With only four rain days in February it was one of the driest in recent years. Lake Ndutu was completely dry at a time when it should have been full. The huge numbers of wildebeest present in January and the first week of February moved west into the woodlands, where they remained out of view for the next few weeks. The storms of the past days are drawing them back out onto the plains once again. It can’t be an easy time for the calves this year, moving back and forth from woodlands to plains?
Water ran into the lodge waterhole for the first time last week. The lake is now full, there are hundreds of flamingoes and the hippos in Lake Masek must be very happy. Even though it’s been dry this year, the game viewing has been exceptional. With no long grass to hide in, cat sightings have been phenomenal. The lions seem very sedentary these days, not moving far from the causeway. Many lion hunts were seen there this season as lions ambushed prey from the salt bushes. 
Having said that, most lion sightings have been of what lions do best during the daytime-sleeping. On several occasions recently we’ve watched on, as elephants have dared to disturb this blissful sleep. It’s a grand sight to see an angry matriarch chasing off a group of lions while being backed up by her family amongst much trumpeting and screaming! During a recent torrential down pour which turned the causeway into a lake, a bull elephant was seen having much fun trumpeting at the Masek pride.
We’ve had the best leopard sightings ever, this year. Apparently there was acacia tree in the woodlands that had nine wildebeest calves stashed in the upper most branches, and obviously a very fat leopard close by! One lucky group of guests even witnessed a pair of leopards mating, which is a very rare sight. The BBC film called Serengeti 24 was shown in the UK last Month which featured much footage of Ndutu leopards. The cats, a mother and two nearly full-grown cubs provided the action for another stunning wildlife film by Owen Newman and Amanda Barrett. I think it’s these three leopards that guests have been seeing this season, as they must have become accustomed to vehicles during their filming.
The northern masked weavers have started nest building in the lodge garage again. Because of the dry weather they abandoned their nests earlier in the year. I hope the favorable conditions continue this month for them to breed successfully. The uncommon denham’s bustard was seen on the plains this week. Cuckoo’s are everywhere at the moment including African, greater spotted, didrik, black and white and black cuckoo’s which certainly liven up the woodlands with their call and antics.
Ndutu Safari Lodge and Tanzania in general has had its busiest year ever. Thankfully we’ve had Nik Hall to help out in the kitchen this season, with staff training. He is a classically trained chef with over fifteen years experience, who has worked all over the world. Although it must be quite daunting to work somewhere so far from anywhere (our nearest shop is 4 hours away and our main shopping area is 7 hours away) where the cooks speak only Swahili.
Despite all this he has thrown himself into the task and is enjoying working with the guys who according to him are the easiest and most willing to learn people he’s ever worked with. He is making all sorts of improvements from new menus to buying new equipment. We now have a food mixer so big it could probably also mix cement!
Last month Nik saw the crocodile that lives in the Big March trying to catch a zebra. He lunged at the zebra but missed and after all his efforts only received a trampling from the panicked zebra who stomped on him. Since then we haven’t seen or heard of anybody else seeing him all month, so I hope he’s all right?
Elephants have been coming and going this season. Some weeks they’re here and other weeks they disappear. There seems to have been a mini baby boom this year with lots of tiny calves running around which is delightful. Last month a huge bull with massive tusks walked right past the bar one evening which was a wonderful sight but sadly we haven’t seen him again.
Our biggest bull is around at the moment, we call him Tabasco. He is a huge and very impressive elephant but not the most handsome. A one tusker, who sadly has just lost his only tusk, and is now tuskless, which doesn’t add to his appearance. How he broke the short stubby tusk is unimaginable because he must have used so much pressure to break it. It also must have hurt as we’ve witnessed him constantly spraying dust into the empty socket over the past few weeks. After one of the recent storms an elephant walked down a very wet game drive track near Masek and left enormous great footprints all the way down the track and completely ruined the road. It must have been a particularly heavy elephant, probably Tabasco!
Yesterday there were at least 3 or 4 wildebeest crossings of Lake Ndutu involving thousands of animals. These crossings are famous, but to see one you need a little bit of luck, as the guests staying here yesterday had in abundance. You could hear the noise and see the dust kicked up by the hooves of a thousand wildebeest from the lodge. From the lake shore it must have been spectacular and guests came in from their game drives on a high.
Sitting out by the campfire last night and hearing people’s tales of the wildebeest, tree climbing lions and someone showed me a stunning piece of video of a leopard. I guess yesterday was just one of those classic days which make a safari so special and is why people come back year after year.
Paul,
Ndutu Safari Lodge
