Suddenly, however, a group of ten hyenas of the Lakeside Clan materialized out of the night and came racing in tight formation towards the battle ground. This group was small, but it was within its territory and the hyenas, as they ran to defend their “rights”, were confident and aggressive. The unruly mob of Scratching Rocksters retreated hastily, leaving behind their badly wounded victim. For a short distance the Lakeside Clan pursued them, but once they had crossed the boundary into Scratching Rocks territory they stopped, uneasy on foreign soil.
Meanwhile the Scratching Rocksters, once they were well within their own territory, also stopped, and the two rival clans faced each other, both sides keeping tight formation. Each individual held its tail curled stiffly over its rump, and the low growling whooping calls sounded louder and louder in the night air. And all the time both clans were swelling in numbers as more and more members, attracted by the calls of battle, hurried to the scene.
Suddenly I saw the shadowy forms of Bloody Mary and Lady Astor rush forward, side by side, and a moment later the rest of the clan was behind its leaders. For a short while the Lakesiders held their ground, and there were loud roars and shrill giggling, chuckling sounds as hyenas briefly attacked and chased each other in the skirmish. And then the Lakeside Clan retreated, running back into its own territory. After chasing for a short distance the Scratching Rocksters, who had once more crossed their boundary, began to feel uneasy and they stopped. Again the two clans faced each other, the whooping calls filling the air until the Lakesiders, reaching a peak of frenzy, rushed forward to renew hostilities. Another brief skirmish and then the Scratching Rocks Clan once more retreated into its own territory.
And so it went on, each clan surging forward in turn behind its leaders and then suddenly breaking and rushing back from the aggressive charge of the other. Eventually there were between thirty and forty hyenas on each side, and the cacophony of their weird calls, the rustling and pounding of their heavy feet, the menace of their dark shapes were everywhere around us in the moonlight.
Twenty minutes from the start of the affair the skirmishing suddenly ended and members of both clans moved farther and farther into their own territories, some occasionally glancing back over their shoulders as though to make certain there were no further infringements of the boundary.
Innocent Killers Hugo and Jane van Lawick-Goodall.
Hunting dogs.
We run because me must …
We run because we like it
Through the broad bright land.
Charles Sorley
But that morning the pack simply looked for anything it could catch. Moving along in a ragged front, they now settled into that inexorable trot, which in its determination has an almost sinister force. Black clouds roiled ahead and the hounds bounded toward them as if their play in the Elysian fields was ended and they were now returning to a Stygian world. A herd of wildebeest appeared, a dark mass moving ponderously under the glowering sky. The dogs halted, scrutinizing the herd intently. I knew that they were looking for a small wildebeest calf. They spotted one, less than two months old and still in its light-brown natal coat. Blacky took the lead as the pack moved closer at a steady lope. Then, when the dogs were about four hundred feet from the herd, they bunched up and stealthily walked closer, their ears retracted, their heads lowered but with muzzles pointing forward, while the wildebeest stood looking at them. The dogs reminded me of a gang of toughs just before a fight. The formation has an important function. A slowly moving, bunched pack can approach prey more closely than a scattered one. Suddenly the tails of the dogs whipped up and the pack dashed at the herd, which wheeled and fled in a compact mass. The wildebeest ran slowly, at about twenty-five miles per hour, the calves crowding the flanks of their mothers toward the middle of the herd. Dogs must scatter the herd to reach a calf, and they now raced behind and beside it, yipping with excitement, each animal an integral part in this cooperative effort. When the herd circled, two dogs met it from the front. This was enough to split the herd and a fragment of it with a calf veered to one side. The pack immediately concentrated on that calf. At first its mother tried to place herself between the dogs and her offspring, but soon she just ran along, trailed by her doomed young. While two dogs nipped her legs, one of the others bit the calf in the thigh and pulled it to a standstill. Within seconds the others tore at its rump and abdomen. The chase had lasted only half a mile. The female wildebeest ran on. She stopped briefly to look back when her calf bleated, but then hurried after the departing herd. Ten minutes later, the first dog set off for home, his belly full, and five minutes after that the last dog abandoned the untidy remains to a hyena. And at the den the pups and their mother awaited their share. The morning’s hunt had required only six miles of travel.
Golden Shadows, Flying Hooves George Schaller.
Hugo van Lawick followed the fortunes of a pair of golden jackals, Jason and Jewel, and their pups Rufus, Amba, Cinda and Nugget.
The first disaster to strike the Jason family occurred when the cubs were about ten weeks old. Jason was curled up near the den and the cubs were spread out insect-hunting nearby. It was a cloudy day with no sun to throw a warning shadow, and none of us saw the black shape silhouetted against the grey sky until it had half folded its wings to dive. Then we heard the air whistle through its feathers as it plummeted to the ground. For a split second the jackals froze, but when they heard Cinda’s terrible scream as the eagle’s claws gripped her they ran – the other cubs towards the den and Jason towards the eagle.
