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Bhejane Trust hosted the first meeting in many years on the status of the rhino in Sinamatella. A big thanks to the National Rhino Co-ordinator, Mrs Diana Marewangepo for the effort she put in to attend this meeting. The meeting covered the history of the Black Rhino in Sinamatella, their current status, what is being done to protect them, and what is required to secure their future. It highlighted the achievement of our Rhino Monitoring and Protection Unit over the last few years, and also brought out the urgent requirement for more rhino monitoring units in the field. We will be following up the recommendations of this meeting
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With the assistance of a TLB from Tulley Huntley-Walker, we levelled all the gravel piles along the worst sections of road in the Chamabonda, and hopefully we now have a full all weather road along the vlei - the next rainy season will telll!
Otherwise all waterpoints are working well, and the game is starting to return to the vlei - without a controlled burn this year we did not have a "green bite" to attract the grazers early on. Next year!!
We have essentially completed our work program here for 2021!
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Scenes from the hyena den in the Chamabonda
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The Kazuma is probably one of the least visited Parks, but is looking stunning , with the Depression having been burnt and the wildlife on and around it. There are herds of Zebra, Tsessebe, buffalo, wildebeest and elephant to be seen, plus a variety of other species.
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Insiza Pan - our recently installed pump system
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Beautiful Kazuma!! Top - very pleased that 4 hippo have now taken up residency in the Corner Pan
Middle - Views on the Depression
Bottom Left - an Oribi - the only place to find them in Matabeleland. Right - the pan in the middle of the Depression still holding water
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Onias as usual has been busy with Parks deployments and maintaining the waterpoints.
He has just cut a new road of 14km from Tsamhole Pan to Big Toms - this proved a bigger job then expected and Parks came to the party with the motorised grader. This now puts Tsamhole, Big Toms and Little Toms on one loop - a vast improvement for both management and tourism!
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The Barn Owl under the basin at Little Toms hide has proved a prolific breeder, and no sooner had one lot of chicks flown and she was into the next brood!
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Like a lot of people in these extraordinary times, I’m usually happy if I can spot something that seems to be a return to some sort of normality. In our game water work in August we met with exactly that - but it didn’t make us all that happy. Elephants, as they do almost every year, decided that in spite of the nearness of a nice pool of water, it would be much more fun to dig up and destroy one of our pipes and create a new and interesting pool, with extra mud, nearby. Usually they target Masuma and we quickly hear of it but this time they cleverly attacked Grassy Pan, way off the beaten track, and it was a good many days before we found and repaired the damage. Our game water team had a long and very muddy day replacing over thirty meters of pipe and re-burying it. So far the elephants have left it alone.
Grassy Pan wasn’t our only repair of the month but it was the only one we could blame on something other than the pump equipment itself. After years of experience we still mention from time to time how we can install a solar pump then go away and leave it and every day it will supply water at no cost and no effort on our part. It isn’t true though – solar is great but it does occasionally go wrong (of course) and it does sometimes need some effort from us to keep it working. We had three incidences of that in August, inverters that started behaving erratically at Bumboosie South and at Gurangwenya and a low-water probe fault at Inyantue Dam. Gurangwenya and Inyantue were both fairly easy to fix and we think we have sorted out Bumboosie South. However, if I believed in bad luck and evil spirits I would certainly think Bumboosie South was cursed with both. Over the years we have probably had more problems there than anywhere else in spite of completely changing the pump, motor, inverter and even the solar panels and their frame! We will monitor it in September and hope for the best.
Our other big game water headache has always been Masuma where demand usually outstrips supply but a new installation that went in during August might have made a significant difference. Thanks to funding facilitated by Friends of Hwange, Forster Irrigation installed a battery system on the number 1 borehole which allows it to pump 24 hours a day. The battery is nothing like we had expected. I imagined a cleaner and bigger version of the things that (sometimes) start our cars but in fact it looks a lot more like a small fridge with a lot of complicated wiring. We built a shed to house it and I would include a picture of the setup but a) there isn’t enough room in the shed to stand back and picture the whole thing and b) it would be boring. Not at all boring though is the flow rate. We are getting around ninety thousand litres per day which is not as good as we used to get with the diesel-powered mono pump but it needs no fuel so we can run it throughout the year if we need to and should be able to keep the dam looking nice for much longer through the dry season than we could previously.
Wildlife.
We are still finding animal sightings are down on normal for the time of year. Amazingly there is still natural water from the rains available in places, so the animals are not yet concentrated around the water points. The buffalo herds seem to join together as the dry season progresses, eventually forming a herd of a thousand or more. It’s hard to hide that many animals and we have seen them quite often recently. Here are some of them down on the Sinamatella flood plain, grazing as they steadily move towards the Sinamatella Pan.…..
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We had a closer than usual sighting of an elephant as we were cleaning the solar panels at Mafa’s Pan. A single big bull came past us on his way to the pan, walking within about thirty meters of us and only a few meters of the car. We were obviously too insignificant for him to notice and he neither slowed down nor sped up and didn’t even turn his head, just plodded by as if we didn’t exist. Sue, of course, was ready with the camera but sadly even her photography can’t show what a privilege these wildlife encounters are……
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Closer to home, and closer to us, the resident Red-headed weaver has started nesting again under our veranda at Sinamatella, forcing us to watch where we sit at mealtimes. This is him…..
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And here is his mate inspecting progress with the building works……
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The Sabi stars by the tourist office are in full flower……
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Sinamatella Camp may not be as beautiful as it used to be but the view is as good as ever…….
