Piglet had been making excellent progress at Tswalu and had been moved into his own enclosure. He disappeared into a burrow one night and, when he didn’t re-appear, his adoptive parents Corli and Joe became concerned and went down to look for him.

Unfortunately he had already been dead for some time when he was found, and it appears he had had an altercation with another animal which had obviously managed to get into the enclosure.

The Tswalu team are all devastated by the loss of this gutsy little fellow who had won many hearts on the reserve and with the general public.

Says Marco: We came across the lions of the southern pride and sat watching the juveniles have a extended rumble..

We would like to share a few observations made during our time spent with Piglet.

- Weight on 1 April 2012: 21kg – weight on 15 April 2012: 24kg.

- He is now roughly 18 weeks old.

- The local Tswana people refer to aardvark as hakadu’s.

- The teething process has started – Piglet has very itchy gums!

- His hair has become longer, darker and more dense.

- Piglet is digging more and deeper every day and for some reason loves to dig underneath concrete.

- When digging with his hind legs, the purpose is always to make a hole for urination, when digging with his front legs, the purpose is for burrowing.

- He has an incredible sense of tracking and already manages to find his way ‘home’ after walking for kilometres.

- Bathroom privacy is a major priority for this him. Passing wind on the other hand is done without as much as a blink!

- At first, Piglet’s tail seemed merely like an extension of his body. But he has now become very aware of his tail and uses it as a defence mechanism as well as to balance himself when digging.

- When at play, he loves to run, roll and do wild somersaults.

- His saliva becomes stickier around feeding times.

- When feeling threatened or as soon as he smells another animal nearby, he releases a very pungent musky odour.

- He loves to tickle you by sticking his long tongue in between your toes and fingers!

- He drinks with his eyes closed and his tongue sticking out.

- After each bottle he will roll onto his back and scratch his belly with his long nails.

- Piglet sleeps best when lying on his back, he also loves to hold his nose with his front feet whilst sleeping.

- Aardvarks most definitely dream, it seems to be about digging big burrows and chasing termites!

- And lastly, the most special moment witnessed when spending time with a baby aardvark has to be capturing that once in a while yawn – a very cute, closed mouth, tongue curling experience…priceless!

These pics of Piglet were taken by one of Tswalu’s duty managers, Marius Stols.

However, he is definitely not out in the cold yet , because we moved him into his new home with his familiar mattress and duvet.

Piglet’s new home is a little garden cottage in front of our house with direct access to the natural Kalahari vegetation.

Piglet fell in love with his new home straight away! He still naps throughout the majority of the day and goes foraging at sunset.

Joe still has to carry him outside most of the time but he has surprised us with a couple of dashes for the great outdoors!

Piglet cuddles up to surrogate mom Corli, after his termite feast

Upon taking Piglet for a midnight stroll, he was introduced to an elephant shrew as soon as he stepped out of the back door.

He started foraging in the garden, sniffing ground squirrel burrows  and following the scent of the afternoon’s visitors:  warthogs, nyalas and a mongoose!

Before we knew it he landed head first in a burrow – possibly  another aardvark’s from the night before. Miraculously the little one’s instinct kicked in and he managed to dig up and eat his first batch of termites straight away!

It was quite an amusing sight as he became  overwhelmed by the number of little insects all over him. Whether he  needed to sniff, eat, swallow or scratch his now very itchy body was still a mystery to him!

After a very exhausting 30 minutes of digging and eating, Piglet was  ready for bed. He simply made a U-turn, headed for the back door and made a beeline for his bed.

After helping him to get rid of the remaining termites on his body, he  suckled his bottle and drifted off to sleep.

A happy little aardvark dreaming of his first gourmet termite  experience!

Apart from the documentary aspect of this project, there is also a strong research objective. Part of the project will be to explore and describe the meerkats’ underground burrow systems and document both the structure of the burrows and also the creatures that share these burrows with them. This research will complement our knowledge and allow us to further understand what happens once these animals disappear underground.

Tswalu has numerous colonies of meerkats but two colonies have learnt, over a number of years, to trust humans and accept them as part of their environment.

The habituation process began years ago when two neighbouring families of meerkats were identified to be the subject of a wildlife documentary (the wildness of Tswalu, its spectacular landscapes and the rich diversity of Kalahari wildlife, makes Tswalu an ideal location for wildlife documentaries). To habituate the colonies, a person would spend every waking hour of the day getting a little closer to the group, slowly gaining their trust and ensuring that their presence did not adversely influence the meerkats’ behaviour. It was crucial that the meerkats continued about their daily life without any form of reward (food) because this would affect the accuracy and authenticity of the documentary being made.