Slowly the bird, a bateleur eagle, carried the screaming Cinda off the ground whilst Jason ran along underneath, his head pointed up as he watched the drama above, unable to help. The bateleur is one of the smaller eagles and it had difficulty in gaining height with its comparatively heavy burden. Suddenly it let go of its prey and Cinda hurtled to the ground. I felt certain that she would survive neither the wounds made by the eagle’s talons nor the impact of landing – for she had fallen some twenty feet.
Jason at once ran to the place where Cinda had landed, in a patch of high grass. I drove over there too when Jason looked calmer, but I saw no sign of Cinda. For the remainder of the day I watched the rest of the family without enthusiasm. For the most part the cubs lay around the entrance of the den, and twice they darted down when birds flew overhead. Jason went off hunting and, eventually, the sun sank. As I lay waiting for sleep that night I could still hear the whistling of wind through folded wings and Cinda’s terrible scream; and I could still see the small golden body crashing down from the sky.
At the den next day life continued as if nothing had happened. Jewel slept in a clump of grass, Rufus hunted insects and Nugget played with a stone, holding it with his front feet as he lay on his side and pawing it with his back feet like a cat that plays with a ball of wool. Then he played with Amba when she came over to try and groom him. Jason was not visible, and I presumed he was out hunting.
Two hours after arriving at the den I started as a small figure slowly appeared from the den. It was Cinda. She walked stiffly, and when I examined her closely through my binoculars I saw she had a deep cut under her chin. I could see no other visible injuries. She blinked in the sunlight and then lay close to the den entrance. After a while Amba groomed her.
Cinda’s wound turned into a nasty abscess and for nearly a week she was lethargic. Jewel and Amba frequently licked the place, however, and Cinda’s health gradually improved until, three weeks later, she was back to her normal self….
When last I saw Cinda she was curled up a few feet from her mate, near the fifth den of her cubhood. Jane and I had seen her courtship consummated – she at least lived to propagate Jason’s fighting blood in her offspring. The tropical dusk was giving place to darkness, and I was about to turn the car and drive back to camp. Suddenly, in the distance, I heard a jackal howling. It was joined by another and then another. When the trio quietened their neighbours took up the strange high-pitched call, and then I heard m
ore jackals to the south, and two more to the west. Finally Cinda and her mate howled, sitting side by side. Their duet, to my ears at least, was the last.
How difficult for man, despite his efforts, to learn the secrets of the animals he studies. The howling of the jackals, back and forth across the plains, probably shouted the information I so badly needed. “Here am I, Jaaason. And Jewel toooo,” might have been the message from the west. And perhaps Nugget and his mate had answered from the east. But I was a mere human and it would take me months of research to piece together the information which Cinda, in those few moments, had stored away in her golden head. I sighed a little as I turned the car and drove back towards camp.
Innocent Killers Hugo and Jane van Lawick-Goodall.
Colobus Monkeys
The worst foe of the colobus is the big monkey-eating eagle (Nisœtus bellicosus), a grand bird, but one of which the monkeys live in terror; a single eagle will keep a whole district in an uproar, for when monkeys are frightened they let the world know it. I have not actually seen the bird in the act of killing, but the Wandorobo say it is a wonderful thing to watch: the eagle, having marked the presence of a family of colobus, floats down to a convenient tree, and perches to await his chance. Presently he sees it, and makes his stoop, to use the falconer’s term; if he misses the quarry he returns to his chosen tree and waits while the monkeys storm at him with all the power of their lungs; and their lungs are distinctly strong. This goes on for a long time, the eagle trying to seize a young colobus. The males show courage in dealing with their enemy; an old monkey will jump at him if he chance to pass below, and I have little doubt that if he made a good shot and alighted on the bird he would quickly get the best of it; his weight on the back of the eagle in flight, and the use he would make of his teeth, must give him an easy victory.
The obvious way for the monkeys to find safety, one might suppose, is to seek cover among the undergrowth where the eagle could not get at them; but to do this would be to leave the frying pan for the fire. If the monkeys had the wit to hold their tongues they might take cover thus; but, as a friend – the best bushman I know – points out, to come to ground would simply mean falling into the jaws of that other foe of monkeys, the leopard. When the uproar begins on arrival of the eagle, the leopard well knows what it means, and is sure to be on the spot to take advantage of the occasion; the colobus, jumping at the eagle, may come to ground and the leopard is waiting for him.
A dweller in the lichen-clad trees of the high grounds, it will be supposed that the colobus is difficult to catch; so he is while he remains in the large timber, but, unfortunately for himself, he likes a change of diet at certain times of the year, coming down to the bamboo region which is about 9,000 to 11,000 feet, and once there he becomes the prey of the Wandorobo. These people mark down a troop feeding in the bamboos, and assembling with their dogs above the victims to prevent retreat to the big trees, drive them carefully down the mountain-side as far as seems necessary. Then, closing in, the men make a rush at some bamboo on which a monkey is feeding, and shake it till he jumps, either to another bamboo or to the ground. The latter seldom happens, for bamboos grow thickly and the colobus is as good a jumper as the rest of his kin; so the hunt goes on, the quarry shaken from one bamboo to another until at last he misses his grasp and falls to the earth, when the dogs seize him, or attack him; the male is no despicable antagonist, and will put up a good fight with a large dog before he is overpowered. I must add that he sometimes gets the best of it and escapes; but many are thus killed.
