Day10: World Environment Day, Ungulates & more!

Morning:

Today was World Environment Day which is an annual event where kids from local schools come to Amakhala to learn about wildlife and conservation. This year’s topic was reptiles and we had about 50 kids from four different schools.  When the kids first arrived we all played soccer together and passed rugby balls around until everyone arrived.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once everyone was welcomed, we started with an egg spoon race, which the kids loved. After that, in groups of 3 and 4, we ran stations to teach the kids about reptiles through games and interactive activities. The different stations were reptiles in general, snakes, a reptile scavenger hunt and other reptiles (everything except snakes). It was really nice to give back to the local community and help kids become more involved in local wildlife. Everyone had an awesome and fun time, ourselves included!

 

Afternoon:

After lunch we had a lecture from Natalie Fowler on herbivore management on small game reserves. In the lecture we learned about the importance of managing herbivores as well as methods for measuring the number of herbivores present and their impact on vegetation. We used what we learned after lecture on a game drive. While on the game drive, we performed an ungulate count. An ungulate count is much harder and more tedious than expected.  It consisted of determining species, count the total number of each species present, sexed each individual and determined each individual’s age. We also got to pet Nibbles, which is Natalie’s “pet” Kudu that she raised since she was a day old.

One of the game drive groups got to see two elephant bulls fighting! When we got back from the game drive we saw the lioness and the two sub adult lions (her offspring) from the lounge deck.

We have a very early morning tomorrow as we have a very exciting day planned! Read our next blog post to hear all about it! Don’t forget to comment on our posts 🙂

Emily, Taylor and Marissa