Rhino Tracking

I may not have mentioned this in earlier posts, but CCF owns eight farms (covering about 50,000 hectares) here, with lots of wildlife including leopard, cheetah, and plenty of antelope of various species. We've also been reintroducing black rhinos, a species which was hunted out over the last 50 years.

We received our first two rhinos in November, and they've been hanging out deep in the bush near the Waterberg Plateau. I know this because we track them using radio signals. This past week we received two more males and two females, bringing us to six. They're still settling in, so I've been out every day tracking their movements. It's a nice gig, the country is beautiful and occasionally I see some cool stuff.

Our youngest male has recently escaped from our fenced in reserve (which protects them from poachers) so I've been out tracking/trying to push him back onto our property. Most of the time this has meant driving around in trucks, but I've also been close to him on foot. The area is very densely vegetated, so I haven't been too close (and I haven't been charged). I did find a black mamba skin, which was pretty awesome.

So far I haven't seen too much of the rhinos, with the exception of the releases when we let them out of their crates. I have seen our biggest male each of the last two days though, and I have some good pics that I'll pass along soon. It's been pretty exciting.

PS - The BBC and MSNBC will be filming here over the next two weeks, so yours truly might be shepherding film people around. Word on the street is Jeff Corwin will be here, too.