September 2019

SEPTEMBER 2019

September, spring month, has come and gone. Like last September, I was hoping to get some spring rains but, alas, it was not to be. We had a few cold fronts come through but they were not moist enough to bring rain although those in the latter part of the month were very cold (down to 4 degrees centigrade!) due to snowfall further south on the Drakensberg range. The photo above was taken facing north from the Miner's Cottage during one of those cold fronts and, as you can see, it is very dry and everything that grows is waiting in anticipation for the first rains. I've had more than one of Finsbury's old timers tell me that they have never seen the river levels quite so low as they currently are, although the fishing has still been pretty good.

Anyway, even though I was away for almost half of the month, I still managed to see and experience a whole bunch of interesting wildlife. Below is a gallery of some of it:

One of the very first trees to flower in the springtime is also one of the most common trees on the Estate, the Ouhout (Oldwood), Leucosidea sericea from the Rose family. Although the Rose family is a large one, it is not well represented in Southern Africa with this species, the African Almond, Prunus africana, three species of Rice Bush, Cliffortia spp and a few indigenous Brambles, Rubus spp the only indigenous representatives on the Estate. We do, though, have at least ten species of exotic Rosids present on the Estate, some harmful and being removed and some naturalised. Two notable naturalised exotics are flowering now, the beautiful pink blossoms of the Peach, Prunus persica, dotted all over the riparian areas of the Estate, and the lovely white blossoms of the Apple tree, Malus pulima, found at the parking spot for M3 near Morrin Pools (Unit 14). The Ouhout is an encroaching species, which means that, although it is indigenous, it will dominate areas that have been disturbed in the past, in our case through mining or alien plant removal. In pristine mesic grasslands they still occur but in much smaller numbers. In these areas they have historically been used as an indicator species: the spots along the mountain streams in which they occur are optimum habitat for the release of Rainbow Trout, Oncorhynchus mykiss!    

I have been rather lucky with my spider sightings in the last year or so with the discovery of a new species almost every month. This is a common and widespread species, the Wolf Spider, Lycosa sp, and although it is strictly only active during the night, it is easy to find by it's brightly reflecting eyes in torch light. These spiders are hunters and do not use silk and web to catch their prey but instead roam the countryside in search of arthropod prey on which they pounce and subdue with their venom. They are easy to identify because they have three rows of eyes: a lower row of four smaller eyes, above that a row of two large eyes and above that, another row of two large eyes. Another identification aid is the fact that the female carries her egg sack with her while she is out hunting. When the spiderlings hatch, they remain on their mother's back until at least after their first moult, very much like scorpions do.

Sticking to arachnids, this is a photo of a Red Spider Mite of the Tetranychidae in the subclass Acari (Ticks and Mites). The picture is of poor quality because the mite has had to have been magnified many times just to get a look at it. With it's legs outstretched it still does not reach two thirds of a millimeter! Although so tiny, this mite is an enormous pest on plants as is sucks the contents of individual plant cells dry, mainly because of its breeding habits where a female, sexually mature at only five days old, lays up to twenty eggs per day for her lifespan of about a month. They are also very difficult to find on plants because of their small size and the fact that they reside on the underside of the plant's leaves. One giveaway is the presence of silk on the plant that is spun by the mite to protect itself from predators and the elements.

This is an underwater shot of two different species of Mayfly nymphs in a fast flowing stream originating from Goudkoppies. They are easily identifiable due to the three hair-like filaments protruding from the rear of the abdomen and the seven pairs of gills sticking out the sides of the abdomen. They belong to one of the most primitive insect orders, the Ephemeroptera which means "winged for but a day". The nymphs (above) may take up to two years to mature but once the adult emerges from the water it will only live from a few hours to a few days, depending on the species, with its only function to find a suitable mate. Even though these insects are small and unnoticeable, they should be well known to the Finsbury folk as they are the primary insect imitated by artificial flies used by fly fishermen. The nymph is imitated with wet flies and the adult is imitated with dry flies

The beautiful but tiny little flowers of the Clumpy Strawflower, Helichrysum caespititium, which grow in the form of little mats lying flat on the ground in shallow soils. They occur all around the office area on the Estate, particularly around the helipad and the rain gauge, and also atop the highest peaks where the soil is shallow and rocky. This little plant was found to be useful in medicine as a anti-microbial agent at the turn of the century when a new phloroglucinol was isolated from the species. A phloroglucinol is an organic compound that is used in the synthesis of pharmaceuticals and explosives. This was an important discovery since the cytotoxicity of contemporary antimicrobial drugs was a huge problem, and H. caespititium offered a solution. If you google the genus you will find endless information of the traditional and scientific uses of the plants. The genus consists of almost 250 species in Southern Africa, with the majority in the Fynbos biome and 19 species, so far, here on the Estate, with at least ten more to identify. Many species are particularly suitable for dry flower arrangements and are commonly known as Everlastings, Paper Flowers or Strawflowers. 

