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A resident special at just the right time

Rest and Relaxation in a tree in Mahale

The Mahale National Park is divided into 3 areas namely the Northern part the central part and the Southern part. The chimp population is divided into 3 groups, namely the K group, the M group and the N group. There are approximately 700 chimps in Mahale National Park, not much is really known of the N and K groups as all research has been concentrated on the M Group. Of the 700 population in Mahale the M group consists of some 75 individuals, Kungwe Beach Lodge is situated in the M group’s territory and these are the chimps our guests see . The top 5 Alfa males are Alofu, Primus, Darwin, Fanana and Bonobo . Fanana being the oldest at 33years of age and Primus the youngest at 20 years of age. There are 9 sub Alfa males waiting on the side lines aged between 10 and 49 years of age with Kalumbe being the oldest at 49 years of age.

Enjoying the attention

There are some 26 adult females in the group with Kariope being the oldest at 51 years of age and Iruti being the youngest at 9 years of age. The females give birth once every 6 years normally, unless they lose a youngster in which case they will come into uterus sooner. Their last pregnancy will be around the age of 35 years of age. Our females Sally and Swale have not been seen for 6 months, so it is presumed either they have migrated to another group ie K or N group or they have died. All the chimps above 2 years of age are named. The chimps have a favourite tree which they often visit during the day at the lodge to eat the fruit, occasionally make their beds in the lodge area so chances are always good that they walk through the lodge on the way to the tree which always causes great excitement.

Kungwe Beach Lodge, Mahale National Park, Lake Tanganyika

Photography of the chimps in their natural habitat is quite difficult due to their colouring and the natural shadows in the forest so a good quality camera with a high available ISO range is essential for good quality photographs. Chimps are not the only mammals around Mahale National Park, we have recorded on camera a number of other species such as leopard, blue duiker, bushy tailed mongoose, Hyena, and bush pigs to name a few, although these animals being mainly nocturnal are rarely seen by our guests. We have the Palm Nut Vulture plus hundereds of other species of birds, always heard seldom seen due to the forest and foliage. Our Red Tailed monkeys and Red Calabus Monkeys are also very special and a challenge to photograph. Not forgetting our 4 warthogs that visit each day and suntan on the beach! Kungwe is a very special piece of paradise!

Images and blog by Mike – Manager at Kungwe Beach Lodge, Mahale

As always, this trip was absolutely amazing!
The team was such a blessing! Extremely laid back and open for the adventure. The friendships that were made will definitely be long lasting. I am so thankful to have met each and every one of them! To those that joined me on the trip again, it is always nice to see a familiar face and for the new participants, you are already part of our family.

I want to write a quick blog post today about our host in Tanzania, Mbali Mbali Lodges and Camps. The connection with Mbali Mbali is one from S4S micro business division. Mr. Sheni Lalji, the owner of Mbali Mbali Lodges, works with S4S vendors and owns the company that distributes shoes around the country to sell in the micro business program. It made perfect sense to work with Mbali Mbali on the arrangements and details of a distribution trip to Africa. And let me tell you…they made sure the trip was PERFECT!

Happy with so little! Priceless photo

There is something about Africa that is unexplainable. The pure joy, love and community that the people share with each other and with their guests is unlike any other place. I have been to Tanzania 3 times now and each time the staff at Mbali Mbali made the planning and preparation for the trip SO easy! During this trip we were able see different aspects of the country and truly connect with the people. We had the opportunity to visit about 5-6 schools/orphanages where we played with the kids, distributed shoes and toys, and had a better understanding of the struggles they face or have overcome. The most memorable moment for me was singing the hokey-pokey with the kids; they could not stop laughing at us.

On a wooden dhow on Lake Tanganyika, destination CHIMPS

We then had the opportunity to go on a chimp trek at Gombe National Park where Jane Goodall did all her research on the chimps. Let me just say…my first experience on the trek was hard work but manageable. We were able to see a chimp within about 2 hours and the hike was a good workout. For the second trek we hiked through the forest, crawled through the jungle, “planked” across the side of a mountain (I just rolled down it), and poured our blood, sweat and tears into the safari. Now some of you might say I am exaggerating…but it’s true. I might have complained more than the others and basically piggy-backed on our guide for a good portion of the trek, but we were able to see the most breathtaking views, encounter a black mamba, and see a family of chimps in their natural habitat. It was an incredible experience, which brings me to our trek on the 3^rd day. This time I decided to join the “slow” group (there are really fast, fast, medium, and slow treks and the first 2 I felt like I was racing, so trek 3, I decided that the slow group was where I belonged).  What do you know? All of us in our different groups saw different Chimp members of one family within 30 minutes before they regrouped. Of course my favorite part was the boat ride and the waterfall. I am obsessed with waterfalls and love how powerful and refreshing they are (my happy place where I can forget about everything and enjoy the moment).

