African Nature Notes and Reminiscences

by Frederick Courteney Selous

Even in the countries to the south and west of the Zambesi river, though there the range of the giraffe has been sadly curtailed since the time when the emigrant Boers first crossed the Orange river in 1836, these animals are far from being a vanished species, or one which is on the verge of extermination. True, there are now no giraffes left in large areas of country where thirty years ago they were plentiful, but these animals are still to be found in Western Matabeleland, throughout the greater part of Khama's country, as well as in the Northern Kalahari, and thence northwards to far within the boundaries of the Portuguese province of Angola. The whole of this vast extent of country is, like so much of Northern Africa to the south of the Sahara and Abyssinia, a semidesert, impossible of settlement by Europeans; for although it is covered for the most part with trees of various kinds, or thorn scrub varying in height from two or three to twelve or fifteen feet, the soil is almost everywhere deep soft sand, and for several months in the year there is little or no surface water, except in the large rivers, which are few in number and far apart. Throughout the greater part of these arid, sun-scorched wastes, giraffes are, I think, likely to hold their own for a long time to come, if only some check can be put upon the operations of the native mounted hunters, belonging to the Bakwena, Bamangwato, and Batauwana tribes, who are now practically their only enemies.

For the extermination of the giraffe in the Transvaal, Bechwanaland, and the country immediately to the north of the Limpopo, Europeans are entirely responsible. The Boers killed most of them, of course, because up to 1890 Boer hunters were always in the proportion of at least ten to one to white hunters of any other nationality. But, man for man, English hunters were quite as destructive as Boers. The fact is, the pioneers of all the white races of North-Western Europe in new countries are tarred with the same brush, as far as the extermination of wild animals is concerned. In North America the western frontiers-men, who were largely of British descent, exterminated in a few short years the countless herds of bison; in South Africa the Boers have exterminated or brought to the verge of extinction many species of animals which but a few decades ago were spread over the face of the land in seemingly inexhaustible numbers; and to-day the inhabitants of Newfoundland are hard at work destroying as fast as they can the great herds of seals which annually assemble in the early spring to bring forth their young on the ice floes off the coast of Labrador.

When human greed of gain is added to the old love of hunting, and both are unrestrained by legislation, the speedy extermination of any beast or bird which has any market value must necessarily follow. The errors of the past can never be retrieved, but it is to be hoped that now that every part of the world has been taken under the protection of some civilised state, no species of animal or bird which still survives in any considerable numbers will be allowed to become extinct. The white man, whether Boer or Britain, is now effectually restrained from taking any further part in lessening the numbers of the giraffes in the countries to the west of Southern Rhodesia and to the north of the Limpopo, which are under British protection, and if only the native Bechwana hunters from Molipololi, Palapye, and Denukana—who are well-mounted and armed with breech-loading rifles—were forbidden by their chiefs to kill more than a certain fixed number of giraffes annually, and severely punished for exceeding the limit allowed, I see no reason why these most interesting animals should not survive for all time, throughout all those great areas of South-Western Africa where, owing to the scarcity of water, no human beings other than a few scattered families of wandering Bushmen can ever make their home.

The belief is very general, both amongst white and native hunters in South Africa, that giraffes are capable of going for months at a time without drinking, and the fact that they are to be found during the driest season of the year in the most arid districts, far away from any place where surface water exists, lends colour to this belief. But yet it seems to me impossible that an animal of the size of the giraffe, which during the dry season is exposed day after day to a sun-heat of 165° (Fahrenheit), and which browses on leaves and twigs which at that time of year contain but little moisture, can really live for long periods without drinking. When hunting with Bushmen in the country to the south of the Mababi river, which towards the end of the dry season is quite waterless, my savage companions would often halt suddenly on perceiving a certain thin, grass-like leaf protruding from the ground, and squatting down, commence digging vigorously with their spears in the soft sandy soil. They would presently unearth great white tubers—often as big as a man's head—white in colour and looking something like very large turnips. These tubers contained as much water as a juicy orange, and were, as the Bushmen said, "metsi hela" (that is, "nothing but water"). They told me, and I think with truth, that they were able to live and hunt in the country where these tubers grew without requiring water to drink. They also informed me that elands, gemsbucks, and other antelopes which live in the desert were in the habit of pawing away the sand from and then eating these tubers, which rendered them independent of actual drinking water. There are probably other water-conserving tubers, known to animals which live in the waterless parts of Western South Africa; and at certain times of year a kind of small water-melon grows in the Kalahari in great profusion, which, as long as it lasts, renders all wild animals entirely independent of drinking water. Oxen and horses soon get accustomed to these wild melons and thrive on them, and human beings can make tea or coffee from their juice.