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RHINO MONITORING & PROTECTION UNIT
Report By Nick Long
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During the month of August we did a total of 22 patrols, 18 of these being Rhino monitoring patrols and 4 being anti-poaching patrols. A total distance of 487.68 Km were covered throughout the month, 402.01 being Rhino monitoring and 85.67 being anti-poaching.
The bush is drying out fast, and tracking is getting easier and we managed to locate some of our rhino . Last month we set a whole lot of camera traps and we had great success with them as we captured several rhinos and even an unexpected video of a mother and calf which was great to see. We had a good month all told on rhino sightings and feedback.. For security reasons we obviously canot disclose too much on the rhino, unfortunately.
We received 6 new camera traps from John Gillon of the Hwange Conservation Society, these are very different from the ones we have been using as the have a white flash as opposed to infra-red. This should allow us to get better night pictures and higher quality as well, Thank you for your support.
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It was a very quiet month on the poaching side
Two men were arrested at Jambezi near Victoria Falls in possession of a pangolin skin - they had caught the pangolin, killed, skinned and eaten it, and were hoping to sell the skin. They are awaiting sentencing.
A dead elephant was found in the Deka Safari Area with the tusks still intact - cause of death unknown.
Otherwise some snares have been picked up around the Deka area
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We have had an amazing period of support from all our friends, new and old, out there, and we really appreciate all this support. Our heartfelt thanks to (in no particular order):
Frank Zindel of the Bright Light Foundation and a longtime supporter has made a very generous donation, which is very much appreciated.Thanks to Stuart Danks of Simply Africa for facilitation
Friends of Hwange and Dave Dell for sponsoring the borehole and new battery system at Masuma
Patrick Jacquemin for his donation to help our operational costs.
Mark Unwin and the Clarkson Family Trust, for yet another generous donation.
Lion Recovery Fund and Rhino Recovery Fund - a big thanks to Peter Lindsay and Markus Hofmeyr
Morne and Michelle Muller of Surgical and Opthalmic Supplies for their pledge of support for this year
Piet Weller, through Lionel and Annelise Finaughty for the offer to sponsor a wateroint in Kazuma in memory of Wessels Weller
Larry Norton for his offer of a percentage of sales of certain prints to go to the trust.
Dr Mark Bristow and Hunters and Guides for the financing of our Rhino Monitoring and Protection Unit. Mark came out and pledged assistance for a further three years!!!
Simon and Portia Rowlands - donation to refurbish attendants accommodation at Shumba
SATIB and the Southern Africa Conservation Trust for their support on insurances - thanks to Brian Courtney
Ian Gloss of Victoria Falls Liquorama for his continued assistance
Pieter and Anthea Erasmus for their continued support, and for the use of their vehicle Thanks for the donated equipment.
Michel Buenerd of Le Pic Vert, and Le Pal Nature Foundation, for funding their eleventh borehole and pump in Sinamatella/Robins area!
Antoinette van Wijk of Holland for her sterling fund raising effort
Nicholas Duncan and the SAVE The African Rhino Foundation of Australia – a staunch supporter.
RAM Petroleum
Jim Goddard of JRG for monthly diesel donation
Ricky Forster and Forster Irrigation of Bulawayo for donated pumps and continued assistance
John Karasellos of Hisspan Motors for his continuing assistance and support.
Hwange Conservation Society (UK) - John Gillon - for their generous support
Inke Kreling-Boysen for her generous donation
Mike Karasellos for grading and mowing roads in the Chamabonda
Mark and Shelley Burden for their donation of borehole casing.
Craig Gobey and Zambezi Sands Drilling for the donation of a small boat and engine for anti-poaching on the Zambezi River
Brendan Malloch-Brown - gravel and transport for the roads in Chamabonda
Michelle Sindall for her donation ( which finally reached us a month late!!)
Sandy Elsworthy for his donation
Machaba Safaris for their hospitality and assistance
Thanks to our Board of Trustees for all the hard work they are putting in - Ian Gloss, Dave Carson, Dan Jones, Stephen Long, Jerry Gotora and Trevor Lane
A big thanks to Ministry and Parks Staff :
Minister of Environment, Climate, Tourism and Hospitality, the Hon. Nqobizitha Mangaliso Ndhlovu
The Director General - Mr Fulton Mangwanya
The Chief Conservator - Mt Arthur Musakwa
The Cluster Manager (Mat North) - Matabeleland - Mr Samson Chibaya,
Area Manager - Zambezi --Mr Marvellous Mbikbiyana
Area Manager, - Robins and Kazuma - Mrs N Moyo
Area Manager - Sinamatella - Mr Mutandwa
and all their guys on the ground for all their support and assistance.
To my wife Liz for her continual support in all my comings and goings!!
Apologies if we have inadvertently left anyone out!! Your help is much appreciated
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Bhejane Trust relies on donations to continue it’s operations, which includes our daily operating costs, as well as specific projects.
PLEASE HELP!!
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Donate to help us save our wildlife heritage - any donations would be gratefully accepted . Donations can be through our “PayNow” button (below) or direct to our bank account:
Bank details :
Bhejane Trust,
FBC Bank,
Sawanga Mall
Victoria Falls
Zimbabwe
Branch Code : 8512
Swift Code : FBCPZWHAX
Account No : 2245093780275
Bhejane Trust office address:
231 Sopers Crescent,
P.O.Box 210
Victoria Falls,
Zimbabwe
Note - we do not have postal codes in Zimbabwe (00)
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CONTACT DETAILS
Trevor Lane : trevor@bhejanetrust.org +263 777 057 024
Stephen Long : stephen@bhejanetrust.org
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