Tag Archives: wildlife

Winter in Mokala: The Mammals

No mention of Mokala National Park would be complete without bringing up the amazing diversity of mammals, large and small, that find sanctuary there. Several of them are species rarely encountered in most of our other reserves and it is not for nothing that Mokala’s tagline is “where endangered species roam”.

Blue Wildebeest

Buffalo

Eland

Gemsbok

Giraffe

Giraffes

Kudu

Kudu calf

Plains Zebra

Plains Zebras

Roan Antelope calf – such long ears!

Roan Antelope

Sable Antelope

Slender Mongoose

Springbok

Steenbok

Tsessebe

Tsessebes

Vervet Monkey

White Rhinoceros

White Rhino cow and calf

Come along as we go on a game drive through the Mokala National Park:

We’ll soon be announcing a very exciting spring-time tour to the Mokala National Park – do keep an eye on DeWetsWild’s facebook page so that you don’t miss out!

Winter in Mokala: Stofdam Hide

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Almost smack in the middle of the Mokala National Park you will find the Stofdam Hide; an excellent place to stop for a while, stretch your legs and wait for the wildlife to come to you instead of driving around to find them.

Walkway to Stofdam Hide

The Stofdam Waterhole

Acacia Pied Barbet

Pin-tailed Whydah

Egyptian Goose

Red-billed Quelea

Red-billed Queleas

Red-billed Firefinch

Red-eyed Bulbul

Violet-eared Waxbill (female)

Neddicky

Blue Waxbill

Black-faced Waxbill

Black-faced Waxbills

Black-faced Waxbill

Springbok

Chacma Baboon

Grey-headed Sparrows

Common Duiker

Fiscal Flycatcher

Orange River White-eye (thank you Don Reid for helping with the ID!)

Green-winged Pytilia

Vervet Monkey

Red-billed Firefinch

Cape Wagtail

Cape Glossy Starling

White-backed Mousebird

Black Springbok

Springbok

Female Red-headed Finch

Impala

Warthog

Yellow Canary

This is a little compilation of sightings Hannes and I had one morning at Stofdam while visiting Mokala earlier in June.

We’ll soon be announcing a very exciting spring-time tour to the Mokala National Park – and we’re sure to spend some time at Stofdam on that trip! Do keep an eye on DeWetsWild’s facebook page so that you don’t miss out!

Winter in Mokala: Birdwatching

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The Mokala National Park has a very healthy population of birds, and even in winter with all the summer migrants having left for warmer parts of the globe Hannes and I still managed to tick 66 species without much effort during our recent 4-night stay.

Ant-eating Chat

Burchell’s Sandgrouse

Cardinal Woodpecker

Common Scimitarbill

Familiar Chat

Gabar Goshawk

Kalahari Scrub Robin

Mountain Wheatear

Pale Chanting Goshawk

Rock Martin

Scaly-feathered Finch

Violet-eared Waxbill male

Violet-eared Waxbill pair

Yellow Canary

Yellow-bellied Eremomela

If you are a bird lover you are in for a treat, because we’ll be sharing even more of Mokala’s bird life tomorrow.

We’ll soon be announcing a very exciting spring-time tour to the Mokala National Park – Do keep an eye on DeWetsWild’s facebook page so that you don’t miss out!

Winter in Mokala: Quintessential Africa

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The scenery in Mokala National Park seems purpose-built for a television documentary on Africa, and I might be biased but there’s no continent with more beautiful sunrises and sunsets than ours.

Mokala Gold

Roan Antelope in silhouette

Camel Thorn

What a sunrise!

Brightness in winter

Mokala’s plains

Camel Thorn Tree with Sociable Weaver nest

Gemsbok on the plains

An Aardvark was busy here digging up the road!

Kniekie Loop

Tsessebe silhouette

Umbrella Thorn silhouette

Come take a drive with us through this beautiful national park:

We’ll soon be announcing a very exciting spring-time tour to the Mokala National Park – do keep an eye on DeWetsWild’s facebook page so that you don’t miss out!

Winter in Mokala: Familiar Pririt

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This female Pririt Batis was also a regular visitor to Chalet #1 in Mokala National Park’s Lilydale Rest Camp when I visited along with Hannes Rossouw last week, but she was a lot more demure than the Chestnut-vented Warbler I showed you two days ago.