After many months of slowly gaining their trust, the meerkat families finally accepted the presence of people and, because they have never been encouraged with food, they now simply look past people and continue facing the challenges of life in the Kalahari.

Over the years, the meerkat family has been the subject of a number of films and documentaries. Tswalu has maintained close contact with the meerkats in order to allow guests to experience a close encounter with the colony and also to make the animals available for behavioural and ecological research projects (this type of careful habituation also makes the meerkats extremely valuable research subjects and data on the colony is collected daily).

We look forward to sharing the Tswalu meerkats with the rest of the world. You can watch them LIVE at www.tswalu.com.

A baby aardvark rescued over New Year from a farm in Vryburg, will soon be released on Tswalu Kalahari, which is home to many of these rare animals.

The extraordinary story of how the aardvark was found close to death and nursed back to health, was told by Dr Dorianne Elliot, a veterinary surgeon from the Bird and Exotic Animal Hospital at the internationally renowned Onderstepoort Veterinary Academic Hospital in South Africa.

Dr Elliot received a call from the couple who was trying to feed the aardvark diluted cow’s milk and Pronutro. She realised what a rare and precious find this was and that it needed expert help, so she and colleague Dr Lecsi Jacobson drove 300 km in the middle of the night to collect it.

Says Dr Elliot: “By the time we got there the aardvark was ice cold, almost comatose and extremely thin. His temperature and blood glucose didn’t even register on our equipment.”

The vets put him on a drip and drove home. He lay on Dr Jacobson’s lap the whole way. At home he was put in an incubator.

Piglet
“We nicknamed him ‘the piglet’ as, superstitiously, we never name severely ill animals until they are stronger. The name stuck, so he is still our Piglet,” explains Dr Elliot.

Over the next few days the vets nursed and tube fed him for 24 hours a day. “We got very little sleep. He couldn’t stand or suckle and didn’t urinate for the first 3 days. We thought his kidneys had failed, but it was just massive dehydration.”

On day five he stood up for the first time. The drip was removed on the seventh day. However, the three-hourly tube feeding became extremely stressful for both the vets and their patient.

“The problem was that, with his oddly shaped mouth, he couldn’t suckle from a normal baby bottle. After lots of research and discussion with zoos in the US we managed to track down and purchase a special feeding bottle designed for babies with a cleft palate. During the second week we got him to accept the bottle!”

It was a huge milestone.

They found that the most suitable milk product was Royal Canin Babycat Milk. As he had been drinking over R100 worth of milk daily they approached the company who agreed to sponsor a large amount of milk powder.

The tendons in his front legs were contracted so Drs Elliot and Jacobson took him for a walk every evening to stretch out his legs. Young wild aardvarks walk long distances with their mothers.

“ We communicated with him in soft grunts, and he would reply.” Says Dr Elliot. “I’m sure our neighbours thought we were mad, crawling around the garden at all hours of the night going ‘here Piglet’ and grunting!”

Digging his first burrow
Some weeks ago Piglet was digging in the garden and to the vets delight was properly forming a burrow for the first time. Then came the problem – he wouldn’t come out!

“We waited all night and into the next day at the entrance to the burrow, calling and shaking his bottle, but to no avail. By the time he had been missing for 16 hours, we decided to dig down into the tunnel to find him. But the closer we got to him the further he dug and eventually the tunnel collapsed behind him. He didn’t know how to turn around so he just kept digging.

“We decided that we had to dig him out and with the help of some of my vet students, we dug until 2am, setting up a camp with lights strung all over my garden, or rather ex-garden!” says Dr Elliot.

The group dug three trenches in attempts to intersect with Piglet’s tunnel. He had dug down to 2m deep, under the foundations of the house.

“By the time we finally extricated him he was howling his head off. He had dug about 9m of tunnel. I don’t know how he survived 36 hours underground in a collapsed tunnel.”

Piglet’s new home
When he was rescued, Piglet weighed just 3.7kg. Nearly three months later he weighs over 18kg. He still drinks milk with additives and is not interested in solids.

“We are hoping that he will learn to eat termites at Tswalu, his new home,” says Dr Elliot.

Piglet was flown to Tswalu on the private charter from OR Tambo in early April to meet his new adoptive parents, Corli and Joe Schoeman. Joe is Manager of The Motse and Corli, his wife is Spa Manager.

The family instantly connected and Dr Jacobson, who accompanied him on the flight, was happy to hand over to Joe and Corli after two days.

Piglet has his own bedroom with a mattress and duvet that are familiar to him. The Schoeman’s job over the next months will be to wean him off the bottle and onto termites, take him for early evening walks, show him how to break open termite mounds and familiarise him with his new surroundings. He is not yet aware of the dangers of the bush, and will need to learn about them.

