It’s a strange feeling to be in a place where you could easily end up in the stomach of a large predator. People living in urban settings usually have little to fear from local wildlife—other than roaches running amok in the kitchen. Here in the Okavango Delta in Botswana, however, the list of dangerous animals is long, and the potential for humans and wild animals to cross paths is high. The locals, both people and wildlife, must know the rules for such encounters to avoid chaos.
Tourists, with their urban instincts, cannot be trusted to react appropriately in the bush. So it’s quite ironic that African game parks put tourists in close proximity to dangerous animals—a sort of Russian roulette game in which the potential danger adds to the excitement of observing and photographing the wildlife.
Our guide, Tau, explains, “It’s not so much the animal, but the fact that people inadvertently blunder into an animal’s territory or don’t recognize the signs of aggression.” Tau is explaining these facts to me as we pole across a lagoon in our mokoro, a type of dugout canoe. Mokoros were once constructed from tree trunks, but now are made of fiberglass molded to resemble the original craft.
Statistically, it’s the hippopotamus that is the most dangerous animal. This water-loving mammal kills more people in Botswana than any other. And it is a dominant resident in the wetlands of the Okavango Delta where we are touring.
Tau continues, “See that group of hippos?” He indicates a pod of about twenty animals partially submerged, their heads just visible above the waterline about fifty yards away. “They have been habituated to the sight of mokoros. As long as we keep a specific distance, they stay calm.”
I look at the hippos, which are watching us glide by. They periodically grunt and splash, submerge and reemerge, always gazing intently at us. Tau says, “If we happen to move too close, cross that invisible line, then they will possibly charge the boat. Once we are knocked into the water, we become food for the crocodiles.” As he says this, he makes the mokoro jiggle a bit, just to drive home the possibility.
The Nile crocodile is also an extremely dangerous animal inhabiting rivers, lagoons, lakes, and even isolated water holes in the Okavango Delta. Yesterday, we stopped at a small water hole, which is a remnant of the floodwaters that cover the low-lying grasslands of the Okavango Delta during other parts of the year. Just as I was thinking to myself that this water hole was too small and too shallow for a crocodile to survive, I spotted a scaly head and two eyes. Judging by the distance from the snout to the eyes I estimated that it was between four and five feet long. Not huge, but big enough to tear apart a soft-fleshed creature—especially if there are several crocodiles feeding together.
Just as we noticed the crocodile, a large bull elephant appeared on the ridge above the water hole and waded into the water to knee depth. The crocodile had already submerged and was no longer visible in the muddy water. The elephant took several drinks, siphoning up muddy water with its trunk.
Tau pointed and said, “See what he’s doing? He’s filtering the water with his trunk. The clear water, he sprays into his mouth, and then discards the dirt.”
The crocodile reemerged just a few feet from the elephant. Suddenly, the elephant began stomping toward the reptile, flapping its ears and splashing water everywhere. We all froze in case the elephant decided to include us in its obvious irritation at sharing the water hole with others. Having made its point, the elephant continued thrashing across the water hole like a spoiled child, passing within a few yards of us. It swung its head to look at us, ears flaring, as if challenging us to object. But it continued on its way, finally disappearing over the horizon.
As we continue our mokoro trip, I scan the lagoon for crocodiles, but don’t see any. That does not mean they are absent, just out of sight. This lagoon is quite large and connected to the river during the flood season; so there are certainly plenty of crocodiles here. Suddenly, a fish jumps out of the water and bangs against the side of the boat, almost flopping right into the mokoro. Yep, plenty of food for crocodiles.
I get a completely different feeling from Tau and the staff at Camp #2, compared to Camp #1 where the guide and trackers seemed genuinely interested in our safety and in providing us with a good experience. At Camp #1, our guide, Baruti, was very cautious and took care to see that not only we, his clients, were safe, but also his trackers. Whenever a predator such as a lion was spotted, he had the tracker move from his observation seat on the front bumper to a position inside the vehicle. And he always backed the bush jeep way out of range and sight of the predator during these transfers.
In contrast, the guides at our second camp seemed more cavalier and appeared to follow the rules less out of concern for us than for liability of the safari camp. We had to sign a waiver, and I got the distinct impression that the instructions were intended mainly to let them off the hook if we got injured or killed. “I don’t know. They didn’t follow the guide’s instructions and ran when the elephant charged.”
We’ve been told that some animals such as elephants and lions often make mock charges at humans. In such an instance, the worst thing you can do is run. There is no way to outrun these animals, and any quick movement triggers their chase instinct.
Tau laughs and says, “I tell a tourist to stand still. Don’t run. They nod and say they understand; but as soon as I turn my head, the tourist is running away.” He makes a comic pumping motion with his arms, imitating someone running frantically. “You just can’t trust an inexperienced person to do what you tell them. Their instinct to run is so great that they forget everything you’ve told them.”
I ponder this point while remembering the advice of our previous guide, Baruti, who went into somewhat greater detail. He advised us that while the lion, leopard, cheetah, and elephant make mock charges, the Cape buffalo does not. Faced with a possible mock charge by a lion, for example, you should stand your ground and make eye contact with the animal; then slowly back away to safety. With a leopard, you should avoid eye contact, which they interpret as a challenge, and then back away. In the case of a buffalo charge, you may as well start running because he always means business. You’ll probably die anyway; so whatever you do, right or wrong, won’t matter much.
I’m thinking that this is a lot of information to process in a split second. Your first thought (if your brain happens to be working) will be that your next move is going to determine whether you live or die or perhaps survive with horrendous injuries. Was it the leopard that I shouldn’t make eye contact with…or the cheetah? Talk about pressure. Who wouldn’t just cut and run?
As our mokoro scrapes to a halt at the shoreline, I step out and walk up the bank, gingerly stepping over the roundish, deep holes in the mud created by the hippos’ feet. They are still watching us, all their heads turned in our direction. They’ve followed the rules and allowed us to invade their territory without challenge; we’ve followed the rules and not ventured too close or made any unusual moves.
We turn and walk slowly back to camp, which is situated on a tree island in the middle of a mosaic of permanent wetlands and seasonally-flooded grasslands. Tau, with his rifle slung casually over his shoulder, leads us in a single file. I continually scan the ground and surrounding tall grass for any movement (this is black mamba territory), but only see a bizarre walking-stick insect that is about the size of a pencil and well camouflaged on a branch overhanging the path.
The sun is high now, and the hot Kalahari sand churned up by jeep tires sifts into my sandals. Everywhere are hundreds of tiny funnels excavated in the loose sand: ant lion traps with a patient, voracious predator waiting at the bottom for an unwary insect to tumble into its jaws. I momentarily consider the scale of the hunting going on around me, from microscopic organisms in the soil to megafauna stalking in the bushes.
Soon, we are back in the shade of our verandah and ready for a cool glass of juice.
Wines and Wetlands 
Pingback: It’s The One You Never See That Gets You | Wines and Wetlands