Unusual Critters
There is a small mammal that is found in the Serengeti which I am not sure we have ever captured on camera-trap or if we have most of you won’t have got the chance to classify them as the capture rate will be very low.
It is not because they are rare or even that elusive, visit the Serengeti or any number of suitable reserves across Africa and you will bump into these odd little creatures. It is just that they are very restricted by their habitat which is rocky outcrops.
The mammal I am talking about is a relative of the elephant, yes that’s right, the largest land mammal is cousin to this rabbit sized African curiosity, the hyrax otherwise known as rock rabbits or dassies. It seems that the two species split some 70 odd million years ago so plenty of time to both specialise in their own way. However one odd trait the hyrax retained was a long gestation period (7 months) more similar to larger mammals. Compare this to scrub hares that have a gestation period of around 42 days. New born hyraxes are extremely well developed and commence eating grass within a few days of birth. Unusually for a small mammal life expectancy is long, up to 12 years.
Rock Hyrax
Photo Credit: Max Pixel; creative commons zero- cco
There are two species of hyrax we could encounter in the Serengeti, the rock hyrax (Procavia sp) and the bush hyrax (Heterohyrax brucei). In fact they can even be seen side by side sunning themselves on rocks. Although they both make their homes in rocky outcrops the two have decidedly different life styles. The rock hyrax eats predominantly grasses and rarely strays far from rocky out crops, conversely the bush hyrax eats mainly leaves, twigs and bark which it climbs trees to eat. The two species however live in colonies in rocks and in the Serengeti at least these colonies can be a mix of both species. The rocky retreats act not only as safety from the many predators that eat hyrax but also offer a way to thermo-regulate.
It’s a wonder that these closely related species don’t hybridise but it seems they have extremely different genital structures as well as the differing dental work needed to cope with the different diets. All species have long sharp upper incisors that are often used in dominance scuffles, hyrax can be very bad tempered and those incisors can inflict serious damage.
Bush Hyrax showing incisors
Photo Credit: Peter Steward, Flickr CC-BY-NC2.0
Living in a relatively small area and in colonies has lead to some interesting behaviour amongst hyrax. They use latrines which are thought to be centuries old. In fact you can often spot the white stains on the rocks of an active colony.
All in all a fascinating little creature, if you are ever faced with a snapshot image with rocks in, take a good look to see if you can’t see a hyrax sitting there.
Kori bustard; Strutting its stuff in the Serengeti.
I found this series of captures from one of the Snapshot Serengeti camera-traps. It shows nicely the way a kori bustard cruises around the savannah looking for things to eat. With males reaching up to 19kg these birds are Africa’s heaviest flying bird. In order to get airborne these birds need a lot of space as they must run to gain momentum. Once airborne their big powerful wings mean they can fly at quite a speed. However they only fly when pushed spending most of their time walking sedately through grasslands.
Found in two main pockets, south, south west Africa and east Africa they favour flat arid open country. The Serengeti plains are ideal habitat. Here they amble around looking for a wide variety of food eating berries, seeds and other plant matter as well as lizards, snakes, rodents and birds. They are known to gather in quite some numbers where there are infestations of locust or other insects. Like other large ground birds recent fires also attract them where they search for scorched or injured small animals. Kori bustards are known to drink water using a sucking motion which is unusual for birds.
Not unexpectedly for such a large bird, they do not roost in trees preferring to bed down on the ground which is also where they build their nests. However they do like to choose a feature to build their scrape of a nest near, perhaps a rock or tree stump or even a clump of grass. Not such a silly idea to choose a landmark in an otherwise featureless landscape.
A kori bustard chick is precocial meaning it can walk around almost as soon as it is born, very important for ground nesting birds. It shares a common trait with other ground nesters of having a cryptic plumage completely different to the adult plumage that helps conceal the young from predators. The stripy baby is also very cute.
Credit: Photo by Mehgan Murphy, Smithsonian’s National Zoo (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Although the kori bustard does very well in the Serengeti outside of protected areas they have suffered like so many other animals from a reduction in numbers through loss of habitat and falling prey to hunters.
Wonderful Wildebeests
Wildebeest
I thought I would write about wildebeest this week, it seems we take them for granted a bit. Certainly on Snapshot Serengeti they generate about the most images and it has been commented in the past “No, not another wildebeest”. The Serengeti is after all world famous for its wildebeest.
But what do you know about them, other than the roam around in large herds and get eaten by lions, leopards, hyenas and crocs?
Well ecologically they have evolved in a fascinating way. They are heavily dependent on water, never straying more than 20km or so from it. However, their square looking lips are designed for nibbling at short grass swards that are found in drier, fire maintained grasslands like that of the Serengeti and they are unsuited to wetter areas of equatorial Africa where grasses become tall and rank. They are bulk grazers that operate in large herds. Wildebeest are not especially fast runners having a body shape that favours their digestive tract, instead they rely on the size of the herd for protection. Unlike their close cousins, the hartebeest who are designed to outpace predators, wildebeest have proportionately shorter legs and males develop sturdy thick necks.
We have all seen footage of the migration with nervous looking wildebeest stampeding along, hell bent on reaching their destination. What you may not know is that this mass getting together stimulates the rutting state in both sexes. In amongst the moving herds males try desperately to mark out and keep a small territory from which he cavorts around noisily evicting other males and trying to impress a few females to mate with. The problem is he has to keep moving with the herd so these territories are very temperal and really only exist in his mind and he has to move on every day or so in order to keep up with the ladies. There are always a few males left in the wake of the procession that get caught up with fighting each other and trying to hold territories without realising the females have all gone. Once the migration has reached its destination everything calms down a bit and things get back to normal, breaking up into smaller groups until it’s time to do it all again.
Wildebeest no longer exist in their historic numbers. They are particularly affected by land use changes, susceptible to domestic live stock diseases and are targeted by poachers. Their dependence on water, quality short grasslands and large herd size means they don’t fare well on marginal land. However it’s not all bad news. Wildebeest are well represented in national parks across their range in Africa.
Snapshot Serengeti 