It is hoped that, as he starts feeding on termites, he will become more and more independent, and hopefully move off into the bush and become totally wild.

A tracker will be put under his skin when he gets a bit bigger, so that the Tswalu guides can keep an eye on him.

In the meantime, Piglet has settled in well to his new home. He does not yet have a huge capacity for the great outdoors, but delights in extended siestas! He has his morning bottle, followed by time in the bush, then when he has had enough, he finds his way to his new bedroom and gets onto his mattress.

He eats six hourly through the night but dozes off immediately he has finished his bottle. He has to be carried outside, a habit started by the vets because he was so weak, which he seems reluctant to give up.

So Joe will begin to lure him outside with his bottle to encourage him to venture out on his own. This freedom will be a major step towards his reintroduction. It will also be impossible to carry him out in a few months, when he is expected to weigh about 60 kg!

Jacques moved to South Africa from New Zealand in 2010, and has already completed 2 years’ academic study at Saasveld in George. In order to finish his diploma he is required to work in a game reserve for a year to gain practical experience.

Says Jacques: “I’m absolutely loving it up here in the Kalahari. I started in January and will be working through the year to December, gaining experience in all aspects of running a reserve. After that I hope to qualify as a conservationist and will then go on to look for a more permanent job on a reserve in southern Africa. I’m hoping it’s at Tswalu so I can stay here because it’s absolutely stunning!”

Jacques has taken some stunning images at Tswalu and agreed to share them with us.

At the Anglo American Hangar at OR Tambo International Airport, we were welcomed by Hettie and treated to tea and sandwiches before we boarded the Pilatus PC12, Tswalu’s own plane which is decorated with designs inspired by Bushman rock art. We shared the two hour flight with a family from Brazil who were flying to Tswalu with their three children.

When we landed at Tswalu we were greeted with a pleasant 29 degrees C and a posse of Tswalu staff, including MD Russel Binks who whisked us off in an open Land Rover for a site inspection.

We drove along Kalahari sand roads, their unique burnt orange colour contrasting vividly with the green landscapes which are framed by the exquisite Korannaberg mountain range. We passed herds of springbok, impala and numerous kudu and nyala.

At the staff village Russel explained that the houses were built to be as eco friendly as possible, with solar heating, water tanks and biolytic systems. He showed us the crèche and school for adult education, and the medical clinic which services the entire community and is staffed by a full-time nursing sister. Various doctors visit regularly, including a German dentist who volunteers his services annually.

Tswalu exists for two reasons: To restore the land to its original state before it was farmed; and to provide work and care facilities for the local community. The game reserve presently employs over 120 people.

We drove to Gosa, where a group of young scholars doing research at Tswalu are accommodated, then on to Tarkuni, the magnificent private residence belonging to Tswalu’s owners, which is available for guests and perfect for families or groups travelling together.

A highlight of our tour was The Malori, a magnificent sleep-out deck and recent addition to the offerings at Tswalu. Here guests can spend a night literally under the stars, in total privacy in the middle of the vast Kalahari. The location was carefully chosen for its panoramic views, and has a kingsize bed under a thatched canopy, which can be sealed off from the elements with weatherproof blinds. Along a wooden pathway is a quaint, rustic outdoor bathroom built under the shade of a camel thorn, with an outdoor shower, basin and loo!

With dusk approaching we set off to The Motse, where we were welcomed by the staff and settled into our thatched family suite with its two sizeable bedrooms, each with en-suite bathroom and outdoor shower, connected by a lounge and opening onto a comfortable patio.

The pool deck at The Motse

Dinner was served on the deck next to the pool. Executive chef Theresa Smith’s a la carte menu promised and delivered. We were spoilt for choice, but I settled for a delicious beetroot mousse, followed by springbok flank which fell off the bone.

Day 2
After a morning of marketing and PR meetings, we joined head field guide Marco Tonoli, assistant general manager Tarryn Huyerman, and reservations manager Jeanine Engelbrecht for lunch on the deck. The conversation revolved around the weather which had reached the 30s, and the various projects that the students, housed at Gosa, are researching – including the brown hyaena, scorpions, aardvark and pangolin.

After a lazy lunch and a quick nap, we met Nick Edmonds, our guide for the evening game drive, a young intern who had been helping to habituate two new rescued cheetahs. Before they are released onto Tswalu they must become accustomed to the sight and sounds of game drive vehicles, so one of Nick’s jobs was to drive past their enclosure numerous times during the day.

At the first enclosure we were able to get quite close to one of the cheetahs, but found nothing in the adjacent enclosure. We were to learn later that the second cheetah had been bitten by a snake earlier that day and did not survive.

