In 2008 18 Wild Dogs were reintroduced ( courtesy of SANPARKS)into the Mashatu area of the Tuli Block, South East Botswana, After an initial good start, they have slowly dissapeared with just one sighting of two males in 2011. The theory is they have been poisoned or snared by locals, apparently the experts were surprised by the fact that they had visited lnearby inhabited faming areas and had killed livestock:eek3:
It seems that the reintroduction into the nearby Limpopo Lipadi reserve has done better, and some sightings have also occurred in the areas to the east of this reserve,
We were lucky to see the pack in its full glory and this image of one of the pups was taken in the dried up river bed of the Limpopo river on 20th September 2008.
EOS 1D MkIII
500mm F4 hand-held
F4, ISO 800, 1/2000
05-19-2012, 04:58 AM
Andreas Liedmann
Hi Ken,
would love to see these beautiful predators .I made already 8 trips to southern Africa,just saw them twice running in far distance.
Nice capture,colors ,detail,contrast work well for me.I would prefer a bit more room on the bottom ,if you have it.If not,it is still working as is.
Cheers Andreas
05-19-2012, 05:27 AM
Ken Watkins
Andreas,
I have been very lucky with Wild Dog sightings, mainly in Botswana and always in the Kwando concession. Unfortunately as it is a private concession it is a bit expensive!
But you really need to make sure you have the right guide and vehicle whilst you are there and be prepared to do a lot of long days.
When we were in the concession over Christmas/New year 2011/12 for 12 days we had good sightings on 11 out of 12 days, they even found us once:S3:
05-19-2012, 09:53 AM
Vivaldo Damilano
Cute as can be, love the raized eyes. Soft light work really nicely with these dogs. Agree Botswana is definitely great for wild dog sightings. It's really sad to hear that the dogs at Mashutu dissapeared.
05-19-2012, 10:04 PM
Harshad Barve
Great image Ken , love the colors and mood here
TFS
05-20-2012, 02:58 AM
Ken Watkins
Thanks everybody, these are my favourite animal, unbelievably labelled as disgusting in the latest issue of "Getaway"because they regurgitate their food to feed other members of their pack, nowt as strange as folk I say!
05-20-2012, 07:31 AM
Rachel Hollander
Ken - nice walking pose and techs look good. Agree on a little more space below would have taken this up a notch.
TFS,
Rachel
05-20-2012, 09:24 AM
Mark Wiseman
Hi Ken,
I like your wild dog pup image, huge cuteness factor. I have yet to see them in the wild and my ideal would be to see them in the KTP. Alwyn Myberg has seen them 20km's from the Kaa Gate.
Thanks for sharing and best wishes,
Mark.
05-20-2012, 09:51 AM
LauraDyer
Lovely image, very cute and inquisitive expression captured. Well done ken, you are lucky with this sighting, looks like it was wonderful!
05-20-2012, 04:46 PM
Morkel Erasmus
Super cute pup here, Ken.
It's sad to hear of population decline of any African predator. I am glad they do seem to be flourishing in other areas of the Tuli.
I do wonder if they ever will venture to the KTP side of the world as the area seems to be large enough to support a pack with plentiful game and established waterholes.
05-20-2012, 11:04 PM
Ken Watkins
Thanks everybody.
Generally Wild Dog seem to do a lot better, where there are smaller populations of Lions, so I would think that Kgalagadi would be a difficult place for them, they are not that fond of Hyenas either.
05-21-2012, 01:48 AM
LauraDyer
Morkel- I actually have asked the head ranger in KTP before about Wild Dog being relocated to the park. He said that with the game numbers, and type/ distribution along the river beds, they would completely wipe out the Springbok etc. He said they could cross over from Bots occasionally, but an actual population with be devastating for the area...
05-21-2012, 03:20 AM
Ken Watkins
Laura,
I have to entirely agree with the head ranger on this, when they were re-introduced to Mashatu the Impalla had no idea what they were and just stood there, they soon learnt!
Reintroduction of Wild Dog has rarely been sucessful, reintroductions into Hwange have also largely failed, thankfully there are several areas most notably Kwando, Save (Zimbabwe) where there are many still surviving.
05-23-2012, 09:41 PM
AdityaPadhye
Cute pup and lovely image. The size of its head is huge compared to its body