July 2019

JULY 2019

July has come and gone and, although we did have a couple of cold snaps where the temperature at seven am was minus three, it was pretty mild. Almost all July's days were typically blue-sky sunny days like the one above of Mount Anderson viewed from the top of the waterfall near the Miner's Cottage (note the cottage in the bottom left of the picture). I have spent a lot of time in the area where the picture was taken during the month with my team moving in to eradicate the Pine plantations on the road to the Cottage. Exposed life is at it's minimum during this time but I still managed to photograph a bunch of interesting goodies:

Walk the mid to high altitude grasslands in the middle of winter and you will be forced to notice the small bush with yellow flowers dotting the landscape. They are Gnidia canoargentea from the Thymelaeaceae, a family of mostly poisonous plants with floral tubes with sepals attached, represented on the Estate by at least three species of Gnidia, the Mountain Gonna, Passerina montana, and the showy Pom Pom  Tree, Dais cotinifolia. The more common, summer blooming Gifbossie, G. caffra, is poisonous to livestock and well-known to local farmers. Of the 150 species of Gnidia, more than half are endemic to Southern Africa. 

Can you see it? Mostly just the eyes! I'm sure most of you know the Crab Spider, Aniphops of the Selenopidae, from their habit of lying flat on your bedroom wall and running sideways, like a crab, when frightened. In the wild, they are found on and among rocks, under which they take refuge when not active. Unlike the Aranea, who represent more than half of spider species and spend their active and resting time in or around their silken webs, the other group of spiders, the Megalomorphs, of which this is a member, roam freely and hunt for food like a leopard would, sneaking up to and pouncing on it's prey. With a modus operandi like this, concealment is of utmost importance and this little chap has it just right!

This skull and horns are the remains of an Eland who succumbed in the high altitude grasslands near Goudkoppies some time ago. Hollow-horned ruminants, which include all antelope type ruminants from a buffalo, bison, musk-ox to a goat, duiker and a steenbok, form the Bovidae family of ungulates (Mammals that walk on their tippy-toes). What differentiates them from the moose, elk and deer-like ungulates of the Cervidae, the other family in the group (Ruminantia) mostly from the northern climes, is the fact that the bovid's horns are solid bone attached to the skull with a keratinous sheath enveloping them, whereas the Cervids who grow horns (called antlers), grow them for a season then shed them afterwards. The keratin that makes up the horn sheath of the bovids, is made up of the same substance that makes up our hair and fingernails and there are only a few animals that can digest this hard type of protein and they are all insects or smaller organisms, eg: fishmoths, clothes moths and some protazoans and bacterium. In this case, the female Horn Moth, Cetratophaga vastella from the Tineidae, lays her eggs on the horns of a dead bovid and on hatching, the larvae burrow into the keratin and devour the horn sheath. The caterpillars construct tunnel-like cocoons from silk, strengthened with faecal pellets and collectively, these cocoons hang off the horns resembling dirty dreadlocks! Once the pupal stage is complete, a small, pale, slender moth with a pom-pom head emerges. Once all the keratin is consumed, we are left with bleached skull with horns like in the old western movies! 

Brrr! We certainly have had some chilly mornings during the month of July with the mercury showing minus three degrees on at least three occasions. Andries Maphanga, our New Holland tractor operator alerted me to these beautiful grass-blade popsickles at the base of the splashing water tank at Vakatsha (unit 9). 

This Cormocephalus centipede from the Scolopendridae was exposed and disturbed by me when clearing rocks up near Goudkoppies. I always feel guilty when accidentally exposing myriapods (centipedes and millipedes) in the dry season because they are very primitive and cannot retain moisture. Insects, being more advanced, have evolved a waxy substance covering the cuticle that helps retain moisture, allowing them to be exposed during dry times. Myriapods, however, need to make sure they are protected from water loss during these times by hiding in damp and shady areas under rocks and beneath vegetation. If a centipede can manage this consistently they may live to the ripe old age of ten years or more! They are predators, unlike millipedes, and use their antennae to search out any suitable invertebrate prey and when located, it will subdue it's victim with a bite from it's pincer-like "forcipules", forelegs modified into hypodermic stabbing tubes. These forcipules contain venom glands and believe me, a bite from one is as bad as a sting from a scorpion. No human deaths have been recorded from a bite from a centipede although those allergic to bee stings should take precautions against these critters as well. Because of their secretive lifestyle and nocturnal habits, centipedes are not often encountered but this is deceiving because, after spiders, they are the most common invertebrate predator in most terrestrial habitats. So common, in fact, that a vertebrate predator in the form of a snake, the Cape Centipede Eater, Aparallactus capensis, has evolved to prey exclusively on centipedes. These snakes are rather common on the Estate 

In my June blog I mentioned a bunch of succulents that can be encountered during the colder winter months. This was one of them, a Crassula swaziensis. They are pretty common throughout  the Estate at all altitudes in exposed, rocky situations. They are extremely popular garden plants for their hardiness, beauty and ease of propagation from cuttings. The leaves, which form rosettes, are bright green when moisture is abundant and become dark maroon during dry times.