Kigomas resident Zebra having lunch with views of the Lake

Our team stayed at the Kigoma Hilltop Hotel and the staff were so welcoming! Everyone became friends and those friendships are probably what made this trip extra special. Everything was perfect. Kigoma even has two resident zebras and monkeys running around. Kigoma would be the place to stay if any of us were to return to do work with the orphanages and schools. A hidden gem.

Overall this trip was my personal favorite overall. I do love all of our trips for different reasons. Honduras-the kids at the orphanage, India-learning about the culture, Peru- the hearts of everyone we work with, Costa Rica- the beauty and growth of the country, Jamaica- the laughter and joy of the locals, Haiti- everything I have learned and watching the progress of the country, the determination of the people, and the relationships I have developed there. I love all of them, but Africa has always touched my heart in a special way. As I mentioned previously, it is hard to describe and the only way you will understand my emotion is by visiting Tanzania. I cannot thank all the staff of Mbali Mbali enough for all of their help with EVERY single detail. Working in developing nations can sometimes be difficult due to communication difficulty, but Mbali Mbali not only made sure they were punctual but knew exactly what to do and how to do it to ensure we had the best experience possible.

Written by: Katie Lentile – Travel 4 Souls

Gombe National park is one of smallest National Parks of the 16 Tanzanian National Parks with only 52sq km, situated on the Eastern shores of Lake Tanganyika, north of Kigoma town. Ironically, it is amongst the most important Parks and known to host mostly primate species including the Endangered Chimpanzee communities. The park hosts the longest study of a wild animal spearheaded by the renowned scientist, Dr. Jane Goodall in 1960.

Gombe hosts about a 108 chimpanzees in three distinct communities namely Mitumba, Kasekela and Kalande communities found on the Northern, Central and southern part of the park respectively. The Kasekela community are the largest group with individuals well habituated to human beings hence open for tourism.

As the two Gombe National Park field research assistants went on with their daily chores of observing chimpanzees’ behavior and health monitoring, they saw a chimpanzee that seemed to be frightened, an unusual behavior amongst Kasekela chimpanzees.  They got suspicious and decided to find out more about why the chimpanzee was behaving this way. The chimpanzee was ripping on a tree and on sighting the research assistants, vanished in to the thicket to hide. The research assistants employed their expertise and crawled in to the thicket with determination to find out what was wrong with the chimpanzee. To their surprise, they found that it was 14 year old Glitter, a twin sister to Golden, who had given birth to a new baby chimp baby. What a surprise? This was the second chimp baby born to Glitter within a year after she lost her first born baby to her mother, Gremlin, immediately after birth in July 2011, which died few months latter. Gremlin, well known as super mum, is the only chimpanzee in Gombe National Park who has been able to raise twins to maturity. She is over confident on her mothering ability.  On several occasions, she has been snatching children from her daughters to rear them herself under allegations that they are inexperienced. Unfortunately, the 42 year old Gremlin does not have enough milk hence the grandchildren eventually die after few months.

Once bitten, twice shy. Having lost her first child to her mother, Glitter wasn’t taking any chances and was staying away from her immediate family and everybody else in the fear of losing her newly born baby.

Indeed, the birth of Glitter’s baby added a historical mark on the chimpanzee population of Gombe National park and the chimpanzee population in General.

Prepared By Bernard Gichobi

Glitter running from the researchers holding her newborn

The wildebeest came and went, and then came back again!  But in much larger numbers the second time. The plains around the lodge were once again swarming with black dots, and the unmistakable sound of ‘gnu’ became merely a background noise as we became so used to it.

In amongst the wildebeest you could pick out pockets of buffalo, impala and other less numerous ungulates such as Topi and hartebeest. And then there is the 70+ strong herd of elephants that has been lingering around (and occasionally passing through) the Lodge for the last couple of weeks. They alone provide hours of viewing pleasure, whether you are watching the tiny youngsters (some as young as a few months we estimate) running after the adults and hiding under the bellies of their mothers for protection from the heat of the day or playful bulls getting carried away with their sparring antics.

