Chad adventure VIII. Zakouma National Park

Chad’s Zakouma National Park is an unexpected gem in this part of the world. Established in 1963, it has seen its share of turmoil. During various conflicts, including the Chadian civil war, the park’s terrain and wildlife suffered badly. Many park guards and large numbers of wildlife were killed in conflict with militia and poachers. For the past years, the Park has been recovering. For example, in 2002 there were an estimated 4000 elephants in the region, but by 2015 there were only about 450, and now there are about 650 (link). The animals of Zakouma are a unique and interesting component of Chad that we were lucky to experience.

Kelly’s thoughts…

We arrived in Zakouma in the evening with the plan to spend three nights and two days of game drives and exploring the local fauna. Right away we saw the Park’s most notable animal, Kordofan giraffes, one of about nine subspecies of giraffe in Africa. There are only about 2300 individuals of this subspecies in the wild with over half of those living in Zakouma (link). We also saw red-fronted gazelle, bushbuck, tantalas monkeys and baboons, these last two species right in the main camp, Tinga Camp, where we stayed.

We stayed in Tinga in lovely bungalows with, tada!, running water including a flush toilet and shower… cold, but that was just fine. Our first tasks were to get cleaned up, shower, and do a bit of laundry. Our bedroom included an actual bed with mosquito netting. A sliding door opened onto a small sill. Baboons were in the camp and easily seen out the door, but at one point I managed to get a picture of the baboon sitting on the sill right outside the window and peering in like some creepy stalker.

The common area was a lovely patio with dining tables with a bar and kitchen overlooking the river bottom. The evening we got there, we settled in and had a wonderful supper in the dining area complete with Gala beer. It was the best food we had had for a while. And that night we slept well in a real bed in comfort after 12 days on the road, camping in tents.

The next day we awoke early to a game drive in an excellent safari vehicle, a traditional open-sided 4WD with stadium seating. We had a vehicle and a guide all to ourselves for two days. We did morning drives and, after the traditional downtime between about 12 and 3, an evening and night drives with bright spotlights for seeing the night-active animals.

And animals we saw. During the day we saw many antelope including roan (a fantastic animal), red-fronted gazelle, waterbuck, topi, and hartebeast among others. We saw many Kordofan giraffe and huge numbers of buffalo, including giant herds as well as isolated, huge bulls. We saw warthog and, at a site on the river, dozens of huge West African crocodiles. Olive baboons were everywhere along with tantalas and patas monkeys.

We saw one modest-sized Central African python (the first python I have seen), many giant Nile monitor lizards, including one eating a giant snail of some kind, and one African spurred tortoise, among other reptiles.

Night drives were amazing for some more unusual animals. Our driver/guide had an exceptionally strong spotlight and was great at spotting things. We were really lucky to see a couple large spotted gennets and, up close, a civet! We saw two banded mongooses (mongeese?). While shining the light along the road we heard trumpeting up ahead. We got closer and two huge elephants tramped off into the brush, trumpeting. They seemed very upset. I think elephants in the area still remember poachers hunting them, often at night. The brightest eyes we encountered were the huge orange reflections from the galagos, or bush babies, cute little primates jumping

around in the trees near the road. We got to see one up close… they are terribly cute. We also saw a spotted hyena up close in the night, a real treat.

The birds were absolutely stunning. There were greater numbers and diversity of birds in Zakouma than anywhere I have been in the world. We saw large eagles and many other birds of prey, a huge number and diversity of water birds including various storks, herons and cranes, hornbills, including ground hornbills, bee eaters of various kinds, hoopoes, rollers, and many, many other amazing species. We tried to keep track of species, but there were so many we had to focus only on the most distinctive ones.

The food was wonderful at the lodge, and we enjoyed lounging in the common area, watching the wildlife and enjoying some true leisure. At one point, for dessert, we were even served vanilla ice cream… I was soooo happy.

The evening of the second day we invited Yves and Armando along on our game drive. In the evening we saw numerous animals including an elephant, red-necked ostriches, a lot of different antelope and other critters. As evening approached, we saw a lot of dust raised in the distance. It was clearly a herd of elephants. As we got close it was evident there were as many as 35 elephants in the bunch. We closed in on them and got a great look at a lot of elephants in the fading light. Armando loaded a trumpeting elephant on his phone, and the bunch we saw heard it. They became really worked up, tramping around and trumpeting and flaring their ears. They were about 75 yards away, and I think Riki started to get pretty nervous about being attacked and trampled. We finally left them in peace and headed toward camp.

As we left, right away we saw a serval, a type of beautiful, spotted wild African cat. But I was beginning to resign myself to not seeing the cats I hoped Riki would see… lions. But as we neared Tinga Camp, about a half mile away, we suddenly saw in the road two large lionesses. The nearest moved about 15 yards off the road and laid down. We observed it for quite some time, and soon the other lioness walked over and laid down next to the first. They choughed for us and gave us an excellent show. We left them and drove near to camp to drop Armando off at his dwelling which was near the edge of Tinga. Right at his camp was a huge male elephant, just hanging around. We dropped Armando and headed towards our bungalow. At the area where the crocodiles were in the river was a few more lionesses, just lounging around, and as we left them, a young male lion crossed our path and headed straight for where Armando was cooking his supper. We heard lions all night that night from right in camp, and they were all around the area.