An old abandoned nest of a Drakensberg Prinia, Prinia hypoxantha, pointed out to me by Dennis Jooste of Coch Y Bundhu (unit 1) and situated on the small island in K32. About 130 species of South African bird construct ball-shaped nests but the situation (in rank bush just over a meter above the ground beside water), the knitted construction (as opposed to woven) and the dimensions of the nest suggest it belongs to the Prinia. These little birds are monogamous (male and female stay together for life) and construct the nest together, share incubation duties and both collect food for the chicks, a real team effort. Many small birds that construct ball-shaped nests, particularly waxbills and sunbirds, build their nests in close proximity to the papery nests of social wasps referred to in my previous blog. These aggressive wasp neighbours aid in keeping predators away from the bird's nest. This is understood to be a commensal relationship which means it is one-sided as the bird benefits while the wasp is not positively or negatively affected. But when I handled the nest to confirm it's dimensions, a "foundress" Umbrella Paper Wasp (see June blog) and a couple of  her helpers emerged and flew away. I obviously disturbed them while they were over-wintering within the safety of the abandoned bird's nest. Maybe the relationship between the bird and the wasp is not entirely commensal. Maybe it is sometimes mutual as both parties benefit from the labour of the other, the bird benefiting when the wasp scares a predator away and the wasp benefiting with a safe refuge to over-winter. I did not find the remains of a wasp nest nearby but the scene is many months old...

The dainty corpse of the small Grass Jewel Blue butterfly, Freyeria trochylus, floating in M18, the water's surface tension not allowing it to sink. Before finding himself in this situation, the common male Grass Jewel vigorously defended a territory by perching on an exposed twig or grass stem and attacking and chasing away all other male Grass Jewels that entered the area. while females were herded within the territory until they were mated with. The females then searched out the larval food plant, Indigofera sp. (and in the lowveld, the beautiful String 'o Stars, Heliotropium stuedneri), and laid an egg on it so that the larva would have a ready food supply upon hatching. Lying on it's back with head turned, all I needed to see was it's tongue lolling out!

Another beautiful flower blooming in the winter time is the Starry Strawflower, Helichrysum spiralepis, found in medium to high altitude grasslands throughout the Estate.The small bushes are attractive both when the flower is budding with it's dark maroon buds (R) and once it has opened it's pale lemon flowers (L).

A minature geranium, Pelargonium dispar, showing different stages of leaf development. The green leaves in the rear are new leaves emerging while the beautifully coloured leaf is an old one on the way out. Also visible are a few that are dead already The striking flower is that of a typical Pelargonium and can be found in and around forest fringes in late summer and autumn. This small individual is completing it's first year of growth and will flower for the first time at the end of this approaching summer.

While having lunch one day high up on the Rock Kestrel Trail, I looked down to see this caterpillar spinning a web of supportive strands of silk to house it's pupa (chrysalis) in the corner of a broken rock. After hatching on it's larval food plant, the ravenous new larva of the butterfly first consumes it's egg shells before getting tucked in to the food plant. When it has eaten until it's skin is so stretched that it may burst, the caterpillar will shed it's skin and emerge with a looser skin and a bigger head and the first thing it does as it enters it's second instar is eat the discarded skin of it's previous instar, a great recycler!. This process is repeated until the end of it's fifth and final instar when it will leave it's host plant and find a suitable spot to enter it's pupal stage. This is where the above caterpillar finds itself in the photo. Once at has secured itself sufficiently, it's skin will harden and the caterpillar begins the pupal process where it's body liquidises and reforms into an adult butterfly that will emerge, mate and repeat the process. I think this is the caterpillar of one of the Whites from the Pieridae. 

In my April blog, I posted a photo of a Ladybird beetle eating an aphid and spoke about how important they are as predators of aphids. Above is a photo I took of an winged aphid, probably a rare male that hatched at the end of autumn. I say rare because it is the only time we get to see the male as he searches for batches of eggs to fertilise. During the spring and summer months, the female, after reaching maturity within a week of hatching from her egg, will bare two to four young parthenogenetically (meaning as clones without fertilisation by a male) per day! Thank goodness for the Ladybird beetle and the Lacewing larvae (Check the May blog) because , without predation, the number of parthenogenetic offspring from one adult female and her offspring will be around 210 to the power of 15 in only one year! That is an unimaginable number!! Only at the end of the season do they bare male offspring. In fact, many species of Aphid in the world do not ever produce males and breed only parthenogenetically. On the day that I photographed this individual they were everywhere, getting tangled in my hair and beard and getting into my ears. Bring on the predators!

Many of you would have noticed a breeding herd of Greater Kudu, Tragelaphus strepsiceros, hanging around the central area since the fire almost a year ago. These two youngsters, photographed by the water tanks for Otter's Rest (unit 10) and Elsmere (unit 11), are two of four that were born on the Estate during the summer. Kudus certainly occur here although usually only for short periods of time before moving back to the more wooded habitat found in Nooitgedacht and Rivendel and sometimes big bulls stay here more permanently. But this is the first time that I have noticed them, as a breeding herd, spend so much time here. I think this is because of their habitat shrinking in our neighbouring farms due to the fences that have been erected in Rivendel over the last few years. I don't think the situation is critical because if they were too stressed about it they wouldn't breed so prolifically. And it is certainly great to have them here. Welcome!