A Game Ranger on Safari A. B. Percival.
Birds
Bird watchers the world over are drawn to the alkaline lakes of the Rift Valley to see the flamingos which gather on their shores; over an estimated million have been observed at one time on Lake Nakuru. Another favourite haunt is Lake Bogoria, formerly Hannington.
In the full moon, at the mouth of the spring, there appeared a group of pale bodies, constantly moving about, while from the dim waters of the lake beyond others swam in and yet others swam out again. In the clear light they were faintly and exquisitely pink, and they had a strange aura of radiance. They were Lesser Flamingos come to drink fresh water at the mouth of the stream and as I crept towards them, fascinated, more and more came, and the murmur of their calling swelled. Crawling on hands and knees I was able to reach a point only thirty feet or so from them, and there I lay content, bitten to pieces by mosquitoes but forgetful of all but the strange scene before me. In the moonlight the colours of their bodies were largely lost but for the pale pink radiance. They swam in to the spring, calling excitedly, from the open lake, they drank, and then swam out again. From time to time some wader would start them all into panic and they would rush out in a body with wildly flapping wings, only to return in a minute or two. When at length the mosquitoes penetrated my fascination as well as my skin it was half past three in the morning and I had been lying beside the water for hours. I crept back to bed, profoundly thankful that I had come.
In the morning, when we woke, the flamingos were still drinking at the mouth of the stream, and there were other clusters of them at the outlets of all the small geysers along the bank and wherever any other source of fresh water ran into the lake. It was my first intimation of the drinking habits of the Lesser Flamingo, and I have since learned that they must have fresh water and that they chiefly drink at night, and will continue to water until quite late in the morning if supplies are short for the numbers of birds present. On this day drinking continued until about eight o’clock and, when the birds had finished, they stood about the shore in flocks of up to a thousand together.
If the scene in the moonlight had been strangely and secretively lovely, the early morning spectacle was well-nigh unbelievable. As the sun rose over the Ngendalel escarpment so it lit up first a bay filled with a broad band of drinking flamingos and then picked out, one by one, the countless birds that were still swimming and feeding on the open waters of the lake, until the whole expanse before us was covered with moving shimmering pink. We tried to count them, but gave up in despair; I should now say that there might have been fifty thousand birds in a bay two miles across and about as long, most swimming on the water like miniature pink swans, but many clustered on shore in a dense band like some enormous flower bed. I have seen greater numbers of flamingos elsewhere and a greater spectacle at the same spot, but I can remember nothing that produced quite the same unexpected impact of transcendent beauty as the rising sun that morning.
The Mystery of the Flamingos Leslie Brown.
The dance of the whydah birds.
But the most interesting birds we saw were the black whydah finches. The female is a dull-coloured, ordinary-looking bird, somewhat like a female bobolink. The male in his courtship dress is clad in a uniform dark glossy suit, and his tail-feathers are almost like some of those of a barnyard rooster, being over twice as long as the rest of the bird, with a downward curve at the tips. The females were generally found in flocks, in which there would often be a goodly number of males also, and when the flocks put on speed the males tended to drop behind. The long tail hampers the bird in its flight, and it is often held at rather an angle downward, giving the bird a peculiar and almost insect-like appearance. But the marked and extraordinary peculiarity was the custom the cocks had of dancing in artificially-made dancing-rings. For a mile and a half beyond our camp, down the course of the Kamiti, the grassland at the edge of the papyrus was thickly strewn with these dancing-rings. Each was about two feet in diameter, sometimes more, sometimes less. A tuft of growing grass, perhaps a foot high, was left in the centre. Over the rest of the ring the grass was cut off close by the roots, and the blades strewn evenly over the surface of the ring. The cock bird would alight in the ring and hop to a height of a couple of feet, wings spread and motionless, tail drooping, and the head usually thrown back. As he came down he might or might not give an extra couple of little hops. After a few seconds he would repeat the motion, sometimes rema
ining almost in the same place, at other times going forward during and between the hops so as finally to go completely round the ring. As there were many scores of these dancing-places within a comparatively limited territory, the effect was rather striking when a large number of birds were dancing at the same time. As one walked along, the impression conveyed by the birds continually popping above the grass and then immediately sinking back was somewhat as if a man was making peas jump in a tin tray by tapping on it. The favourite dancing times were in the early morning, and, to a less extent, in the evening. We saw dancing-places of every age, some with the cut grass which strewed the floor green and fresh, others with the grass dried into hay and the bare earth showing through.
Nine Faces Of Kenya Page 39