The Wanderings of an Elephant Hunter

by Walter Dalrymple Maitland Bell

For many days we saw no sign of elephant. Kob and water buck were fairly numerous on the banks, and whistling teal, guinea-fowl, Egyptian geese, spoonbills and egrets were common, while inland giraffe, rhino, buffalo, haartebeeste, topi, oribi, roan, and duiker were numerous. Lion were frequently heard, and W. shot a fine male on the carcase of a hippo which was pretty far gone. This hippo must have been wounded by man somewhere, as it was full grown and quite beyond a lion’s ability to kill. Fish became so unsophisticated as to take anything you liked to put on a hook, and that right alongside the canoe. So tame were they that our boys used to dangle buck gralloch in the water and spear the fish which immediately swarmed round it. Why fish were so numerous I do not rightly understand. It may have been because there were no natives, who, with their gigantic traps, must destroy countless fish. A curious thing was that the enormous “crocs.” we saw appeared to prefer buck to fish. One which we shot was dragging a dead haartebeeste into the water. The haartebeeste was full grown and had evidently been kept under water for some time. We often spotted these monsters lying motionless in the grass, waiting for buck to come along, I imagine. Another large crocodile whom we were tempted to photograph was taken by W. at only about 8 yds. range. He had sustained damage to one eye—the one nearest the photographer—and probably that was why W. could approach him so closely.

So far we had not met with great numbers of tsetse. But now we began to reach a very flat country which was evidently all under water in the wet season. Half submerged evergreen forests became more and more common. These cool, damp forests were full of tsetse, and in a few days we were overjoyed to find that elephant frequented them in goodly numbers. Buffalo also seemed fond of them. Had it not been for the swarms of tsetse I think we would have found these groves of evergreen standing full of elephant and buffalo. As it was they came to them only by night, withdrawing to the open bush and dry grass lands in the daytime. Only once did we actually see elephant from the canoes in the daytime, although we frequently did so by night.

SPUR-WINGED GEESE: SHARI RIVER.

MALE EGYPTIAN GEESE IN BREEDING SEASON: BAHR AOUCK.

One day we saw ahead of us what appeared like pure white trees. When we drew near we saw that the white on the trees was caused by a colony of egrets sitting on their nests, the surrounding foliage being covered with their droppings. A curious fact in connection with this colony was that when we repassed it on our way down-stream some six weeks after, white spoonbills had taken over the nests and were busy sitting on them, while their earlier occupants, the egrets, were all over the sand-banks, teaching their half-grown progeny how to catch fish, etc.

At the time of our up-stream journey the Egyptian goose was also breeding. On every sand-bank there were scores of ganders, while the geese were hidden away in the vegetation, sitting on their nests. These we found, but always with great difficulty, so well were they hidden.

Fly and game became more and more plentiful as we journeyed on. When I speak of fly I mean tsetse; there were other flies in plenty, but they appeared of no importance beside the fiendish tsetse. We began to see buffalo now, and one day we saw where the river bank had been trampled down. As we approached it became clear that a very large herd of elephants had been there. It was soon evident that the tracks were quite recent, having been made the night before. We found a nice site for camp on an island, where our fires would not be seen by elephant revisiting their drinking place. We hoped that they would come in the night, and sure enough they did so, soon after sundown—such a splashing and rumbling, trumpeting and crashing. Lions were also busy, roaring on both sides of the river. It was a busy spot and one of our happiest camps. From it as base we hunted in all directions. And what a long way the elephant used to go in the daytime from the river. They would come to the river just after sundown when the flies were quiet. There they would spend the night, crashing the evergreen gallery-forest, plastering themselves with mud as a protection against fly on the following day, eating acres of the still green river grass, and generally enjoying themselves. It must be remembered that at this season everything a few yards back from the river is burnt up either by sun or fire. The dry season in these tropical parts is the winter of the Northern Hemisphere, in its effects upon vegetation. Instead of dying off the grass is burnt off. The grass fires wither the leaves on the trees and they fall immediately after. All temporary water, such as pools, puddles, etc., dries up. Fly desert the dry parts and congregate in myriads in the shade of the river forest. But they will follow man or beast for miles into the dry country. It is astounding to look behind one as one leaves the vicinity of the river. Behind each man there is a small cloud of tsetse; they keep about two or three feet from the ground. Each traveller keeps flicking away fly that settle on the man in front of him. It is rather startling at first to receive a hard slap on the back when one is not expecting it. Fly generally got us under the brims of our hats and, when near to buffalo, one would be bitten every thirty seconds. Lucky for us that there were no natives about with sleeping sickness. During the dry season there is not much for elephant to eat away from the river. They pick up a fair lot of tamarind fruit, dig up roots, and chew aloes and sansivera fibre, spitting out the fibre in balls. But it is on the river that they depend for the bulk of their green food and water, and, were it not for fly, they would doubtless remain there day and night.

Early on the following morning W. and I separated, he taking one bank while I took the other. I tracked a large herd back from the river for about five hours’ fairly slow going, as the tracking was difficult. Dry season tracking is difficult because the ground becomes so hard, also because all the old tracks remain, as there is no rain to obliterate them.