Our time in Zakouma was amazing… we saw most of the animals I had hoped to see, and some I did not expect. For Riki’s first experience seeing African fauna, I think it was truly amazing and impactful. Though game parks in Kenya or South Africa may have more species or the animals may be easier to observe, the uniqueness of Zakouma, its remoteness and the special opportunity to see Chad animals was just simply wonderful. See the list below of animals we were able to identify in Chad. We saw many more birds than these, but there were so many it was difficult to try to get them all identified in the time we had. Zakouma was an amazing addition to our Chad experience, truly unusual and unique.

Riki’s thoughts…

My favorite animal is the giraffe, so it was fun that the first wild animal that we saw at Zacouma was a giraffe. The species of giraffes at the park was beautiful, especially the males, who have deep mahogany-colored spots. If they are caught out in the open, they run away. But if they are standing near a tree, it is as if they think they cannot be seen, because they will stand perfectly still. We also saw baboons pretty quickly. They were kind of cool, but they watched us suspiciously, and with a glance that led me to believe they wished me dead. One evening, we saw one baboon at the top of a tall tree, sitting atop the highest branch all alone. We saw this again later. We never knew the reason for this behavior. Did they want some alone time? Were they a look-out for lions?

I have a few humorous memories from our time there. The first night, against recommendations, we were sleeping with our sliding door open. We had been warned that the baboons might try to get into the bungalow if the glass door was open. I was having a bit of trouble sleeping and I heard what I thought was a lion huffing outside our door. I thought it might be just Kelly sleeping, but I got up and closed the door just to be safe. When I closed the door, the sound stopped. I thought maybe I had awakened Kelly by getting up. But the next morning at breakfast, the staff asked us if we had heard the lions moving through camp the night before. It was then that I realized that the noise I heard that I had attributed to Kelly was actually a lion. Something similar to this had happened a few nights earlier. I was awake and heard something that I thought might be hyenas. I heard the strange noise all around our tent. I think the dogs in the village nearby heard it, too, because by the time I woke Kelly up to listen to the sound, all he could hear was the barking of the village dogs. I guess there is one advantage to not sleeping well in Africa. You get to hear predators! I sometimes hear coyotes at night in New Mexico, so I guess I have a knack for insomniac predator recognition.

Another memory was not so humorous at the time, because I thought it might be my last. We had invited our cook and driver to join us on one of our game drives. We had a good drive and saw lots of interesting wildlife. It was approaching dusk when we found a herd of elephants. Our cook thought it would be a good idea to play a trumpeting elephant sound with his cell phone. The elephants were already agitated, and the recording seemed to agitate them further. The matriarch of the herd was stomping, trumpeting, flaring her ears, and keeping the herd in a tight circle by striking them with her trunk when they tried to go near us. The elephants were too close to us, and getting too agitated for me to feel like we were perfectly safe. I was, as I was the entire time we were in Chad, the only woman in the party. I was also the only one that seemed to think the situation was less amusing and more dangerous. I was very relieved when the driver decided to head back to the camp.

 

The birds were off-the-charts amazing. I love the bright blue-green bee-eaters and the crowned cranes. The hornbills were amazing, as well, along with all the water birds. Seeing the birds there and getting better at using binoculars has inspired me to learn more about the birds in our backyard in New Mexico. Kelly taught me the word biodiversity, which processes in my brain as God showing His magnificent creativity. We enjoy so many varieties animals and plants in the world around us! There is not just one type of bird, but thousands of them. We don’t have just one type of fruit tree, or one type of flowering plant, or even one type of giraffe. What an amazing world we live in! Zacouma was my first game park, and even if it is not one of the most impressive parks in Africa, it was enough to blow my mind and leave me wanting more.

Mammals:

Elephant

African buffalo

Lion

Spotted hyena

Kordofan giraffe

Roan

Topi

Lelwel’s hartebeest

Defassa waterbuck

Warthog

Western kob

Red-fronted gazelle

Bohor reedbuck

Oribi

Bushbuck

Common duiker

Golden jackel

Serval

Large spotted genet

African civet

Banded mongoose

Senegal galago

Olive baboon

Tantalas monkey

Patas monkey

Rock hyrax

Scrub hare

Striped ground squirrel

Scimitar horned oryx (Ennedi)

Dorcas gazelle (Ennedi)

 

Reptiles:

West African crocodile

Comman agama

Brook’s house gecko

African spurred tortoise

Central African python

Nile monitor lizard

 

Birds:

Pied avocet

Little green bee eater

Northern carmine bee eater

Abyssinian roller

Arabian bustard

Denham’s bustard

Black crowned crane

Pied crow

Namaqua dove

Whitefaced whistling duck

African fish eagle

Long rested eagle

Martial eagle

Cattle egret

Little egret

Great egret

Clapperton’s francolin

Egyptian goose

Helmeted guineafowl

Hamerkop

African harrier hawk

Squacco heron

Greenbacked heron

Purple heron

Black headed heron

Green woodhoopoe

Black scimitarbill

Eurasian hoopoe

Abyssinian ground hornbill

Northern red billed hornbill

African grey hornbill

Sacred ibis

Glossy ibis

Hadada ibius

African jacana

Purple glossy starling

Blackwinged stilt

Yellow billed stork

African stork

White stork

Saddle billed stork

Mrabou stork

Spotted thicknee

Sahel paradise whydah