However, despite all the larger attractions, including the calls of hyena and lions on a nightly basis, it is our feathered friends who have really caught our interest recently. Charles and I always take a keen interest in the birdlife wherever we go, but we have been richly rewarded for the many hours spent looking and listening for flashes of colour or unrecognised calls from the bushes in the last month.

Every morning we are treated to a flurry of different birds playing in the bushes outside the reception, led by the ever vocal Bare-Faced Louries and Von der Deckens Hornbills. At first glance you might think there are only a few birds playing hide-and-seek, but a few minutes spent quietly sitting and watching reveals such delights as Blue Waxbills, Puff-Backed Shrikes, Speckled  mousebirds, Paradise Flycatchers and Spot-Flanked Barbets.

Spend some time at the restaurant looking out across the valley and you’ll be treated to fantastic sightings of Bateleurs hunting, White-backed and Lappet-faced vultures circling overhead tracing the “scent” of the previous nights’ kill, and even giants such as Tawny Eagles. Look a bit closer to home and you’ll notice the trees alive with the appropriately named (and very noisy) Arrow-marked Babblers as well as Red-headed Weavers building nests.

To date, our best discovery has been the pair of Lilac-breasted rollers that have made themselves a home in the hollow of a tree at the back of the lodge and are raising some very vocal chicks. Rollers are surprisingly big birds, and they are fascinating to watch when you can catch them displaying in flight. However, for us now, it is the parents’ dedicated and persistent search and supply of moths, crickets, and grasshoppers for their young  that has us fixated on a hole in a tree, trying desperately to get the perfect photo of them coming in to land or sneakily trying to exit without drawing too much attention to their nest. They are beautiful birds, and always worth stopping for if you see them in passing. The challenge though, is to count how many colours their feathers display…

The Serengeti is a fantastic place to view the bigger charismatic species, but don’t forget to take some time to enjoy the smaller side of wildlife, it’s worth the effort.

Charles, Kerri-Lyn and all the staff at Soroi Serengeti Lodge

Jeff & Sue Webster : Super staff, Fantastic Lodge. Wonderful chimps. Thank you all

Robyn  & Scott Elman : Amazing time, great guides, staff, everything . Thanks for all the memories. Kwaheri, tutaonana!

Ole, Marianne, Christian &Caroline Thrane : Thank you for some fantastic days with kind people, chimps, beautiful nature and of course lake Tanganyika, we will be back.

Graham+ Rhylle Polke : What a privilege to visit this special place. Thank you for your excellent service.

Tessa & peter Yarrow : Simply excellent – chimps, service, food. Thank you. Very Comfortable

Vera Martens + Remmer Witte : Not just the chimps, everything was perfect, we felt more than welcome. Thank you Alof (Chimp) and the family, Thanks Bernard and his team.

Louis Klamka + Conerward : What a beautiful place! The chimps were amazing including our close call with Chrismas (Chimp). We feel very privileged to have experienced it. Everyone made our stay special, especially Sixtus – our guide.

Jennifer + John Winton : One of the most memorable experience, yet in Africa . Bernard+ Given were specially  wonderful and the  viewing of the chimps extra ordinary, Thank you for everything

She is Jane Goodall’s favourite living chimpanzee. Aged 41, Gremlin has raised five offspring and is known for her patient, fair and tolerant character.  She and some of her family were behind us as we made our way back from the waterfall for a late lunch at the Gombe Forest Lodge. We noticed that Gremlin was sitting down on the track breast feeding her grandchild – how she came to take care of her daughter Glitter’s two month old baby is another story not witnessed by us (see Mbali Mbali blog 10/7/2011).  We were the only tourists on this special day.  We were accompanied by our guide, Ramadan, a tracker and a park ranger.  A researcher was also present.   Initially Gremlin chose to sit down on the track several metres away from us all.

We all watched her for several minutes as she breast fed the baby.  Then, to our surprise and delight she looked straight at us, got up, ignoring the others and calmly sat down right in front of us.   She was as close as one metre, which is very much nearer than the 10 metre separation tourists are asked to keep.  She stayed with us for about 10 minutes until a noise further up the track prompted her to move on in the direction she was originally headed.