I visited Mike and Angela from Lone Tree Cottage (Unit 3) one evening to glean as much information as I could on the grasses found on the Estate, Angela's specialty. Besides having a ball, I also encountered some of their local fauna. This one is a Silver-striped Hawk Moth, Hippotion celerio, from the Sphingidae. Hawk moths are rather special lepidopterans from their sleek beauty to their speed to their pollinating specialities. They are among the fastest of insects with flying speeds up to 18 km/h and they are one of only four nectar feeders that evolved the ability to hover before a flower. The others are Hummingbirds, some bats and Hoverflies. Also, rolled up beneath their chins, they have a long probiscid (the Hummingbird Hawk moth's is almost 30 cm long!) used to suck nectar from flowers. In the early evening when a Hawk moth is preparing to forage, it will begin vibrating it's wings to warm up it's muscles. Then it will fly out into the evening and locate flowers mainly by scent. About 30% of Southern Africa's Orchids rely on moths to pollinate them. Orchids are specialists in securing very specific pollinators through their intricate flower design. Many orchids have very long spurs protruding from the back of the flower with nectaries right at the end of the spur. Only Hawk moth species with probiscids long enough will normally be able to reach this energy rich food source and so complete pollination more acurately as soon as it flies to the next flower, which will most often be of the same species. Clever, huh?

This was another one the fauna we encountered at Lone Tree Cottage that night. It is a Wahlberg's Velvet Gecko and it featured in my blog in March this year. That one I stumbled upon outdoors at Kingfisher Lodge (Unit 6) and this one is almost always indoors. Look at the colour difference, this one is much paler! Besides being spectacularly beautiful, this chap certainly is the biggest danger to that Hawk moth that I photographed just prior to this. His strategy is to lie in wait near the artificial light and ambush insects attracted to the light, which are mostly moths!

Another insect that is frequently attracted to artificial light is the Red Driver Ant, Dorylus helvolus. The one pictured above is the male who flies about at night in search of the scent of a colony. He looks more like a wasp than an ant and if you pick one up, it bends it's abdomen towards your fingers as if it is going to sting you. But never fear, there is no stinger! The colony, however, is filled with females only and they look like normal ants with big jaws...and stingers! The colonies normally consist of a couple of hundred thousand minor and major workers and soldiers but they can become huge, especially in central and east Africa, where they can consist of up to 50 million individuals! In places where the colonies become so big there will be certain times in the year when there is simply not enough food for them so they become nomadic and move through the bush in huge columns overpowering and consuming everything in their path. Even small vertebrates and immobilised large ones too. The first and only time I ever saw a marauding colony was a few weeks ago in the coastal forests of Kosi Bay, northern Kwa-Zulu Natal. Some Masaai in Kenya even guide these marauding colonies through their villages where they devour all pests from cockroaches to rats! The east Africans even use the soldiers' jaws as emergency sutures on open wounds: they hold the wound together, pick up an ant and force her to bite on each side of the wound, then break her body off. This is repeated along the length of the wound and the jaws remain attached and seal the wound like sutures. Anyway, once the male finds a colony he lands among them where they immediately rip his wings off and carry him back to a queen in the nest. 

What a great shot of a Brown Hyaena, Hyaena brunnea, taken by the new camera trap up on the junction of Loop road and the Cycle path, and at 08h00 in the morning! Although associated with more arid areas, this scavenging carnivore can survive in a wide variety of habitats. Although they scavenge alone mostly, they live in extended families where the previous offspring stay with Mom for a few generations, helping to raise the next offspring and the next. Males are more prone to leave the clan and the bigger and more successful of them roam around huge areas as rogues. The females in the clan do not mate with clan males, since they are all related, they only mate with these rogue males who are welcomed by all clan members during female oestrus cycles. Unlike their larger spotted cousins, Brown Hyaena do very little hunting of their own and if they do, it is for small mammals and other vertebrates, otherwise they are strict scavengers.

Another carnivore caught on the same camera trap last month, a Serval, Leptailurus serval. The grasslands of the Estate are optimal habitat for this solitary hunter of rodents. Upon hearing a rodent busy in the grass, usually from four or more meters away, the Serval will stand dead still until it pin-points the rodents position with those huge ears. Once it is sure of its prey's position, the spotted cat will launch itself into the air, up to two meters up and as far as four meters, and land directly on top of it's victim!

But what made these camera trap sightings so special is the time/date stamp. This Rooikat, Caracal caracal, appeared on the scene, in the same place, less than one and a half hours after the Serval, also sniffing around. Much more powerfully built than the Serval, the Caracal prefers a more wooded habitat than our grasslands and subsequently is much rarer than the Serval here on the Estate. The Caracal targets much larger prey items too, up to the size of a Common Duiker, which it can hoist into a tree just like a Leopard. So that's three special carnivores photographed by the camera trap up on Loop road in less than three weeks. Groovy!

Graeme Naylor from Cochy-Bondhu (Unit 1), a lover of orchids and all else natural, showed me an epiphyte orchid growing on the trunks of forest trees close to the Majubane waterfall. I told him I would keep an eye on them and photograph the flowers when they bloom. Well, Graeme, is it not beautiful? It is a Polystachya ottoniana orchid and all the other flowers were still just buds while this one had just opened by the last day of the month.

That's it for this month. Let us hope that October is the month that we get decent rainfall so that the water levels can increase and all this life that is on hold, will burst forth. We look forward to your visit...