Another day in paradise

30 October 2010
As you gathered, it was an amazingly scenic flight up the Wild Coast on Friday. On arrival we went straight to work and after loading darts we set out looking for our patients. Spotting a single animal in a herd, with a tracking collar around its neck sounds easier than it is! We got lucky with a zebra and managed to dart it first time, but it had other plans….it kept running and would not slow down, until my worst fears came true – the only thing that was going to stop it was a physical obstacle and that came in the form of a stream. In its intoxicated state, the zebra misjudged the jump and landed on the far bank! I feared for the worst but after the reversal the zebra was just lame on the right front leg, which I could not examine because it was lying on it and I could not move it in that position, so it seemed better than expected. Although I did not see it again the next day, I believe it had a good chance of making a full recovery and hope it did since there was nothing more I could do for it.


Head winds and fuel shortages forced us to stay in a town called Margate for the night, after refuelling at the local airport – not what we had planned! After the noise of a “small city” overnight, we were on our way back to the reserve at 5.30 am on Saturday.
Winds picked up but we found the large eland herd with two collared females near a massive cliff, which is home to a vulture colony. Dodging vultures and fighting sudden downwinds, we decided to drop one of the team to make the helicopter lighter, and proceeded to dart two eland and remove their collars. It was not all plain sailing with the herd running into an area about 50m wide – flanked by a boundary fence on one side, and a sheer cliff on the other….not the time to be pushing the animals too hard…… I think our pilot, Marius, gained some grey hairs as he dodged vultures, fought the winds and tried to fulfil my requests for darting form the back seat….. With our fuel running low we finally found the red hartebeest too. Jan was dropped once again and after some pushing, the female we wanted split onto her own, but she was not slowing down or giving us a shot….. The wind pumping and the red hartebeest galloping left and right at high speed, I was unable to get a shot, and then we were low on fuel again. Off the pilot went with Jan to refuel in Margate, again. On their return they decided it was too dangerous to keep trying in the increasing wind with the weight of the fuel, chasing a nippy red hartebeest, so we packed up and headed home.
Three out of four collars retrieved was not too bad, I just wish we could have finished the job, but one thing we cannot control is the weather, and safety comes first.

All in all an amazing trip not to be forgotten and some video is sure to follow. You wanna see it?