KwazuluNatal
I spent the last days in KwazuluNatal to visit a conference near Durban and afterwards I joined two entomologist (Fiona and John) for a field trip through the Drakensberg region. It was absolutely awesome!!! The landscape is wonderful and I have seen a lot of new stuff. Actually, it felt a bit more like being in Africa compared to the life in Stellies. It is completely different than the "European" Western Cape.
The first night after the conference, we stayed at the place of Fionas parents in Southport ... They are really lovely people and their house is just amazing ... sea view and a great garden with tonnes of different birds. I also have seen Vervet monkeys (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vervet_monkey) there. Cute!! :)
After the days at the coast we were heading towards the Drakensberg region which differs quite dramatically from the coastal regions. It is very dry there at the moment because rainfalls are restricted to the summer time. Consequently, the grasslands are drouthy and brownish now. Nevertheless, the mountainous landscape is awesome. During our trip we stopped at several wattle populations to collect leaf material for my work, but also to empty seed traps for Fionas and Johns work. Both are investigating the potential release of biocontrol agents to reduce the seed production by invasive wattles. Therefore, they installed seed traps under the wattle trees to compare seed rain before and after the release of biocontrol agents. However, we were collecting the seed trap samples and in the evenings we spent some time to sort the seeds out. This was quite interesting because beside the seeds you could find a lot of other stuff among the samples ... mostly insects and spiders which were accidentally catched in the traps. Maybe the most exciting sample was the one that I´ve got at the first evening of our field work. We were aware that there might be some bigger spiders in the bags with the samples ... therefore, I shaked the transparent plastic bags before I opend them to see if something big and living is in the bag. However, I was doing this with the very specific bag as well ... nothing was moving while I shaked the stuff and so I opend the thing and poured the content at the table in front of me ... however in the same moment the sample starts to move and a huge rain spider appeared and started to run towards me. Gosh ... I guess I was screaming while I was jumping up from my seat and try to get far away from this spider. XD But even Fiona jumped up from her seat and at least John kept calm and he catched the creature somehow to put it back in the bag. Wow ... I mean they are quite interesting spiders but when one of them is running towards you it isn´t really funny. You see ... sorting seed trap samples is not for sissies. ;)
Beside diverse spiders, we also had the luck to see some other wild life during our trip ... e.g. zebras, a Several cat (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serval), vultures, sunbirds, different antelopes ect. ... and we also met several nice people. A fantasitc field trip. :) Here are some pics for you ...
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| flight impressions |
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| flight impressions |
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| flight impressions |
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| way from the conference venue to the beach |
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| at the beach |
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| Laura, Elana, Suzaan and me (right to left) at the beach after a conference day |
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| bananas |
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| something pretty typical for KZN ... sugar cane ... yummy |
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| lucky bean tree / coral tree |
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| a nymph of an eyed flower mantid (Pseudocreobotra wahlbergi) ... beautiful, isn´t it? |
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| Rondavel houses |
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| first flowers of silver wattle ... actually, I have to say my study species is really pretty :) |
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| Southern region of the Drakensberge |
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| Southern region of the Drakensberge |
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| Southern region of the Drakensberge incl. wide plantations of exotic trees :( |
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| cattle in the silver wattle jungle |
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| Southern region of the Drakensberge incl. invasive cacti (Opuntia spec.) |
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| Southern region of the Drakensberge incl. invasive wattles |
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| Southern region of the Drakensberge |
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| Fiona and John looking for feeding damage to acacia pods |
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| a freshly dug hole of an aardvark (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aardvark) |
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| Zeeeeeebraaaaas :) |
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| Wattles in the sunset |
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| Sunset impressions |
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| DANGEROUS!! ... :D ... signs to prevent that the traps will be destoyed by rubbernecks |
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| our work during the evenings ... sort the seed trap samples and to count the seeds per trap |
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| ... or to count the number of rain spiders per seed trap :D (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palystes_superciliosus) |
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| more field work impressions |
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| more field work impressions |
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| at a farm property where we emptied some traps |
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| more field work impressions |
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| Fiona and John looking for galls at wattles |
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| I'm always impressed how these women can balance different stuff on top of their heads ... here a woman with lots of fresh eggs ... I guess if I had to carry eggs on top of my head there would be no other option than to make scrambled eggs after scratching the damage off the road :) |
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| ... and she has to walk quite a bit |
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| at another farm where we emptied traps ... surrounded by pigs ... |
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| ... cattle ... |
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| ... more cattle ... |
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| ... and goats. |
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| aloes in flower |