Nick’s other passion is meerkats, and we needed no persuasion to agree to a visit to one of Tswalu’s habituated meerkat colonies, where the little community had just returned to their burrows after a day of foraging. Nick encouraged us to move quietly and confidently to within touching distance of the quaint little creatures and we watched with delight as they groomed each other and investigated their surrounds curiously, paying no heed to us. One little fellow was so exhausted by the day’s activities that he kept dozing off!

Our day ended with another magnificent dinner served on the deck. This time we enjoyed the Tasting Menu, each dish beautifully prepared, presented and paired with a carefully selected South African wine. The most memorable combination that night was the Grilled Nama Karoo Lamb Loin with Buchu Potato, Morogo Spinach and Cumin Carrot, served with a glass of Remhoogte Merlot.

Day 3
Day three started with an early game drive with Nick. We left at 6am in an effort to see as much as possible before the animals retreated into the bush to find shade and protection from the midday heat. Our guide took us to a waterhole where we watched a warthog wallowing in the water and got close to a journey of giraffe. Along the way we saw numerous bird species, a tortoise crossing the road, zebra, nyala, springbok and gemsbok.

Spotting game is hard work and we were rewarded with coffee and rusks by our guide who set up a picnic for us at a waterhole.

We drove back to have a late and leisurely brunch at The Motse, and after delicious Tswalu Eggs Benedict, we opted for a nap before our spa treatment in the gorgeous, cool Tswalu Spa which has recently been named the Best Safari Spa in Africa. Spa Manager Corli Schoeman treated me to a deep cleansing facial using the all-natural products from Esse.

That evening we were collected from The Motse by Tswalu’s Conservation Director Gus van Dyk who was accompanied by South Africa’s scorpion expert Jonathan Leeming. Armed with UV torches, we were being taken on a scorpion hunt in the dunes! In the dark, the UV light shows the scorpion as a luminous green creature.

The hunt came at the end of an exhilarating game drive which was heralded by the sights and sounds of a lightning storm across the Kalahari. This put paid to the dune dinner we had been looking forward to, but the highlights of the drive, which included a close sighting of a black rhino and an aardvark, was good compensation and the scorpion dune hunt was thrilling.

Day 4
On Monday morning we received a very early wakeup call, because Gus had promised to take us to see the four new male lions being kept in a holding boma before their imminent release.

On the drive there, Gus explained that because Tswalu is isolated from any other wildlife populations, human intervention is sometimes needed to maintain the genetic vigour and diversity of the lion population. Late last year, four new male lions were acquired from the South African National Parks Board and collected from the Marekele National Park in the Waterberg. Since then they had been in a holding camp on Tswalu to allow them to settle down and acclimatise to their new surroundings.

The lions were fairly disinterested in us, which Gus said was a sign that they had become habituated to the game drive vehicles.

Then we set off to find the existing lion populations on the reserve, known to Gus and his team as the northern and southern prides.

We were accompanied by an expert tracker, Sarel Bot, and it wasn’t long before he spotted the tracks of a lioness and two cubs at a watering hole. We found her some kilometres away, resting just a few hundred metres from a recent kill.

The southern pride were enjoying a hearty breakfast of warthog when we came upon them, lying in the shade of some acacia trees and chewing noisily. We watched, fascinated for about half an hour before we realised that we would have to start heading back to The Motse to pack and catch our plane home.

We were disappointed that we would not be able to watch the lion release that night, but are looking forward to seeing them on our next visit. In the meantime, we can imagine them roaming the thousands of hectares of the Green Kalahari, which is their new home.

One of the exciting projects underway is the Tswalu Brown Hyaena Project being run by a team of South African PhD researchers.

The brown hyaena’s IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) classification status was increased from Lower Risk – Least Concern to Near Threatened in 2000. The global population size is estimated to be below 10 000 adult animals, and its population is believed to be decreasing.

The project aims to determine the density of large carnivores in Tswalu Kalahari Reserve with the focus on brown hyaena abundance. Ten camera traps will be set up and a minimum of two brown hyaenas will be fitted with GPS telemetry collars in order to calculate home range sizes, determine clan membership at den sites and obtain true abundance and density estimates. All data derived from camera traps and GPS telemetry collars will be used to create habitat sensitivity maps taking the behaviour and activity of brown hyaenas into account. A monitoring programme will be developed to detect changes in brown hyaena abundance, movement and activity. These programmes may also be applied to other large carnivores in the reserve or to other areas of similar habitat, prey base and carnivore community.

Brown hyaena density and survival often depends on the occurrence of other large carnivores such as lions and spotted hyaenas. Comparing carnivore densities and their influence on brown hyaena density at Tswalu to other areas will ultimately aid its conservation.