The days are lengthening and warming up as winter fades and spring approaches. And as you can see, no matter what time of year you come there is always a lot of life here. Come and indulge. See you then... 

June 2019

JUNE 2019

June has come and gone and the days are already getting longer.The grasslands have dried out as you can see from the above landscape shot featuring Mount Anderson as seen from the extreme north east of the Estate. There's plenty of beautiful dry season flowers blooming, especially the succulents. The aloes are blooming fiercely this season and I have had trouble driving these country roads because my eyes have been on the aloes and not the road, and at 90km/h it can be hazardous to say the least! I won't make it this year but I love to visit Berg-en-Dal camp at this time because it is filled with aloes of multiple species, with myriad sunbirds flittering in a frenzie all about. 

We have winter and summer flowering Aloes here on the Estate and the species currently blooming are featured below together with a bunch of other interesting wildlife I have encountered during my work here in the month of June... 

A bunch of Cliff Aloe, Aloe arborescens (arborescens = tree-like), growing in its typical habitat in the Lower Majubane valley (Note the Majubane waterfall in the distance behind them). This common aloe occurs all the way from the cape peninsula around the eastern mountainous side of the continent up into Malawi. It is probably the most cultivated aloe worldwide as an ornamental and it certainly is easy to propagate from cuttings or truncheons. They also grow happily in the shade and if you hike to the Steenkamps waterfalls, just beyond the rope balustrade, look north and you will see the south-facing slope before you is festooned with these plants. And they only receive decent sunlight in the very middle of summer! In the Orient, these aloes are commonly grown in gardens and widely used as a convenient first aid remedy for burns and abrasions, by applying the jelly found inside the broken leaves to the wound. Also very soothing for sunburn.

Although the spotted aloes are very difficult to distinguish from each other, I think these are Aloe affinis (affinis refering to its close affinity with other spotted aloes) also with the Majubane waterfall in the distance. They only occur within 1200 and 2000 meters above sea level and in between northern Swaziland in the south, Mariepskop in the north, Graskop in the east and Lydenburg in the west. The most proud specimen stands 20-30 meters east of Patrick's gate on the right side of the road as you enter Highland Run.

This spotted aloe, Aloe longibracteata, is the easiest to identify because of its elongated floral bracts (hence the specific name). Otherwise it differs from the previous species by its smaller stature and the flower stalks habit of branching lower down. 

Ha! Look at the long blonde bangs hanging over this little orb-weaver's eyes. She is a Hairy Field Spider, Neoscona hirta, and she's only 5mm long when crouched like this. Once she reached adulthood, she remained in the same web and is waiting for a male to find her. When he does, he spins a small little triangular web on the ground and deposits a little sack of sperm onto it, turns around and picks this up with his pedipalps (arm-like appendages). He then gingerly approaches the females web and tugs on the strands. She naturally responds as if this movement is a prey item snagged in her web so he drops down on a drag-line to prevent becoming a meal. He repeats this process until she realises that it is a male and not prey. He then approaches her and deposits the sperm pack in her genitalia and beats a speedy retreat lest he overstay his welcome and does become her prey. She can store this sperm for the whole season using only what is required to fertilise her eggs and saving some for later use on another batch of eggs. She produces an egg-sack in which she deposits her eggs and guards them until they hatch and reach their 3rd or 4th instar. Once ready, the minute spiderlings climb to the highest point of their mother's web, unfurl a strand of silk and drift off into the wind and into the unknown like a lost balloon. This process is known as ballooning and it is how spiders disperse from their mother's nest. Many perish because they land up in unsuitable habitats but those that survive, often do so very far from their birth place. David Attenborough has even collected ballooning spiderlings, alive and healthy, many kilometers above the earth's surface in the upper layers of the stratosphere!

Another beautifully hairy chap. A Bee Fly from the family Bombyliidae in the Diptera order (flies). They are powerful fliers and excellent at hovering. They get all their nutritional requirements from pollen and they will hover over a flower and gather it without landing. The gravid female will seek out the entrance to a tunnel that houses the eggs and stored food of  the solitary bee or tsetse fly that is it's host and lay a solitary egg there. When the grub, fat and legless, emerges from it's egg, it burrows into these chambers and eats the stored food and the larvae of it's host. Locusts are a host to some species of Bee Fly and the larvae will do the same to the subterranean nest of these pests, making them a "good fly". 

This velvety Eucalyptus Weevil, Gonipterus sp., with it's metallic golden eyes, was trying to overwinter in the dried inflorescence of a Phymaspermum daisy on the Rock Kestrel Trail before I rudely interrupted it. Weevils belong to one of the largest of all insect families but are all easy to identify with their cute look of long (some very long) snout with antennae in front of it's eyes. Touch any species and they will immediately sham death by falling onto their sides with their legs outstretched and remain like that for some time, looking quite dead. Many species are economically important as they are pests on specific crops. This is an exotic species, brought here from Australia together with it's host plant: Bluegum (Eucalyptus) trees. It was thought to be one species, Gonipterus scutellatus, but is now one of ten in the "scutellatus" complex and is still to be formally described. And yes, I wrapped it back up in it's cosy overwintering inflorescence.

