Dave Taylor's African Safari: Dave Taylor's Safari Diary - Samburu / Buffalo Springs

Dave Taylor's Safari Diary
Samburu / Buffalo Springs
Page 11

A short drive past this stop lies the road to Samburu / Buffalo Springs Game Reserve (29 600 hectares/ 73,200 acres). The road was dusty and, in places, washboard-bumpy. Kids waved at us, but not all of the waves were friendly. Once, a pair of African donkeys bolted out in front of us giving us a real scare. We took all of this in stride and enjoyed the drive.

This was my second trip to these parks. I had been there in 1988 and I looked forward to seeing them again. The country is drier than the Serengeti and is characterized by scrub bush and patchy grasslands. This year it was greener than I'd seen it or expected it to be. It appeared that the wetter than usual conditions that delayed the Serengeti's wildebeest migration were also going to affect animal behavior here too.

During the wet seasons, animals do not congregate in large herds around water holes. They don't have to because there is water everywhere. This means that safarists see fewer animals spread out over wider areas. That was certainly true in Samburu. We did see small herds of oryx, Grevy's zebra, reticulated giraffe and gerenuk. We didn't see any buffalo at all as they had migrated out of the park. That didn't concern us as we'd come to see the first four species mentioned.

Unique Animals

Beisa oryx can be aggressive antelope when they encounter a predator. These horse-like animals have long, straight tapering horns. Lions have been found dead, impaled by oryx. It is a risky proposition for a lion to tackle one of these antelope but it can be done. We saw one lion kill where the oryx lost the battle.

Grevy's zebra may or may not be a zebra. In overall shape, it resembles a large donkey more than the more horse-like common zebra. It has a much finer stripe than the zebras you see further south. Its behavior is quite different too. Male Grevy's zebra maintain a territory whereas the common zebra stallions collect a harem of females that stay with them for seven or eight years. Another difference between the two is that the Grevy's is an endangered species. Less than 10,000 exist and the number is declining.

Reticulated giraffes are one of three races of giraffe that can be seen in Kenya. The most common is the Masai giraffe. It can be seen in Nairobi National Park, the Serengeti-Mara ecosystem and other, more southern parks. It has blotchy, star-like spots. The reticulated giraffe has dark, square-like spots and is found in the NFD. The third is the Rothchild's giraffe whose pattern resembles the reticulated giraffe except that the spots do not go down its legs. It appears to have white stockings on. Rothchild's are only found in Lake Nakuru National Park where they were introduced from Uganda.

Gerenuk are long-necked antelopes that stand on their back legs in order to feed on tree leaves that would otherwise be out of their reach.

Two Nights at the Samburu Lodge

As much as I enjoyed photographing these animals, the real surprise came after dark. The cat-like genet and its larger relative, the civet, both visited the lodge. They were the first I'd ever seen and were not bothered by my flash.

We spent the next day on two game drives. The first began at 6:30 and lasted until after 10 am. We encountered a cheetah and two cubs towards the end of the drive. She’d just made a kill and the cubs were busy dining on the impala while mom watched.

The afternoon was spent swimming in the pool and sketching the vervet monkeys that seemed to have the run of the camp. Then, at 3:30, we went for another drive and re-photographed this park’s "special" animals. We also watched a blue-necked Somalian male ostrich as it pecked for food. The highlight was a leopard lounging in a tree at sunset. Elephants were a common sight.

Select a Page:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19