Bianca goes exploring

Last week I went across into NG32 and Chitabe. One of my collared cows, Bianca, walked up to the top of Chitabe and back down again, so I wanted to follow her route and take vegetation samples from the sites that she passed through (see map above). We got permission to go into NG32 but there was a hunt starting a day later so we only stayed 2 nights in that concession, mostly on the floodplains next to the Santantadibe. Bianca spent a lot of time walking, when most of the time herds move more slowly, grazing as they walk. This was good because it meant I could get samples of vegetation that she walked straight through, which is what I record as ignoring habitats.

After two nights in NG32 we headed up into Chitabe and stopped by the camp to say hello to one of the managers that I had previously met in town, and to let them know we were in the area. There was a big elephant right next to the office who successfully negotiated a very tight turn between the end of the ramp leading to the guest quarters and the office. We were given coffee and told to get in touch with them if we had any problems.

We followed the route that Bianca took to the north and eventually reached the point that she reached after walking 6 km in 4 hours, after which she rested for an hour and turned around to walk back south. We sat and tried to think like a buffalo and work out why she turned around at that point, but did not succeed. She got there at midnight, so it is unlikely that she was offended by the view. There were zebra and tsessebe grazing across the channel that was close by and several of my other herds have spent time in that area. She has now walked further south into a different area that she has not used previously, but is moving more slowly around that area.

There are several possible explanations for the movement pattern shown by Bianca. From the amount of faeces at the various sites, she was in a herd smaller than 100 individuals. They could have been a dispersal group trying to move into a different herd. They could also have been somehow comparing the quality of grazing in the area that they left with that in the area they walked to. If so, they may well make the trip again at a later stage.