Another exotic, this fruit capsule of a Jimsonweed, Datura stramonium, is drying out and in so doing splits open and peels it's sides backwards, exposing the 500 odd little black seeds within. Any movement of the plant, either by wind or animal, scatter the seeds about. I remember my generation calling them the afrikaans name of MALPITTE when I was at school, referring to the hallucinogenic properties of the seeds that make a person mad. All parts of the plant contain dangerous amounts of the tropane alkaloids atropine, hyoscyamine and scopolamine, classified as deleriants. The reason it is not utilised in modern times is because the risk of overdose is high, but in older times it was used by the locals in central america to help them commute with their ancestral spirits. The dormant seeds can be buried and still germinate when exposed many decades later and fire also initiates germination. This was realised in the Kliprots valley this past season after the fire of last August when they just sprouted up everywhere, causing me and my team to stop what we were doing and concentrate on removing these plants before they produced seed. The plants are annuals meaning that they die after producing their seeds, so they are geared to growing quickly and I have found that if a plant is uprooted with small undeveloped fruits, the fruits will still develop, draining all the nutrients from the dying plant. This meant that once small fruits were visible, they had to be harvested from the plant before the plant was uprooted. Over a period of about six weeks we filled 46 fish feed bags with these fruits and with about 1000 fruits per bag and 500 seeds per fruit, we are looking at about 23 million seeds that were removed from the area between K33 south to W6.

A Common Dotted Border butterfly sucking up the sweet nectar of a Wild Aster, Felicia filifolia. These small, hardy shrubs are filled with copious amounts of gay mauve daisies that brighten up the drab winter grasslands. They are particularly common on the rocky, shallow soils around Elsmere on the Spekboom stream. Anne has also successfully planted a few individuals outside the office, behind Simon's quarters, and they are flowering even more profusely than their wild cousins!  

After the aloes, the honey-suckle flowers of the Tree Fuchsia, Halleria lucida, are also an important food source for our sunbirds and sugarbirds. Found in the riparian areas, in the Afro-temperate forests and on exposed rocky situations at high altitudes on the Estate, the Tree Fuchsia is one of our more common trees. The tree is unusual in that it's flowers, then edible but untasty fruits are produced directly from the stem, not from the tips of it's branches like most flowering trees. Fig trees do this too, like our Red-leaved Figs, Ficus ingens, and the Stamvrug, Englerophytum magaliesmontanum, which is not found on the Estate but is plentiful on Klipspringer hill in Rivendell farm on the entrance road. This is a very popular garden plant as it attracts sunbirds to it's flowers and many other birds to it's juicy fruit and it's shiny green leaves are attractive against it's dark, fissured bark.

Another succulent is the Kalachoe rotundifolia, found in the shade in steep rocky situations throughout the Estate. This little crassula grows easily from seed and cuttings and blooms for a long period of time, making it popular as a garden plant as well. Other crassulas that are flowering now to look for on the Estate are the Kalanchoe thyrsiiflora, Cotyledon orbiculata (Also planted by Anne, alongside the Felicia filifolia bushes behind Simon's room) and Crassula swaziensis.

Last year in my winter blog (June and July 2018) I posted a picture and a caption of a Cross-marked Sand Snake, Psammophis crucifer,. It is a blotchy and boldly marked snake that pursues it's prey of lizards and other cold-blooded vertebrates. This month I encountered two individuals of the much rarer plain phase, one where we chop fire wood at the central area and this one that James Mackenzie from Pebble Creek caught at K9. The rarer plain form is found around the Arnot area south west of us and the more common, boldy marked form is found here and south of us. Looks like we are lucky here to have both versions of this active, day-time snake.

This Twin Vapourer moth, Bracharoa quadripunctata, was photographed while resting in the thickets at SPK12. The combed antennae identify this individual as a male, while the females have simple antennae (This is so with all moths). When the female moth is ready to mate she releases and advertisement pheromone chemical into the air and a male, as far away as 100 meters, can detect as little as a nanogram (one billionth of a gram!) of this pheromone with these combed antennae. He will then turn in that direction and fly until he finds the next and the next in a zig-zag  until he finds the female, whence they mate. On the extreme, the male moths of the Silkworm, Bombyx mori, can detect a females advertisement pheromone up to 4,5 kilometers away! 

An Umbrella Paper Wasp, Polistes sp. Vespidae, warms up in the sun. In early spring, an over-wintered female, called a "foundress", begins constructing a nest from chewed vegetation material that dries like paper once it has formed (hence the common name). The nest consists of a pliable petiole that attaches multiple hexagonal cells, each surrounded by a potential six neighbours, to the inner branch of a tree or the eaves of your roof. A single egg is laid in each cell by the foundress and guarded by her until they hatch into immobile larvae with voracious appetites that she has to satisfy with pieces of caterpillar until they enter their pupal stage. The adults that emerge from these pupae are all worker females who are completely subordinate to the foundress and their task is to collect food and protect the next brood. The final brood of the season contains males and females who disperse and find mates. The mated females over-winter to become the next generation of foundresses. What I find amazing about such a simple creature is that when she goes in search of caterpillars for her brood, she actually tracks them down by flying low to the ground in search of caterpillar droppings which are not hidden away like the caterpillars themselves. Once she finds these droppings, she flies upwards into the foliage and searches for the hidden caterpillar responsible for the droppings....busted! 

