An African adventure part 1:Kicheche Laikipia bush Camp

Cheetah

We landed at Nairobi international airport late evening on Monday 30^th September at the start of our Kenyan adventure. We decamped to the airport Sheraton for the night and enjoyed a nightcap in the roof bar with views over Nairobi. The next morning breakfast gave us a small taste of the many wonders to come with brightly coloured superb starlings picking at crumbs around our feet.

Our driver picked us up after breakfast and took us to Nairobi Wilson airport for our light aircraft flight to our first destination, Kicheche Laikipia bush camp in the Ol Pejeta conservancy some 150 km north of Nairobi in the shadow of mount Kenya.

On landing we were greeted by our driver and the accompanying soundtrack of crowned plover alarm calls. Our driver showed us the reason for their distress; they had nested some 20m from where the plane had stopped! The locals had surrounded the “nest”, actually a shallow depression in the ground, with a ring of stones to make sure it was not disturbed. The nest contained 3 beautifully camouflaged eggs so we quickly departed to allow the parents to brood their clutch.

Crowned plover

On the drive to the camp my new Kenyan bird list kicked into overdrive with sightings including little bee-eater, white-bellied bustard and grey-headed sparrow. We were also treated to our first wild life sightings with herds of zebra, groups of wart hogs and magnificent African elephants.

African elephant

White-bellied bustard

Kicheche Laikipia bush camp consists of just six rather luxurious sleeping tents and a central mess tent. With no barriers except the canvas between you and the bush you are pretty much guaranteed a fully immersive bush experience. At our camp briefing we were told that it was safe to walk around the camp during the day but at night we were to be accompanied by an askari.   The rationale being that the predators mainly feed at night! We were also told that we did not smell like food to the lions, cheaters and leopards! It’s amazing how easy it is to put your lives in the hands of people you hardly know! At night in the tents we had many experiences of lions roaring and moving around close to the canvas, again they apparently never go in the tents! We took comfort from the fact that, statistically at least, if you are killed by a wild animal in Kenya its likely to be a buffalo or elephant.

Pale flycatcher next to our tent

Red-headed Weaver

I had requested a bird expert for our guide and driver during our 3-night stay at the bush camp and Simon, our lovely guide, certainly did not disappoint.

As in the UK, the wildlife is mainly active at dawn and dusk and the game drives are centred on this timetable. We were woken up at 05:30 with hot drinks and departed for our safari drive with Simon at 06:00. Breakfast was served picnic style in the bush at around 09:00 and we were usually back in the camp by 11:00. Our second drive of the day started at 16:00 and finished with a very welcome sun-downer of gin and tonic in the bush at around 18:30.

 

Waterbuck

The intense equatorial sun poses photographic challenges with the best photos invariable taken in the golden hour after sunrise or before sunset.  Achieving the correct exposure with the sun high in the sky on subjects partially in sun/shade is particular challenging with the strong contrast resulting in 3 or 4 stops exposure shift on different areas of the same subject. Luckily the trickery of light room allows some reasonable latitude in camera settings.

Black-headed oriel

There are many symbiotic relationships in the bush. Perhaps my favorite was the whistling thorn that grows specific hollow shells for ants to live in. When something lands of the tree, the ants pour out to protect the tree by spraying the unfortunate interloper with phosphoric acid. 

Nubian woodpecker on whistling thorn

Oxpeckers are commonly seen hitching a free ride on antelopes in return for their insect removal services.

Red-billed oxpeckers on eland

There are a multitude of brightly coloured starlings in the bush most with strongly coloured stunning eyes and we were treated to great views of a number of these beautiful birds during our drives.

Violet-backed starling

Greater blue-eared starling

Lions are, of course, one of the start attractions and we had some very memorable close encounters with adults and family groups during our drives

The loan mating pair

We learned the history of the various groupings from our knowledgably guide Simon. We saw a young male and female pairing distant from any pride. The lioness was in season and mating was a rather full on activity occurring every few minutes or so. This was their third attempt to raise cubs.  Simon explained to us that if a male lion in a pride hears another loan male roar he will go and investigate and if, as in this case, he finds an isolated partnership with cubs he will kill the cubs to preserve his gene line. This was the unfortunate fate of the first two sets of cubs. 

Lion cubs

In a pride it is typical to have several families of cubs of various ages suckled by a number of lionesses in the nursery. We were again treated to many delightful moments of the antics of cubs, as they play fought with each other in preparation for more serous activities in later life.

Lion cubs

We had a number of encounters on our drives with the rather unique go -away bird, which announced its presence by the loud call, which gives it its name. Their crest, which they raise when excited, gave them an almost angry go-away appearance.

