A Lifetime’s Worth of Memories!!

 A Lifetime’s Worth of Memories!!

As part of my three month stay at the wildlife campus, I had the pleasure of spending 10 days training at Black Leopard Camp and oh, what an experience it was! Mike and Kari treat their guests like family and I can’t wait to return and live in luxury, if only temporarily. I gained a wealth of knowledge from my guide, Mike, while we drove around the property spotting random trees, birds and stars. I had the opportunity to see my first African civet and genet. 

I was even proud of myself because now I am able to spot leopard spoor from the Land Cruiser! To top off a wonderful 10 days, 7 of them were spent observing wild leopards! We were able to locate the family of 2 leopard cubs that are estimated to be just under a year old. We sat quietly (well, almost quietly) each morning and evening waiting for them to appear and – BINGO! I witnessed a male and female cub enjoying a lovely kudu for dinner night after night. The female has only one eye, but she is most precious and completely oblivious to our presence. She is curious more than anything.

As Tara and I began driving on Monday night, we stumbled upon what we believe is a third, female cub but she is more skittish than her siblings so we only caught a quick glimpse before she ran into the thick brush.

Our camera traps have caught loads of pictures so we should be able to identify them easily and return to you with more details shortly. 

Also, it’s possible that Tara may have found a new sub-species of Golden Mole in our area but we’ll have the results back from the lab a little later.

Well, I’m off to do some more tracking. Until next time, enjoy these photos and keep checking back for more sightings!

                                                                                                                        -Toni 

Team Leaders accommodation

All of our courses have been developed over several years to provide authentic and practical bush training, but moreover an immersive experience and one where our students are fully involved. On site team leader Tara is a zoologist and also experienced field guide, having worked on several reserves as both guide and TV presenter. Tara is one of only a handful of female guides who have qualified to the highest level FGASA level 3.

Its not all hard work. Zoologist and Guide Tara Pirie

What could be cosier, than cooking indoors on an open fire. Above Operations Manager Alan Watson checks on the steaks. Below a freshly baked bread, cooked on the fire, delicious! It seems there is never any left in the morning, in fact its usually all gone even before its had time to cool.

Written by Will Fox

No roughing it, this is my kind of camping

The main lounge come research study is shown in the background. The hammocks are proving to be very popular for a mid afternoon snooze

I figure the pictures say it all. There is no roughing it at our conservation Village.

An example of a student tent, hardly what most folks think of as camping

Carbon Neutral Camp - A win win

Solar panels and water heating on the kitchen roof

One of our aims in creating our new Conservation Village was for it to operate on a carbon neutral basis. During construction we used local stone in the buildings and gathered fallen trees from within the reserve to use wherever possible. We even managed to buy some reclaimed thatching poles to use for roof supports and some structural supports. All aimed at minimising the ecological impact of the buildings.
We're particularly proud of our solar panel system which provides more than enough power for lighting in each student tent and the main communal kitchen, dinning room etc as well as powering laptops and computers we need for our research.
In typical African style we have used some basic practical methods for heating water for showers etc. As can be seen above we've simply put a coil of large bore piping up on the kitchen roof, which uses the sun to heat water. Of-course, we also need some way of heating water on cloudy days and have added a wood fired donkey. It may be 200 year old technology but a donkey is very efficient, using just a few logs to heat a tank of water for a morning shower.
All the wood that we use for fires comes from fallen trees or from alien tree species that are being eradicated on the reserve as part of a conservation initiative. A win win, we get a great supply of fire wood and no indigenous trees are harmed.

Written by Will Fox

New Conservation Village a huge success

View from the main lounge door across the village showing two permanent tents

Our new conservation village is officially open and is already up and running with conservation assistants having moved into to their new accommodation and loving it. Conservation training and research is now based in our new home.
As can be seen from the picture the village is set in a magnificent valley within the Thaba Tholo Wilderness Reserve. A remote location, that puts us right at the centre of our leopard research zone. It couldn't be in a better place.
Students share two bed tents, each located within the treeline. There is a central kitchen and separate lounge tent, together with a lapa for relaxing at the end of the day.
The current team are already growing herbs and ensuring that the game species that visit the village each day are comfortable with their new neighbours. I stayed over after the grand opening night party and was intrigued to hear kudu warning barks during the night, followed by the tell tale calling of a leopard near by. Wonderful sounds to hear which had the research team heading off in that direction the next morning to try to identify which leopard was around.

Written by Will Fox