!

HOWABOUTGIRAFFES?

Okay, get ready for this one! Giraffes are also akin to cows as well as deer! Yet their horns are not antlers and are not normally lost during their lives. Go figure, right? How’s a non-expert supposed to decide. Further complicating the whole issue is the fact that scientists can not even agree on how many species of giraffe there are, some saying there are as many as 6 separate ones and others saying only 1 with several subspecies. Of course most folks know that giraffes are the tallest land animals: males can reach 16-18 ft. in height and females only a foot or so shorter. Males can weigh up to 3000 lbs. and females a few hundred pounds less.

Giraffes are spotted all over except for their white underbellies and the spot patterns are unique to each individual, just as the stripes on zebras are different. The tongue of the giraffe is 18 inches long and it can use that tongue to clean its entire face. Can you think of another mammal capable of that feat? I certainly can’t, nor do I wash my own face that way. The final fascinating factoid about giraffes is the short sleep requirement. They usually sleep only an average of 1.9 hours out of 24! I simply cannot imagine such a thing I sleep many hours every day and love every nap I take.

Oh yes, I forgot one thing: giraffes have only one current close relative and we did not see one It is the okapi, also a resident of East Africa, but he kept himself well away from us. If you really want to know how closely he resembles his much taller cousin, go on the internet and request a picture for your files.

Blackrhinos

There are 5 species of rhinoceros in the world and two of them live in East Africa: the black and the white. The other three are in Asia. All five are gravely endangered! And these species are each other’s closest living relatives. However, both Black and White Rhinos are misnamed. The smaller black rhino is not black at all; he usually takes on the color of whatever dust and/or mud he wallows in. When washed clean, he reveals a grayish skin color. The white rhino is not white either: he is called white because of the misunderstanding or mistranslation of the Dutch word “weide” as “white” when it really means “wide.” The white rhino also usually takes on the color of his wallow spots. Besides the size difference, an easily recognized distinction between the two is that the black rhino has a prehensile upper lip, useful in pulling up its chosen food plants. Though they look quite heavy and ponderous (and they do weigh in at 1.5 to 2 tons) they actually can run very rapidly up to 35 miles per hour for a short distance.

Both these truck-size creatures have extremely poor eyesight and rely on their excellent senses of smell and hearing to detect predators. Most animals will not attack such a large and well-defended animal (horns, sharp hooves, great strength). Only youngsters and injured or sick adults would be at risk, even from lions. However, the solitary rhino is as short-tempered as he is short-sighted and will often display aggressive behavior to tree trunks, vehicles, and elephants if his dim vision tells him they are predators. He will charge and slam into them if he feels threatened.

We were warned that we likely would not see black rhino and that there was even less chance to see white ones Well, the guides were correct about the white we saw nary a one. But in Ngorongoro Crater we hit the proverbial “mother load”. Of the 20-35 rhinos believed to live in the Crater, we saw 17! Pretty amazing. This poor creature is so close to extinction that he needs extra-special protection from human beings Unfortunately for him, many Asian humans believe that a powder made from his horn (made of keratin) will cure everything from impotence to cancer. That means that impoverished Africans will poach these creatures in order to profit by the demand. Some measures as desperate as “dehorning” have been tried to cut down on the poaching but no ones really knows what the loss of that important appendage is to the rhino’s health and safety.

If rhinos do go extinct in the Serengeti, there will be more consequences than simply disappointed tourists and conservationists. Because they prefer woody plants, rhino help keep the grassy plains open without the encroachment of trees. If the plains become dotted with forests, what will happen to the great migration and the grazing animals?

Mother Nature has evolved her world into interconnected relationships between plants and animals, climate and geography. When human beings muck around in the sweet balance, the law of unintended consequences rules!

Good luck to the dedicated conservationists who are trying so desperately to preserve the rhinos in their own intended habitats.

HOWABOUTHIPPOS?