Female Pririt Batis

We’ll soon be announcing a very exciting spring-time tour to the Mokala National Park – do keep an eye on DeWetsWild’s facebook page so that you don’t miss out!

Winter in Mokala: Peeping Tom Gecko

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On the last night of our visit to Mokala National Park last week I found this Bibron’s Thick-toed Gecko on the floor of the bathroom in Lilydale Rest Camp’s Chalet #1. I didn’t question it about its intentions but I did carry it outside to more suitable habitat. The towel was a very necessary precaution; she’s a biter!

Bibron’s Thick-toed Gecko found at Lilydale in the Mokala National Park

We’ll soon be announcing a very exciting spring-time tour to the Mokala National Park – do keep an eye on DeWetsWild’s facebook page so that you don’t miss out!

Winter in Mokala: A very chummy Chestnut-vented Warbler

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This little Chestnut-Vented Warbler came to welcome us to Lilydale’s Chalet 1 immediately on our arrival – Hannes and I hadn’t even unpacked the car yet! Invariably it would appear in a flash every time we stepped outside. So habituated was it that it would peck crumbs from beneath our hands where we sat eating sandwiches on the deck outside the chalet, offering wonderful opportunities for up-close views of a bird species that is notoriously frustrating to photograph because it never sits still!

This little Chestnut-vented Warbler was a frequent visitor to the deck in front of our chalet at Lilydale in the Mokala National Park

We’ll soon be announcing a very exciting spring-time tour to the Mokala National Park – do keep an eye on DeWetsWild’s facebook page so that you don’t miss out!

Winter in Mokala: Lilydale Rest Camp

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I am fresh back from a mid-week visit to the Mokala National Park in our Northern Cape Province with friend and colleague Hannes Rossouw.

We stayed in the beautifully situated Lilydale Rest Camp, where our chalet – # 1 – had a lovely view over the Riet River. Truth be told, all the chalets in the camp as well as the dining room behind reception have equally good views of the fast-flowing stream down below.

Chalet #1 in Lilydale Rest Camp

Chalets in Lilydale Rest Camp

Lilydale’s reception building

Lilydale might be built to provide a comfortable stay to human visitors, but it seems to be even more popular with Mokala’s wildlife – from tiny birds to kudus paid us a visit during our stay, and I’ll be telling you more about three of the cutest visitors in the next three posts on DeWetsWild.

Warthog family enjoying the green grass next to Lilydale’s swimming pool

Rock Hyraxes sunning themselves on a ridge below our chalet

This little Chestnut-vented Warbler was a frequent visitor to the deck in front of our chalet at Lilydale in the Mokala National Park

A Small-spotted Genet came by in the early evenings after we finished braaiing

This is one of two Kudu bulls that regularly ventured into camp after dark

We’ll soon be announcing a very exciting spring-time tour to the Mokala National Park – do keep an eye on DeWetsWild’s facebook page so that you don’t miss out!

Agapanthus

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Genus Agapanthus

The genus Agapanthus, known as Blue Lily, Star of Bethlehem, Lily of the Nile and African Lily in different parts of the world, is a family of flowering plants consisting of between 6 and 10 species that occur naturally in southern Africa, though they’ve been spread to nearly all corners of the world due to their popularity as garden plants. These are hardy plants, relatively pest resistant and easily propagated. Agapanthus plants grow to about 1m tall. It contains chemical compounds that are useful for a wide range of medical conditions, ranging from inflammation to coughing, explaining why it is so widely used in traditional medicine and folklore.

Incidentally, the winner of this year’s Chelsea Flower Show Plant of the Year was an Agapanthus bred here in South Africa by another De Wet (no relation, as far as I know).

Common Dwarf Gecko on an Agapanthus-leaf

Agapanthus

Mole Snake

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Pseudaspis cana

The Mole Snake is a large snake – it may grow to 2m in length – that kills its prey, which includes small reptiles and mammals like moles and rodents, by constriction. Left unmolested, Mole Snakes are harmless to humans; in fact they’re very useful to have around as an effective control measure for pests. Attempting to catch one by hand however is likely to end up in deep bite marks that need stitches to close.

Mole Snakes get their name from their habit of staying mainly underground in animal burrows, where of course they also find their preferred prey. They mate in spring and females give birth to between 20 and 90 live babies in autumn. Males will fight each other viciously.

Mole Snakes are widely distributed in Africa south of the equator and occur all over South Africa. The IUCN considers it to be of least concern.