Now, the occurrence of wild melons and tubers which contain a great deal of water, probably explains the otherwise unaccountable fact that large antelopes and other animals are able to exist in the most arid portions of South-West Africa at a time of year when there is absolutely no surface water; but in the country to the south of the Mababi the Bushmen stated emphatically that giraffes never dug up the water-containing tubers of which I have spoken. My own belief is that, although they must be able to go without water for a much longer time than most animals, they must nevertheless drink periodically throughout the year. It is possible that in the recesses of the Kalahari the giraffes may obtain the fluid they require from the wild water-melons like other animals, or in periods of prolonged drought they may migrate to the neighbourhood of the Botletlie and other rivers. To the east and north of the Botletlie, a glance at a good map will show that giraffes could never be more than fifty or sixty miles from permanent water. When I was hunting elephants on the Chobi river, in the 'seventies of last century, elephants were in the habit of drinking early one night in that river, and then travelling straight away into the waterless country to the west, and I am sure they got their next drink, either twenty-four or possibly forty-eight hours later, in the overflow of the Okavango, known by the natives living on the Mababi as the Machabi. These elephants, which had become excessively wary, through much hunting, I believe never quenched their thirst twice running in the same river; and as giraffes would not require to drink nearly as frequently as elephants, they would be able to range over far more extensive areas of country than those animals, drinking at intervals at points far distant one from another, and between which there was absolutely no surface water. I cannot help thinking that the idea that giraffes can go for months together without drinking, in countries where there is but a small percentage of fluid in the food they eat, and in which the heat and dryness of the atmosphere are so intense that one's nails become as brittle as glass and the hairs of one's beard are constantly splitting, must be a mistaken one. It is, however, only right to say that many very experienced African hunters hold the view that giraffes are quite independent of water, and that they can and do exist for months at a time without drinking.

Giraffes certainly show no aversion to water, as I have frequently seen them drinking, and watched them as they gradually straddled their forelegs wide apart, by a series of little jerks, until they at length got their mouths down to the surface of the pool.

Many herbivorous animals are, as a rule, very silent, but all antelopes are capable of making, and do occasionally make, certain vocal sounds. But the giraffe appears to be absolutely voiceless. At any rate, I have never heard one make any kind of noise, and that was the experience of my friend the late Mr. A. H. Neumann; whilst Mr. H. A. Bryden, as well as other men who have hunted these animals, have put the same fact on record.

Although giraffes often feed through dense thickets of wait-a-bit thorns on their way from one part of a country to another, they are more partial, I think, to open park-like surroundings than to thick forest. In portions of Khama's country—both near Lopepe and Metsi-butluku—I have upon more than one occasion seen giraffes and springbucks at the same time. In such districts, before the days of the modern long-range, small-bore rifles, it was very difficult to get within shot of the former animals on foot, as, owing to the great height of their heads above the ground and their quickness of sight, they were always able to see anything approaching them, when still a long way off. Giraffes are also very keen-scented, as any one will agree who has often followed on their spoor with Bushmen trackers. Pointing to the ground, on which they have read as in a book that just here the giraffes have commenced to run, these quick-sighted savages will suddenly dash off along the spoor with right arms extended, crying, "Sabili; ootlili pevu"[16] ("They've run away; they've got our wind"). Running on the tracks of the disturbed animals at a pace which it requires a sharp canter to keep up with, it is seldom that these wiry sons of the desert will not bring the mounted hunter in sight of the giant quarry. "Tutla, tutla ki-o" ("The giraffes; there are the giraffes"), they cry, pointing eagerly forwards with glistening eyes. And then it is for the white man to do his part and secure a plentiful supply of meat for his savage friends.

[16] Literally, "They've heard the wind."

The chase of the giraffe on horseback lacks, of course, the fierce joy and the soul-stirring excitement which accompanied elephant- and lion-hunting, with the rude muzzle-loading guns used by professional African hunters some forty years ago; for the giraffe is a most harmless and inoffensive animal, in no way dangerous to human life. The same thing may, however, be said of the fox and the wild red deer of Exmoor, the pursuit of which animals, it is generally conceded, affords some of the most exhilarating sport procurable in this country.