That's all for this month. The temperature has really been very mild this winter but the temperature has plummeted these first days of July so I suspect it will be cold this month. But there is lots of fire wood so come down and cuddle around the fire during the cold and play in the sun during our beautiful sunny, blue-skied days. See you soon!

May 2019

MAY 2019

The month of May, the end of Autumn and the beginning of Winter has come and gone. During the month sunrises have moved well into the morning and the temperatures have plummeted. It all seems so sudden. But still, we have not had many white mornings with frost covering the ground and it still gets nice and toasty in the middle of the day. And I still managed to encounter a whole bunch of interesting little critters while out there doing my work. Below is some of those that I managed to photograph:

A Black-legged Golden Orb-web Spider, Nephila fenestrata, photographed at the entrance to the Steenkamps Waterfall walk, is well known from the sub-tropical lowveld but not so much from our temperate climes. The massive orb webs they construct can be up to 1,5 meters in diameter and have a distinctive golden silk. They spend their entire time on the web and with the web being so large and the spider around 100mm from leg tip to leg tip that they are exposed to potential enemies more than would be the case for most spiders. To mitigate this, they construct barrier webs on either side of the main orb to make it more difficult for predators to reach them. The hub of the web is the top half of the orb, while the bottom half consists of the ensnaring sticky strands. Carotinoids and others are responsible for the golden colour of the silk and experiments reveal evidence that suggests that sunlight reflecting off the golden silk is attractive to bees. Also, the spiders can reduce the intensity of the pigment, so in shaded areas they spin webs that are more camouflaged with the background foliage, to the vision of potential prey insects because the spectral reflectance of the silk is within the particular range of insect vision. The silk also loses its stickiness with age, so the spider has to spend much time constantly maintaining its web. The old silk is consumed by the spider while she spins new strands to replace them. I remember when I was guiding in the lowveld, I used to tug on the support strands connecting the orb to the surrounding trees to show my guests just how strong the silk was as they watched even large branches sway! In fact, from 2004 to 2007, a shawl was made from the silk from 1.2 million spiders that were collected from the wild and released again a half an hour later, after they had produced their silk. Then in 2012, a cape was added to this and these garments were exhibited at the Victoria and Albert museum in London. Google these. You will be impressed by the beauty of the garments! Now, when you encounter these webs, there are usually other, smaller spiders on them. These can either be males of the species or a different  species altogether. The male Golden Orb weaver spiders are much smaller than the female and after reaching maturity, they leave their webs and find a female's web which usually has other males present already. they then compete until the most dominant male is there to mate with the giant female. Otherwise, if the other spiders are black and silver, then they are from the genus Argyrodes and they are there to feed off of her captured prey. They are kleptoparasitic. Like the government...

Gee, how beautiful is this moth with feathers. I had to disturb it to get it to spread its "feathers" but normally when at rest they are closed tightly together which makes the wings look like sticks. This, together with the long, spindly legs with branch-like protuberances camouflages the moth expertly in its grassy habitat. so, essentially, the Plume Moth, from the Pterophoridae, has fold-up wings.

If you've been up high on the Estate where quartzite boulders dominate, you'll be familiar with the bright orange crustose Lichens growing on them. This is called Firedot Lichen, Caloplaca cinnabarina. As mentioned in previous blogs, Lichens are a group of living organisms made up of a tight symbiosis between a fungus and an algae or cyanobacteria. The fungus attaches the organism to the substrate and can even dissolve some minerals from it. The algae or cyanobacteria provide the organism with carbs produced by photosynthesis and they both absorb water. The mycobiont (the fungal part of the organism) produces spores and reproduces like other fungi but the spore has to meet up with compatible algae before a lichen is formed. Lichens are also very long lived and according to Wikipedia, the longest living organism was a lichen dated at more than 8000 years! Now, in my blog of November 15 2017, I introduced you to the endemic Drakensberg Crag Lizard, Pseudocordylus melanotus. This lizard has bright orange streaks and patches on its body that camouflage it perfectly in its habitat that includes Firedot Lichen. One can figure who came first. 

On May day I accompanied the Moores and Van Heerdens on a hike around the amphitheater on the eastern end of South Valley, when we encountered a very grumpy little Berg Adder, Bitis atropos, on our pathway. I'm sure you are all very aware of these little vipers because they are one of the more common snakes encountered on the Estate, especially at higher altitudes. We do, however, have two different colour morphs of the species with the typical one being a charcoal grey with pale-bordered black patches. The less typical colour form, which happens to be more common here, is like the one above, plain pale brown with no markings. I have seen both colour forms within 500m of each other and have also seen pale brown ones, like this, but with markings. Although there has not been a recorded human fatality from a bite from one of these snakes, the Berg Adder is unique among the vipers in having a neurotoxic venom like that of Elapids (Mambas, Cobras and others) and unlike the Cytotoxins carried by all the rest of the vipers. It has been suggested that this is due to the habitat where prey can escape easier because of large boulders and cliffs etc. Neurotoxins are much quicker acting than cytotoxins, so the prey item is subdued in a much shorter time-span. Unlike the Elapids, though, the nerve affecting venom of the Berg Adder does not seem to affect cardiac and pulmonary functions that make elapid venom so dangerous. But, on the negative side, the venom is not neutralised by antivenoms made today, so envenomations have to be treated symptomatically. The symptoms of a bite have been likened to severe alcohol intoxication and bizarrely, some victims have suffered these symptons for many months, with some having permanent damage. As you can imagine, those symptoms wont fair well for a mountain climber, who will probably fall before getting to safety!     