Our 10 minutes of intimate time with this grand old mother was devoted to her showing us how at ease she was in our company.  Her lower lip hung down as she relaxed and groomed herself.  She looked up and down and to both sides giving us the impression that we were no threat.  Then she looked directly into our eyes for quite long periods: much longer than tourists are advised to look at chimps.   It was impossible not to return her gaze.  And then the most remarkable and intimate moment:  she seemed to be showing us the baby, which she conveyed by eye contact from us to baby, while stroking its head.  The baby was contently asleep with its head resting on her out-stretched leg.

Back in Australia we have our special nature moments, but they are very different.  Our 10 minutes alone with Gremlin will remain with us for ever even if they will fade somewhat.  So, isn’t it wonderful that we have both stills and video to bring the moment alive again and to share it with our friends and relatives.

Ian Coupar, August 2011

The Katuma pride has been in and around camp most nights, and we are having regular sightings of them some days right here on the edge of the Katisunga floodplain. On Saturday we spotted two male lions feeding on a huge hippo only about 3km from camp, surrounded by hundreds of vultures.

The large breeding herd of elephant led by Rafiq was around on Sunday – they were not so particularly co-operative! Not only coming for a look (again) at our new pool, but also broke our pathway lights…. Nevertheless it was still fantastic to have them around.

Monday, only about 200m away from camp the katuma pride was spotted again under the shade of the trees, one big male 4 females and two cubs… looked to be recently fed with very nice full bellies.

Today there is a herd of buffalo and some Giraffes scattered out on the plains, and we are looking forward to an exciting month with a very busy time ahead of us. More guests at the Lodge equate to more time spent outside, experiencing the wonders of this fascinating park.

This is an incident of its own kind, unbelievable, unimaginable yet real. The 2^nd Oct 2011 left a mark in history for Mahale mountains national park. This is when the world turned upside down for the Mahale ‘M’ group chimpanzee president, referred as Alpha male named Pimu.

Chimpanzees share over 98% of our gene resemblance. They are territorial social animals and known to modify and use tools such as chewing leaves to make sponges for drinking water from the streams and prune tree twigs for termite fishing and probing. They use hard substances such as stones to crack nuts or hard-shelled fruits and use tree branches or stones as weapons.

Some might remember the blog from Kungwe in 2010 on Pimu,  the then fierce Alpha male of the Mimikere group… now brutally killed by his own community members. Chimpanzee’s intra- community aggression is usually mild, mostly males fight for dominance whilst play for the young ones may end up in a fight. But it does not ever go too far since the more dominant males always stands in for mediation. However, the inter-community aggression results mostly on major injuries and sometimes death.

Pimu, the fierce and strong 23year old son of Fatuma and a brother to Fibi and Fravia, had a very successful life as he rose to Alpha position 4 year ago.  He withdrew Alofu from the thrown in 2007, he was a dictator and a brutal leader who unlike most of the chimps in this M group, never had a long-term friendship with anyone. Whenever he met up with to the group he would test his wit by ‘charging’ everyone in the community to intimidate them.

His brutal behavior was definitely not liked by the members of the group, but he commanded his respect by force. His behaviors resulted in formation of a caucus by the top ranking males including Alofu, Bonobo, Orion, Kalunde, Chrismas and Primus to push him out!

It all started on the morning of 2^nd Oct 2011 at 10.15am when Primus, a 22year old upcoming male was seen grooming Wakusi, the mother to Alofu – the former Alpha, who was on oestrus at the time.

Pimu was not pleased to see Primus being close to Alofu through his mother. Hence Pimu charged for a couple of minutes and suddenly bit Primus, who then screamed for help and all other dominant males came rushing for his rescue. The dominant males in unison attacked Pimu with kicks, blows, biting and using all crude weapons including logs to beat him up. They cut his leg muscles and ligaments to cripple him down.

Only Fanana and Darwin sided with Pimu, Alofu charged at them and knocked them out the way. Fanana probably knew what was good for him and suddenly changed to side with the rest of the males. Kalunde also charged at Pimu, pounding him with his teeth and arms. The fighting lasted over 3hrs 15min, up until 1.30pm in the afternoon when Pimu succumbed to the beatings and was left severely wounded, unable to defend himself, and he died shortly thereafter.

All other chimpanzees disappeared shortly after the incident, leaving behind only Darwin, mourning the death of his short time friend.

Pim’s legacy is there to stay. But who will the next leader be?

RIP

Bernard, Sixtus, Given, Samjee

Kungwe Beach Lodge Manager, Guides and Tracker – Mahale Mountians National Park.