Life and death in the African Savannah

I hear murmurs of excitement as we round a bend and standing in the road in front of us is a dazzle of Zebras, including a very young foal. We watch them grazing for a while, happy to see them content now with the heat of the afternoon having passed and recent rain providing new shoots of grass on which they feed. Quite suddenly, sharp eyed tracker Phanuel, exclaims he’s spotted a Cheetah, lying underneath some bushes just 100 meters away. We drive off into the veld and indeed; a male cheetah lies there full bellied and snoozing under a bush.

It is always so special to see a cheetah, as so few exist in the wild today. We sat captivated, observing his beautiful spots, delicate whiskers and distinct red-orange eyes that look straight through you. Surprise and joy of the cheetah aside however, the crowd pleaser of the afternoon remained the zebras, who were still grazing near the road a short way off, and in particular the young zebra foal, who after hopping around in play started nuzzling its mother and began to nurse. The collective “aww” was soon interrupted however, when we realized that the cheetah too was watching the youngster suckling. The cheetah’s body language changed in an instant and suddenly he was on his haunches, directly facing the dazzle of zebras. We sat in anguish for the following minutes that passed as, completely oblivious, the zebras grazed ever closer to the predator lying in waiting. We had previously semi-discounted the cheetah from hunting due to his full bellied, panting nature, but what a turn of events this was to be. It goes to show how opportunistic these rare animals are however, because without warning, he leapt up and shot off, scattering zebras every which way, his eyes on one individual only…the foal. Over in just seconds, the dust settled to present the cheetah and foal lying in a tangle on the ground, the cheetah’s mouth clamped firmly onto the foals neck, suffocating it to death.

What happened out next was truly heart rendering as the rest of the zebras re-grouped, recognised their missing foal, and came back in search for it, calling out their desperate, shrilly whine, loudest of all it’s mother. They soon found their quarry, lifeless at the feet of a cheetah, and apart from snorting alarms and calling out, they recognised that the situation was helpless, and left the area, heads down, whining in sadness.

Action over, the cheetah panted hard in recovery and then eventually pulled the foal by its tail, beneath a small bush to feed. As if convinced that a nearby predator or scavenger must have heard the zebra alarm calls, he nervously looked all around, in anticipation of an approaching predator coming to steal his kill. None arrived however, but we left before it got too gory, my guests heartbroken at the loss of the young animal they had grown so fond of that afternoon. Such is life and death in the African savannah. 

Lucky to survive...the rest of the zebras look on at the cheetah suffocating the foal

Checking for approaching danger

Is that Ostrich flirting with me?

“Big-5, big-5!” requested my guests on arrival, and the Big-5 we certainly did see. But it wasn’t a member of the Big-5 that proved to be the star of their safari, but rather a bizarrely behaved female ostrich. Ostriches are not prolific in the Sabi Sands, contrast in fact, but for some time now we have been enjoying regular sightings of a female Ostrich who appears to have adventured her way to us from somewhere farther afield in Kruger National Park. 

Approaching our vehicle with great interest

Being the tallest and heaviest bird in the world, the Ostrich certainly is a marvel, but what is odd, is that this gregarious, flock-living bird is here on her own. Odder still is her behaviour, which seems to be getting stranger by the day. It started with her approaching and later chasing game drive vehicles, but more recently her behaviour seems somewhat “courtship” like.

Male ostriches perform an interesting courtship display called ‘kantling’, whereby they squat on the ground and sway from side to side whilst fanning and quivering their outstretched wings. At this signal, if the female likes what she see’s, she too squats and flaps her wings backward, while bending her neck forward and making clapping noises with her beak. I’m rather embarrassed to admit that this was extremely similar behaviour to what we witnessed. The female ostrich approached our vehicle, squatted, bent her neck forward and even made the clapping sound with her beak! This is a bit confusing, because last time I checked I’m quite sure that apart from a feather duster, our green land-rover’s don’t resemble a male ostrich in any way!

Our female ostrich displaying courtship behaviour

A researcher at heart, I did some reading on the subject, and found that indeed behaviour such as this has been observed in ostriches before, albeit in farmed ostriches in England. According to “British Poultry Science”, it was found that 70% of the female ostriches observed in a particular farm reliably “hit on” the humans when they were around! So perhaps in the absence of any males or female friends, our lonely African ostrich is just a bit confused and looking for love.

A short word on love though, and that is, she must be more careful of her choice of partner! Africa is a dangerous place for birds, especially one that shares the open savannah with the fastest land animal on earth – the cheetah. Even with her two-toe adaption for speed, she would not be able to out-run a hungry cheetah, a known major predator of the ostrich. Why then, she has chosen a few times to join us for a date with the cheetah, standing less than 20m away from the enemy fathoms believe! My only explanation is that perhaps she doesn’t recognise the risk…and luckily for her, it seems they haven’t seen her in the food light yet either.

For an ostrich who’s name is derived from the Greek “strouthos”, referring to the (false) belief that they bury their heads in sand, it seems this ostrich really does seem to buck all typical ostrich traits and seems to have exactly that- her head in the buried in the sand.

The Cheetah and the Ostrich....an unlikely pair!