A young Striped Skink, Trachylepis striata, emerges from the grass by my patio. Found pretty much everywhere on the Estate, from the river thickets hugging SPK 2 to the summit of Mount Anderson. A nimble little predator of small to medium insects, the Striped Skink also faces a wide range of enemies. From the crow-like Red-winged Starlings to the Drakensberg Crag Lizaed mentioned earlier. And, it also happens to be the preferred prey item of the little Bergie featured above. But it has a defensive mechanism that is particularly effective against the first two predators mentioned but not from the adder : it can drop its tail and while the predator is confronted by this wriggling distraction the wily little skink runs off to live another day. the tail re-grows, although not as long as the original.

When laying her eggs, the adult female Lacewing excretes a sticky fluid from the tip of her abdomen, touches it to the substrate and then lifts her abdomen away from the substrate, stretching the sticky fluid into a thread, which hardens quickly in the air. She then proceeds to lay one egg on the end if this thread so that it resembles a miniature helium-filled balloon on a string.She repeats this exercise till her batch is laid. In spring and summer she will lay a batch of eggs on a plant that is infested with aphids, the small bugs that suck the juices of the plant. Her offspring are voracious predators of these aphids and are not adverse to cannibalism either, necessitating the mother to lay her eggs on a stalk, to help keep the offspring away from each other upon hatching.  In the previous blog I showed a photo of a Ladybird eating aphids, and explained that their larvae eat them as well. Well, these larvae resemble Ladybird larvae and can often be found together with Ladybird larvae in among a colony of aphids. In the instance of this photo, at the end of the season like it is, the Lacewing would lay her eggs on or near a plant that is attractive to aphids and hope that aphids are present the following spring after the eggs have over-wintered and then hatched. The adult of this species is bright green with big shiny eyes and delicate wings like other members of the Neuroptera order of insects. Another member I have posted about in previous blogs is the Ant Lion, whose larvae dig cone-shaped pits in soft sand.  

My little camera is no good at taking distant shots so this is a poor shot but a photograph nonetheless. In the centre of the frame is a Sable Antelope, Hippotragus niger, and at the top is an Eland. On the 15th Don called me on the radio early in the morning and asked if I had ever seen Sable here before. I hadn't, except for the breeding projects in Rivendell. So I rushed out and got to see this Sable just above the old road opposite K9 that is now the end part of the Rock Kestrel Trail. Trent Sinclair, from Mount Anderson Ranch next door, said he sees one on his place that was not there at the time so this must have been it. Very exciting and a new species for me to add to our mammal list here on the Estate.

While burning the firebreaks this month we stumbled upon a Thick-clawed Scorpion, Opistophthalmus sp., that crawled out from under a rock that we had disturbed. The venom of the scorpion is rather weak and that is why the pincers are so large and powerful, so that it can subdue its prey, small to medium-sized insects, quicker than the venom will allow.  So the general rule is: If the pincers are large and the tail is thin, then the scorpion is less harmful but if the pincers are small and tha tail is thick, then it is more harmful. The above Thick-clawed scorpion's sting is not worse than a bee sting but it can still give you a painful nip with those big pincers.

A nice close-up of an Orange Acraea, Acraea anacreon, resting on the autumn bloom of a Tetraselago wilmsii. Because of the toxins carried in the body of the butterfly, it is a slow and sluggish lepidopteran that is commonly encountered in the autumn months throughout the Estate, at all altitudes. The larvae feed on the small, needle-like leaves of the very common River Rice Bush, Cliffortia linearifolia from the Rose family and Aeschynomene bushes from the Pea family that are also common along the rivers' edges on the Estate.

A Mountain Malachite Damselfly, Chlorolestes fasciatus, perched above the water on the look-out for prey, has a DBI of 4 (see Jolly Season 2018 blog). Prey consists of small flying insects like flies, lacewings and mosquitoes that are caught on the wing near the waters edge. The bronze body colour of this individual tells us that it is old. With a life expectancy not exceeding 5 weeks, this one is maybe a little older than a month. The larvae of Damselfies are also predatory but they reside and catch their prey under water where they are a  common prey item to fish, especially Trout. Most wet flies, used in fly fishing, are made to resemble a Damselfly larva. 

