The monkeys woke me up early again this morning. I guess I should just be thankful that they haven't got into our room yet. The girls had their room ransacked because they left chocolate and biscuits out everywhere so a pack of monkeys just came in through the windows and went through all of their belongings. Occasionally I'll come into our common rooms and see one hanging around the kitchen waiting for someone to leave or drop something, but other than that they haven't posed a real problem for me.
The morning we spent feeding some of the animals in the predator encampment. A horse was brought in, shot, and then cut up with a machete and distributed to the white lions, Shemba and Nala, the cheetah, the tiger parents, and the lion/tiger cubs. It was smelly but entertaining work and I got a couple good pictures and videos of the animals going crazy once they get the meat. For some reason, they still think that it's a live animal and they take the measures to strangle or ensure that it's dead before they start actually eating it.
The late morning shift was a lot of fun. We went out for another game capture, in order to give any animals we caught an anti-tick booster. Over the course of the two hours we were out there, we had four rounds of animals rounded up and come through our nets. As always, William the game warden would ride around on his motorbike and "push" herds toward our trap, which was a semi-circle of nets surrounded by dense thickets on either side. The first two rounds were two blesbok in each, and I would run in and grab either the horns or the back two legs while other people held the animal down from other places. The third round was an adult blue wildebeast and a calf, but the adult one plowed through all three walls of nets and got away, unfortunately. She stayed there and watched from afar as we held the calf down to give it the injection, but then the calf was reunited shortly thereafter. The last of the four rounds was an additional three blesboks. Every time, the animals would run down and plow into the nets unaware, usually ripping the net poles out of the ground and dragging them a little ways until they got tangled and stuck. I kept having to use my bowie knife to re-sharpen these stakes so that we could more easily drive them into the ground over and over. William tried to get a pack of five giraffes to come down the hill into our trap, but they didn't come close enough.
After lunch, we had more predator interaction and went into the enclosure with the now-stuffed white lions, Shemba and Nala. We hung out with them for a little while while William de-ticked them, and then we moved on to held feed the bachelor male lions (kept separate to prevent inbreeding, since most of the lions at Kwantu are related). We were going to go interact with the three tiger adolescents, but because of the meat stench in the air they were too rowdy to go in with. Instead, we went and played with Hobbes, the not-cub-not-adolescent tiger in the enclosure next to the cubs. After dinner, I tried once again to unsuccessfully use the internet at the Kwantu hotel, but when it wasn't working a few of us just went for a swim instead. It was a colder evening, so I just comfortably read and hung out on the patio instead of trying to escape the heat inside.
The morning we spent feeding some of the animals in the predator encampment. A horse was brought in, shot, and then cut up with a machete and distributed to the white lions, Shemba and Nala, the cheetah, the tiger parents, and the lion/tiger cubs. It was smelly but entertaining work and I got a couple good pictures and videos of the animals going crazy once they get the meat. For some reason, they still think that it's a live animal and they take the measures to strangle or ensure that it's dead before they start actually eating it. 
The late morning shift was a lot of fun. We went out for another game capture, in order to give any animals we caught an anti-tick booster. Over the course of the two hours we were out there, we had four rounds of animals rounded up and come through our nets. As always, William the game warden would ride around on his motorbike and "push" herds toward our trap, which was a semi-circle of nets surrounded by dense thickets on either side. The first two rounds were two blesbok in each, and I would run in and grab either the horns or the back two legs while other people held the animal down from other places. The third round was an adult blue wildebeast and a calf, but the adult one plowed through all three walls of nets and got away, unfortunately. She stayed there and watched from afar as we held the calf down to give it the injection, but then the calf was reunited shortly thereafter. The last of the four rounds was an additional three blesboks. Every time, the animals would run down and plow into the nets unaware, usually ripping the net poles out of the ground and dragging them a little ways until they got tangled and stuck. I kept having to use my bowie knife to re-sharpen these stakes so that we could more easily drive them into the ground over and over. William tried to get a pack of five giraffes to come down the hill into our trap, but they didn't come close enough.
After lunch, we had more predator interaction and went into the enclosure with the now-stuffed white lions, Shemba and Nala. We hung out with them for a little while while William de-ticked them, and then we moved on to held feed the bachelor male lions (kept separate to prevent inbreeding, since most of the lions at Kwantu are related). We were going to go interact with the three tiger adolescents, but because of the meat stench in the air they were too rowdy to go in with. Instead, we went and played with Hobbes, the not-cub-not-adolescent tiger in the enclosure next to the cubs. After dinner, I tried once again to unsuccessfully use the internet at the Kwantu hotel, but when it wasn't working a few of us just went for a swim instead. It was a colder evening, so I just comfortably read and hung out on the patio instead of trying to escape the heat inside.
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