Go away bird

We encountered two of the African rollers during our excursions. The commonest of which was the aptly named lilac-breasted roller, which boasts a stunning colour combination of blues and lilacs. We also have one view of the less common rufous-crowned roller.

Lilac-breasted roller

Rufous-crowned roller

Some 15 separate species of woodpecker are listed in the Kenya helm guide of whom we managed to see 5 during our trip. A bearded woodpecker was examining a dead branch on a tree for insects in typically woodpecker fashion. We noticed that one major branch on the tree appeared completely dead while the rest of the tree seemed very healthy. Simon explained a fascinating adaption that the tree has evolved to cope with toxic elements in the ground: it filters them out of the water in absorbs and then pumps the concentrated contaminants into one branch which it sacrifices. The ingenuity of mother nature never ceases to amaze me!

Bearded woodpecker on sacrificial branch

One of the most famous and instantly recognizable birds of the central African bush is the grey crowned crane: the national bird of Uganda. While listed as globally endangered it seemed to be fairly easy to connect with in the conservancies.

Grey crowned crane

In the Kenyan bush there are many examples of the fowl family, some such as the yellow-throated spur fowl are very brightly coloured. Perhaps the commonest bird we encountered was the helmeted guinea fowl. Large flocks of these fowl were commonly encountered frantically running around searching for a morsel to eat. They roost in the top of trees at night and it was a truly humorous sight watching these rather rotund birds flying with some difficulty at sunset to the safety of the treetops.

Yellow-necked spur fowl

Shelley's Francolin

Hyena packs and jackals are common on the savanna. The jackals seem to always be running with purpose to some unknown destination. Their manner is such that they always look to me as thought they are up to mischief.  While it can be fairly said that adult hyenas are a somewhat acquired taste, the cubs are rather adorable which their disproportionally large ears and eyes. They have the inquisitiveness of youth and would often come up to our truck to check us out.

Spotted hyena cubs

Jackel

We visited a marshy area on the reserve several times for wetland specialists and saw flocks of glossy, sacred and hadada ibis, the later again being named for its call. There were 3 species of egret present, great white, yellow billed and cattle. We watched a beautiful yellow-billed stork for sometime as it fished in typical heron style on the wetland

Hadada Ibis

Yellow-billed stork

Sacred ibis

Black-headed heron

Sacred Ibis

We had a number of encounters with the truly magnificent martial eagle, the largest eagle in Kenya and a member of the booted eagle family. They were typical perched high in the treetops in a rather regal manner clearly unconcerned that anything could or would challenge them.

Martial eagle

One of the birds I really wanted to see on this trip was the secretary bird. At the Ol Pejeta Conservancy our views were restricted to a nesting bird which stood up to see us as we approach and they sat back down to brood its clutch. We had closer encounters with grounded birds later in our holiday; more on this and the reason behind the name in a latter blog.

Secretary bird

We struggled to connect with giraffes on our first day on the conservancy. It may seem strange but they can be incredibly well camouflaged when in wooded areas. Simon located a small herd on our second day and we spent a very enjoyable hour or so in their company as they browsed the treetops. Giraffes have evolved specific ways to overcome the circulation problems associated with their long neck. Firstly, their heart is truly massive at some 10 kgm and 60 cm long. Secondly, they have a series of one-way valves, which stop the blood flowing backwards during beats and towards the head when it is lowered.

Reticulated giraffe

It is inevitable the case that you see the best birds when you don’t have the camera and this happened while we were having lunch one day in the mess tent. An astonishly coloured red-crested sunbird flew in and took its fill of nectar on a flower next to me. Forewarned is forearmed and the next day I took my camera to lunch and it reappeared. The colours of these sunbirds almost defies description. I was tempted to turn the saturation down on the pictures below but in the end left it as shot as this really does represent the appearance of these sunbirds.

Red-chested sunbird

We encountered 3 species of bustard during our stay at the conservancy, the white bellied mentioned above, the black bellied and the magnificent and cryptically coloured Kori bustard, the largest flying bird in Africa.

Kori bustard

Black-bellied bustard

We saw a number of plovers in addition to the crowned plover,: the black-winged, spur winged and the aptly named blacksmith whose call is said to resemble a blacksmith at work.

Blacksmith Plover

We had a truly memorable 3 nights at the bush camp and left for the next leg of our adventure full of wonderful memories.

As a footnote, we heard of an incident a week or so after we left the camp that really highlighted our proximity to the wildlife. Louise, the manager of the camp, had a portly jack russell called spoldge who followed her everywhere. She was sitting down with spoldge just in front of her when a leopard ran up and grabbed the dog! The screams and shouts of Louise seem to have caused the leopard to drop its snack and run off and a very lucky spoldge survived his encounter, all be it with one hundred stiches needed to put him back together!

To be continued …