This miniature little moth-like insect is a Caddisfly from the order Trichoptera. They are closely related to Moths and Butterflies from the order Lepidoptera which means "Scaled-wing".On closer inspection, you will see that the wings of the Caddisfly are hairy, not scaled  like the moths. Trichoptera means "Hairy-wing". Like the Damselfly larvae before this, the Caddifly larvae also reside under water, but they use silk and sand grains, twigs or other debris to construct a protective mobile home which helps protect them from fish, although they are still relished by Trout. Dry flies used in fly fishing are often made to resemble an adult Caddisfly. Another big difference between Moths and Caddisflies are the mouth parts. Moths have a long, coiled proboscis while a Caddisfly has reduced mouth parts or, like this species, a broom-like appendage to sweep up micro particles. The above species has a characteristic tight S-shaped dance that it performs on the floor while it sweeps up its food.

Even though the grasslands are  more drab as we enter winter, there are still some lovely flowers out there. This is a Hesperantha baurii found among rocks in our grasslands at higher altitudes. If the flower seems familiar to you, it is because it is very closely related to the Scarlet River Lily, Hesperantha coccinea, which is much redder, a bit larger and grows on the waters edge at lower altitudes.

Ryan Nicholson, Charles Van Heerden and Scarlet Moore pose on the newly opened path leading to the Olinia gorge summer waterfall. They completed  some community service work for me by clearing the path from its junction with the Rock Kestrel Trail until it sinks into the Afro-temperate forest in the gorge.The new Olinia gorge walk starts at the starting point for the Rock Kestrel Trail in South Valley and forks off it 600m from the beginning. Instead of turning left to continue on the Kestrel trail, you carry on straight on the new path and after a further 300 meters you will enter the forest. Once you reach the river line, you will turn left, uphill, and a further 200 meters on you will find yourself at the base of a beautiful waterfall which is just a trickle right now, but flows strongly in the rainy season. Once you have enjoyed your time at the waterfall, you will turn around and head back downstream to the parking, in the gorge for most of the way. So from the parking to the waterfall and back to the parking is a 2,5 kilometer circular hike, less demanding than the Steenkamps Waterfall hike. Olinia is the genus name for the Mountain Hard-pear tree, Olinia emarginata, which is very well represented in the gorge and is most certainly one of the most beautiful trees found on the Estate.

And to finish off, a photo of a Ragwort plant, Senecio sp., covered in ice. Even though it has not yet been too cold here yet, we have still had some cold mornings, brrrrrr!

Winter is here but it wont be for long. Get here before it's gone and enjoy some crisp early morning activities from Fishing to cycling, running or hiking.

April 2019

APRIL 2019

The end of April ushers in our short Autumn which traditionally means that the rains will come to an end for the season. The last four years have seen suitable annual rainfall figures but the rains have fallen at the wrong time with it starting in mid-summer and raining into the winter period. This is sufficient for the water table but is unsuitable for vegetative growth as a large chunk of the growing season has been dry. This season we have had 788mm which is substantially less than our mean average of around 950mm but we have had rain fall every month of spring and summer which is during prime growing time. This, together with the large fire of August, has promoted lush growth this season. It sure is still warm enough for lots of life to be thriving and reaching their quotas in time for winter. Here are some of the goodies that have been spotted this month:

The Common Morning Glory, Ipomoea purpurea.  Originating in the tropical and subtropical areas of the Americas it has spread around the entire planet in warmer areas for it's ornamental properties. First recorded in the Durban area in 1830, this and the following three photos illustrate four different colour forms I encountered this month in the small area between Finsbury House and K9.

In tropical and sub-tropical climes it establishes itself as a perennial and can become a serious pest in gardens and cultivated fields. But in areas where frost occurs, like here, the plant establishes itself as an annual and cannot grow very big so it does not become a pest. 

The most famous of all the representatives of the Morning Glory genus is the Ipomoea batatas, the Sweet Potato, also originating in the tropical Americas, whose flowers resemble these in size and structure but are more bland in colouration like the two indigenous species I have so far encountered here on the Estate.  

The seeds of this plant contain a powerful hallucinogen and therefore even a small number present in maize grain causes the crop to be down-graded, affecting the price of the crop.

A close up of the female in a mating pair of Crane flies from the Tipulidae family of flies. Because she emerges from her pupa already bloated with eggs, the distended abdomen of this individual indicates her sex. Since the adult only lives for a mere two weeks, the female must find a mate as soon after emerging from her pupa as possible. After mating, she lays her eggs in very dark, moist places where the larvae, called Leatherjackets, burrow into the substrate and consume living or dead vegetable matter. These Leatherjackets are serious pests to certain agricultural crops but were made known to the layman in 1935 when thousands of Leatherjackets were removed from the wicket of Lord's Cricket Ground in London resulting in bare patches that introduced an unaccustomed spin for most of the season!

Most insect larvae eat a very different food type to the adults of the same species. This reduces competition for food amongst the same species and puts different generations in different environments. Not so with this Ladybird from the Coccinellidae family of beetles. This beetle finds a large colony of Aphids (pictured) or Scale insects, both the worst enemy of the avid gardener, and deposits her eggs in amongst the colony. She then proceeds to stuff herself with the sap-sucking insects (pictured) and when her larvae hatch from their eggs, they also voraciously consume the aphids. Truly a gardener's best friend! But they were released as a biological control organism in the US as early as 1916 and they are now the pest, out-competing the local insects and establishing themselves as the most widespread Ladybird in the US today.

