South Africa is suffering from one of the worst droughts the country has ever recorded, and the Pilanesberg National Park has not escaped its ravages. This was the view over the bone-dry Ruighoek Dam at the time of our visit at the end of December 2015.
Our end-of-year 2015 holidays were absolutely packed to the brim. Apart from our ten-day visit to the Kruger National Park (read more about our time at Lower Sabie, Olifants and Shingwedzi in December), we also made day trips to five other reserves, and will be sharing photos from those (except Suikerbosrand, which we introduced in a post all of its own) daily through the month of February, in a series we call “a month of monochrome memories”.
DeWetsWild 
Dis darem maar sleg as dit so droog is!
Verskriklik om te sien, Ineke. En sekerlik honderd maal erger om daardeur te leef…
Ek wonder hoeveel water daar nou in is?
Ons was 2 weke gelede terug Pilanesberg toe, en dankbaar om te kan se Ruighoekdam het toe mooi water gekry in die tussentyd.
It’s hard to hit the *like* button on this one 😦
Drought is such an ugly business…
Monochrome adds a very dramatic emotion to this photo and accentuates the dry, barren starkness of what I imagine is a bountiful landscape during better times…
Pilanesberg is indeed a very scenic reserve Jane, right in the transition between the dry western and wetter eastern parts of South Africa, but to see it this dry was worrying…
Must be very hard on the animals. I hope weather patterns are less harsh this year.
We do too Jane. Our summer rainfall season is almost at an end, and getting through the dry winter is of great concern.
Dis vreeslik droog selfs hier by ons!
Die droogte gaan ons duur te staan kom, dis verseker.
Scary stuff. Glad some rain has come along
Every drop helps Cal, but with the end of the rainy season almost in sight you have to wonder how they’ll cope through autumn, winter and spring…
Dis ongelukkig siklusse in die natuur,waaraan mense weinig kan doen.Pragtige foto,Dries.
Dit is so Dina, maar mens kan ook nie anders as om te wonder hoeveel ons self doen om daardie siklus te vererger nie.
Jy is heeltemal reg.Oorbevolking,oorbeweiding,ontbossing…al hierdie dinge dra by dat wanneer ‘n erge droogte toeslaan,dit bitter moeilik raak om dit te bestuur.
What an awful shame. What is happening??!!
The weather prophets blame El Nino for the current dry cycle, Lois. That’s little comfort for the people and animals suffering though.
My sister lives in California and they’ve had it rather bad, also. Climate change? The black and white adds to the starkness of the area. Hope things get better.
The experts blame El Nino, Pat, and probably exacerbated by global warming. We seem to be setting new record high temperatures and record low rainfall with alarming regularity these days…
Very sorry to hear about the drought – hope it breaks soon.
We returned to Pilanesberg this past weekend Maamej, and happily they had some good rains since December, Some other areas of the country have not been as lucky yet.
Inspiring… 🙂
Thanks Drake