By Katie Beilfuss
The sun has long since set, and the heat of the day is dissipating on a refreshing night breeze. We pile into the game drive vehicle, a large open air truck with elevated seats for improved wildlife viewing. We are ten people – staff of the Gorongosa National Park Department of Scientific Services and other volunteers – all braving the first nocturnal surveys of the park in many years, eager to see the park’s nighttime wildlife, most of which is invisible during the day.
Our goal on this night survey is to drive every part of the 100-km game drive network over the course of two nights, looking for and counting all animal species we see along the way with the help of our bright spotlight. We also stop at wetlands – seasonal pans and riverways – to listen for frogs and toads as they sing their courtship calls into the night. We want to document the species of toads and frogs in the park and to mark their phenology – the timing of their mating cycles – as different species are active at different parts of the year.
We use many senses. Sight only works where the spotlight shines, because the darkness is so prevalent, but smell can be helpful, as sometimes that’s the first indication you get of larger game like hippos and buffalos. And ears are particularly useful to hear the scritch scratch of animals running up trees or the rustle of animals moving through the bush. Sound is how we find our frogs and toads. Our portable digital tape recorder documents the chirps and rattles at each stop so that we can confirm the identification of each species later.
And the sense of sight is the surest way of finding animals at night – the animals’ sense of sight, that is: the orange, red, or even green glow of our light’s reflection in eyes is the first sign of many animals. Experienced nocturnal wildlife watchers can even identify certain species by the color of its reflecting eyes.
Our nighttime search is successful. The animals appear. Genets and civets, conspicuously patterned raccoon-like animals in the cat family, abound. The bright white of the civet contrasts strongly with its black spots, and the colors are striking in the night. We come upon a bonanza of porcupines at one wetland that we quickly rename “Porcupine Pan.” Nine big, spiny porcupines are all there enjoying the tender shoots of the water hyacinth growing at the edge of the pan’s water. This pan is one of few that are still wet this time of year, the end of the dry season, so is a strong attractant for animals in search of water. A bush baby hops across the road in front of us, oddly reminiscent of a kangaroo, disappearing quickly into the bush.
And we see plenty of our diurnal friends as well: waterbuck, impala, bushbuck, oribi, even sable, many hunkered down in the night, hiding from nocturnal predators, always on guard.
We come to “Hippo House,” a vestige of the old days at the park. Once a popular restaurant, bar, and viewing platform at the edge of Lake Urema, now the building is a mere skeleton of its former self. But the wildlife are still there. We find a family of elephants – several females and their young – enjoying a muddy bath at the edge of Lake Urema. We want to stay and watch them, curious and excited at their site, but leave them in peace, remembering that elephants can be fierce when disturbed.
We drive along the Urema River, listening to the sounds of the night. Then the smell hits us – musky and strong – and moments later we see the huge beast lumbering along the road in front of us: a hippo out of water, looking for areas to graze out in the cool of the night. Our view of him is short: he disappears into the woodland once again.
The time passes quickly, our attentions focused on finding more creatures to add to our list. But finally we complete our loop and return to Chitengo, where the generator has long since turned off for the night and our colleagues and neighbors are fast asleep. We slip home in the dark, cool from our night air drive, happy with our sightings of the evening, tired but exhilarated from the effort.