Although most trees are bearing fruit by autumn time, these beautifully inscripted pea-flowers adorn the Grassland Hook-leaf Pea, Otholobium wilmsii, at the moment. This attractive little tree is not common but can be found in forest fringes at high altitudes.

Considering the lush growing season and the fact that there was still plenty moisture in the soil, we decided to burn our first Patch Mosaic burn block in the south west of the Estate. With a patch mosaic burning policy we divide the Estate into much smaller blocks than was traditional. We then burn alternating blocks in successive years during the rainy season when lightning is common, simulating natural lightning fires. Because the fire is cool, resulting from moisture and green growth, the fire will not burn areas that do not have sufficient moribund (dead vegetable material). This will reduce the risks that fires pose and reduce the labour required for normal burning because the fire will not burn easily into more recently burned adjacent blocks, containing it safely. 

With only two small blocks remaining on the Estate that require a conventional fire, we will begin our patch mosaic project next summer. This will reduce run-off into the weirs; create evenly spread grazing for the animals; reduce the labour required for fire work; put an end to the huge, uncontrollable fires experienced in the past; and benefit the grassland ecosystems immensely. In the picture above, you can see a storm gathering over the fire. Needless to say, the fire was extinguished before it finished burning the block.

The Golden-spotted Sylph, Metisella metis, is a common Skipper found on the Estate throughout the year. The golden spots adorn the butterfly like jewellery, as in the mythical Metis, the original spouse of Zeus. The larvae feed on various grass species. 

In my February blog, I posted a picture and a little information of a Spittle Bug from the Cercopidae family of bugs. That was the nymph feeding off the copious amounts of plant sap, filtering it to extract the nutrients and excreting the waste as foam spittle to protect it from the elements and its enemies. This is the adult, called a Froghopper because it is squat like a frog, and it can jump like a frog although it springs more like a flea. 

We decided we wanted to offer the young 'uns something more exciting to keep them occupied this Easter break. So I compiled a workbook outlining a basic mountain survival course. We had bookings for 11 kids to attend but by the time Easter weekend arrived, there were only two left to enjoy (or not!) it. They were Joel (foreground), a visitor at Morrin Pools and his school buddy, Christian. The course covers mind control; dangers one may encounter in these mountains and how to avoid them; and orientation in the day and night. One of the biggest dangers one could face here is lightning strike and soon after we set off on the adventure, a lightning storm hit us from the south which was not in the forecast for the day! we had to descend into a gorge quickly and after waiting out the storm, we ascended again (you can see the haze of the storm heading north on the left of the picture). Talk about a practical course!

This is a panorama shot from the tippy top of the summit of Mount Anderson, facing west. It was full moon, so we wanted to see the moon rise while the sun set but you can see the clouds rolling up over the watershed on the left from the Sabie Valley, so the moon-rise was not so visible but we did have a spectacular sunset. note the guys are wrapped in space blankets because at this stage, the wind chill was getting to our bones...

The following morning, as the sun rises and the shadow reaches our camp, Christian walks through the soaked grass to join us sunning ourselves after a cold, wet night under the stars. The course was not very structured because it was the first time but it will improve next time. Get the kids ready! I will do a course for your kids anytime if you give me notice. 

If you are exploring the dark, afrotemperate forests on the Estate and you see a flash of colour pass by low to the ground, it may be a Dry-leaf Commodore butterfly, Precis tugela tugela. If you want a better look at it, follow it with your eyes and carefully mark the spot where it lands....

Because if you don't mark it carefully, you may never find the butterfly although it is right under your nose! when it lands it closes its wings and the undersides look just like a dead leaf, even differing from individual to individual! I had this one in my sights and I was still unsure if I had the right thing even when I was less than a meter away.

The Banded Garden Spider, Argiope sp., is a large brightly coloured web-living spider that is found in grasslands and areas with low vegetation all over the world.The spider spins a large but flimsy orb web about a meter above the ground and then waits for prey upside-down in its centre. Usually, close to this central area on the web, the observer will notice a zig-zag pattern of silk called a stabilimentum. There are many theories to the function of this zig-zag of silk, from reflecting UV light to attract insects, to making the web visible to larger mammals so they don't walk through it. But as its name suggests, it may just be there to stabilise the particularly flimsy web.

This beautiful Leopard was spotted, by the Moores from Rock Solid, on the other side of the Klipdrif stream in the bottleneck of South Valley at the end of April. After explaining its location to me, I rushed over there and it was still lying in the same place described to me but it was dark by that time so I didn't get as good a look. Nick said it was a large male leopard and, looking at the photo, I agreed, thinking he was the new big guy on the block. But after comparing the spot pattern on the bib and elsewhere, it appears to be the big female the Beaumonts from Cochybundu spotted and photographed nearby some time back. It looks like she has a whole Reedbuck in her tummy... 

As we enter the month of May, so do we change seasons and already one can feel the change in temperature and notice the shortening of the days. The water levels are still nice and high and the fishing is great so bring yourselves to the mountains as soon as you can.

To all who knew Doctor Mack Rogan, our sincerest condolences. Dear Mack, I'm going to miss you terribly. RIP.