Although there's a ton to see right outside our windows (as discussed in earlier blog posts), we have started venturing out to see some of the local sites. The first thing we did was visit a couple of the local animal rescue centers that are dedicated to taking in orphaned and injured animals and, as much as possible and realistic, healing them and releasing them back into the wild. The first was the Hoedspruit Endangered Species Center (HESC) (https://hesc.co.za). (It is similar to Care for Wild, https://careforwild.co.za, where Ari worked for a few weeks while on his gap year.) This center started originally as the Hoedspruit Cheetah Project and has expanded from there to help and rehabilitate other local endangered creatures.
We had an amazing tour with tour-guide Clifford. In our open safari vehicle, we drove around the property and into the enclosures with the animals. Due to its origins, the Center still has tons of cheetahs in residence in various stages of rehabilitation. They also do some limited cheetah breeding at the center. The center also has all sorts of other animals -- rhinos, nyalas, cheetahs, leopards and other types of cats and painted wild dogs. While the animals are in enclosures, the areas are very big with plenty of room for them to run around. Almost immediately, we met their resident rhino, Esme, who, while not tame, has become used to the safari vehicles and likes to chase them when she sees them. She runs around with her best friend, Millie, the sheep. Clifford had to diligently move forward and backwards as Esme got close to the vehicle since she doesn't realize her own strength and, when she rubs up against it, she dents and damages it. During our tour, Esme was feeling friendly and came up to examine one of our fellow tour members, even resting her big head right on his lap. Then she wiped her nose on his sleeve in a maneuver eerily reminiscent of a young Ellie "giving me a hug." It was a bit freaky, but very cool. And when we needed to move on...Esme and Millie followed.
HESC also has a "vulture restaurant." This is a large area where they go dump all the scraps and bones from the food they've prepared for the other animals. Of course, when they dump this out, the vultures (and sometimes a few other birds such as eagles and kites). While vultures are not stately birds like eagles or majestic animals like lions or cheetahs or cuddly like rhinos, they do have an important role in the ecosystem and they have been decimated by poachers. Since vultures feed on dead animals, the rangers see circling vultures as location identifiers for the poachers. So once the poacher has killed a rhino or elephant, they stuff poison into the carcass which kills the birds (and anything else that eats it).
The vulture restaurant (see an eagle - I forget what kind - actually swoop in, pick up some food and fly off right towards us too):
We really enjoyed our visit to HESC -- Clifford was very knowledgeable about the animals and passionate about the work that they are doing.
A couple days later, we headed in the other direction to visit another animal rescue/rehabilitation center, Moholoholo (http://www.moholoholo.co.za). This one is bigger than HESC and has some similar animals - lots more big birds that have been injured by electric lines (but no rhinos). It has been around longer (about 30 years) and is better known than HESC. Again, it was great to see all the animals and learn about the work they are doing there. It is sad that such rescue centers need to exist. The bigger animals are mostly injured with interactions with people (poachers shooting or farmers trapping or animals getting caught in fences) and birds are often injured by power lines. We didn't like Moholoholo quite as much as HESC -- the enclosures for the animals were much smaller (almost had a zoo feel to it) and the guide seemed to have more of a canned speech. But they seem to be the local go-to organization called in when a animal of any type needs to be rescued or removed from a less than ideal situation. They are doing good and necessary work.
Comments