Paradise Fly Catcher- Part 2

Another Dead Hippo

Just upstream of one the hippo pools that we study (and the one we have the live webcams on), a hippo has died.  It died a few days ago and has slowly been rotting in the water.  It is a bit too far away from the bank so we couldn't put one of our game cameras on it.

The crocodiles have started showing up for the feast.  

The Research Blues

It has been a tough field season for us.  

Sometime over the last few days, one of our depth loggers was swept away by the Mara.  I had last downloaded data from the logger on November 1st, so we lost about three weeks of data from the Purungat Bridge.  This is the third depth logger that the river has taken from us this season...all in different locations and secured within the river in different ways.  The erratic flows and large wildlife in the river continue to make it an extremely challenging environment.  

The Mara...is a tough river to work on.  This area...is a tough place to work.  We've got...the Research Blues.

If you happen to be in Tanzania and you see one of these floating by, do please grab it and give us a call. 

Paradise Fly Catcher

A little paradise fly catcher has been moving into a tree directly above our fire pit in front of our tent. We saw her start building her nest a few weeks ago. Looks like she is almost done.

Changing Camera Batteries

Some of you noticed that our Mara Live page stopped updating two days ago. Sorry about that! Turns out the camera batteries died- still working out the optimum settings. It's been really exciting to be able to check the river level, no matter where we are, even from Nairobi! Thanks to Chris, seen here getting things back up and running

Tuka Pamoja

A conversation I overhead between Amanda and an Armed Game Ranger....

Amanda:  "What happened to your head?" (Armed Game Ranger had a cut on the top of his head)

Armed Game Ranger:  "I was chased by a hippo this morning.  I was walking to my post and this hippo on land started chasing me so I ran as fast as I could through the bush and got away.  But, I scratched myself on my head as I was running through the bushes".  

Amanda:  "Really?  Simon (a different Armed Game Ranger) and I were chased away from the water by a hippo just a few minutes ago while I was checking on an experiment."  

Armed Game Ranger:  "I don't know what was wrong with the hippos today...they have been very upset.  Tuka Pamoja."  

"Tuka Pamoja" roughly means "we are together."

The Scariest Hippo Carving...ever

The Narok Coffee House

Our new favorite restaurant in Narok.  The only place for legitimately good coffee in town.

My diff is on fire

Intentionally. Not sure if you can see it in the below picture.  We had to repair and weld a small crack that had developed this season caused by all the kilometers of travel on bad roads.

All better now so we're headed back to the bush.

Flows are finally dropping...

If you haven't stopped by our live webcam yet, you may have missed a crocodile.  Flows are finally dropping in the river so a bit more of the bank is being exposed.  A large crocodile has been hanging out just in front of the webcam.  Check it out.