Here’s another crazy relationship fact the closest relatives of the hippo are the whales and the porpoises, not elephants or rhinos as you might expect Well, they are huge, no mistake about that third largest land animal, after the elephant and the rhino. They live in water during the day to protect their thick but easily dehydrated skins and they exude a reddish-pink oil which acts as a sunscreen for their sensitive gray skins. A quick glance can deceive us into believing that the animal is injured and bleeding. Their hide alone weighs ½ ton! At night, the hippos go on land to graze on the grasses. They often walk up to 5 or 10 miles in search of food. On land and in water, the hippo is a formidable force. He will defend his young and himself against even 18 foot crocodiles in the water and he usually successful. On land he can easily outrun a human being, able to run at 30 mph, faster than an Olympic sprinter. Most authorities say that the hippo is the most dangerous animal in Africa. Hippos kills many more humans than lions do even in their wildest dreams of revenge against the Masai who used to kill lions routinely in order to be accepted as adult men in their tribes.

Hippos usually live in small pods of up to 15 individuals but often they can be found in larger numbers depending on the size of the available pools. We saw several hippo pods on our trip and one of the largest was comprised of over 100 hippos, males, females and young That pool was at the confluence of three rivers and so there was plenty of constantly running water. But they did seem to be very close together but actually liking the proximity. Adult hippos can stay submerged for up to 6 minutes and they do not have to wake themselves up to rise to the surface. That happens as automatically as breathing Baby hippos can stay under only about ½ a minute.

PENULTIMATEMEMBEROFTHEBIGFIVE: THECAPE BUFFALO

Also regarded as a highly dangerous animal, the Cape Buffalo is very protective of his herd and seems to “remember” which human beings have made threats or hurt him or his family. There are so many stories about the “revenge of the Cape Buffalo” who has been injured that there must be some truth in it. Many hunters relate stories of wounded or insulted Cape Buffalo who lie in wait and ambush their attackers Cape Buffalo are formidable creatures with large and heavy horns, both males and females. They can weigh up to 1500 lbs. and stand 5 feet at the shoulder.

Their bodies are muscular and powerful. It takes several lionesses to bring down an adult buffalo and only on few occasions can a single male lion kill an adult buffalo. My relatives, the lions, are smart and know that the buffalo is a fearsome adversary and they rarely attack him since they do not want to risk injury to themselves.

These buffalo are a bovine species so they are somehow kin to cows and some species of wild cattle, but oddly enough they are not closely kin to the Asian Water Buffalo. Their ancestry is in doubt and scientists are not in enough agreement about it for amateurs like me to even try to discuss it. However, unlike the Asian water buffalo, but like their fellow plainsmen, the zebras, they have never been successfully domesticated. They remain wild and free on the Serengeti and in many other parts of Africa. That reminds me of human opinion of my own status as a free creature. As Jean Burden has rightly said, “Prowling his own quiet backyard, or asleep by the fire, the cat is still only a whisker away from the wilds.” We have never been fully domesticated either, I am proud to say. The knowledgeable short story writer, Saki, reports, “ The cat is domestic only as far as suits its on end.”

MYRELATIVES: THEFELINES

At last we are arrived at the most important, impressive, beautiful, and universally admired, animals on the Serengeti the felines! My relatives and my idols! I am so happy to report that I saw 4 of the 5 possible species of cats to find in East Africa: the lion, the leopard, the cheetah and the serval. Only the caracal eluded me, but I am sure he is every bit as wonderful as the others,

Over the past few years I have seen how excited Kay has gotten over discoveries she has made in her genealogy research. Every new cousin or grandparent found has been a source of pride and accomplishment. She learns everything she can about each individual and records it in her computer and shares with other relatives. I knew that I would be just as exhilarated and rewarded when I could observe my relatives it doesn’t matter how distant. After all, Kay can claim kinship with John of Gaunt and Charlemagne, no matter how removed by generations. And I know that I also have royalty in my family! After all, isn’t the lion universally acknowledged as the King of the Beasts? Now my problem is to decide how to present my findings, largest first, smallest first, most elusive, most endearing? I think I will start with the smallest, but by now means the “least” important.