By Hannah Uttley, of Carleton College
This week, like every other magical and challenging week thus far, has been full of excitement and surprises. For starters, my fellow students and I were blessed with some truly rare and incredible sightings this week. Most notably, Ian Nelson and Emma Buckardt happened upon a pack of wild dogs (Lycaon pictus) on their way to their transect one morning! This species is beautiful and rarely seen by Round River students, so we were all so excited that they were spotted in the area.
A colorfully patterned Lycaon pictus surveying the area, ears perked and alert. Photo by Emma Buckardt
Emma and Ian also spotted two side-striped jackals on the same transect. This canine is another rare species, so needless to say, the Botswana bush has smiled upon our group. Finally, Emma, Ian, Jack and I all saw a leopard, a juvenile ostrich, and a whole herd of sable antelope while on transects this week. The leopard was a striking young male, known to the local rangers as ‘Nicolas.’ BG, one of the rangers helping us on transects this week, managed to spot him lying in the grass near the side of the road. After taking down information about him for our opportunistic predator sightings record, we stayed to admire him until he walked up the road and out of sight.
Nicolas spares us one parting glance before continuing on into the bush, just as the sun rises. Photo by Hannah Uttley
The ostrich was also super fun to see, since we don’t see them all that often, and it’s awesome to see such an enormous bird. Finally, the herd of sable antelope was an amazing sight, seeing as we normally only spot them alone. We watched in awe as the whole herd galloped across the floodplains in front of us, a sea of rich black and brown pelts and impressive horns. Samara, one of our lovely instructors, has told us that our group has been despicably lucky with our sightings, and that even though she’s here with us, she is a little bit bitter that we’ve seen so much. She then threatened to end the program early, to kick us all out and send us home. While she was obviously joking (teasing us, as usual), she is absolutely right about how lucky we are, and we all feel beyond grateful for all the spectacular wildlife we’ve seen so far.
While transects have been quite exciting (although, there are some—who’ve seen so many kilometers of Mopane trees that they feel like they’re going insane—who might disagree), we all started going just a little bit stir crazy after being in camp for over 2 weeks. So, to break up the routine of camp life and the pattern of rice, beans, veggies, and pasta as meal staples, one inspired pair of students decided to attempt something daring and bold for dinner: bush pizza. A cooking power-team, Emma and Lauren took on the challenge, along with some help from Jack and E. With all our remaining flour, a pound of cheese, a hearty amount of creativity, and a pinch of Dutch Oven magic, the team managed to pull off one of the most impressive meals so far!
The heroic team of cooks that pulled off the impossible. Photo by Lauren Berkley
Everybody loved the meal, but unfortunately, no battle won comes without casualties. In a stoke of bad luck, one of the pizzas was dropped cheesy side down directly into the dirt. As tragic as it was, there was still plenty to go around, and no tears were shed over the spilled pizza. There were, however, very nearly tears shed about the disappearance of milk towards the end of our 20 day stint in the field. Some members of the group discovered how refreshing a cold cup of milk can be on a 41˚C day (which is nearly 105˚F…it’s just a wee bit toasty here in the heart of the dry season), and after that, we were flying through milk like nobody’s business.
Finally, what would a week in the bush be without some good ole fashioned manual labor? Before I explain, allow me to introduce you to our best friends in the field, our noble steeds, Lucy, Frank, and Duke. These three well-loved cars take us everywhere we need to go, and allow us to safely count animals in the bush. Frank is an old soul, with manual roll-up windows and an engine like a lion roaring, or perhaps a chainsaw. Lucy is the youngest of the bunch, with higher suspension that affords her the ability to cruise over the sand dunes that constitute roads this far out. Then, there’s Duke, good ole Duke…we love him dearly, with his open caged truck bed and sensitive door frames (tangent: people do NOT slam doors here, which has been an adjustment for us, since people tend to slam car doors without thinking about it in the US). Unfortunately, Dependable Duke is not quite as dependable when the strip in the middle of the road is too high relative to the tire tracks, or when the sand is too loose and deep. This leads to one of the little adventures (and workouts) of the week. Jack and I were on transect, with Kamwae as our guide and Cosmos as our driver, when we came upon a particularly sandy patch of road. We revved up Duke and tried our best to make it through, but alas, the underside of Duke got stuck on the middle mound. Hoping that this would be a short delay, we hopped out of the car, grabbed a shovel, and started digging. After 15 minutes of futile attempts to dig him out of the sand ditch he’d created for himself, we decided we needed a new approach. Cosmos pulled out the car jack, and we all took turns getting an arm workout from turning the lever.
Cosmos, Kamwae, and Jack all pitch in to get Duke un-stuck. Photo by Hannah Uttley.
Eventually, we got Duke high enough off the ground that we could fit some thick branches of Mopane under the tires to give him some traction, and shoveled out as much as we could from the middle strip. Finally, with fingers crossed and the petal to the medal, Duke roared out of the sand pit and out of danger. With cheers of triumph, everyone piled back into the car after 45 minutes of spit, grit, sweat, and teamwork, and we continued on our way. And I have to say: after our victory, the transect cookies tasted a little bit sweeter.