I’ve been away more than I’ve been at home recently (more tales from my adventures shortly!), but thought while I have the chance, I’d check in quickly before disappearing from your screens again for a while.

The geese are faring fairly well, with eleven goslings still in tow (above). One casualty so far is sad but not bad going, considering how many contenders there are for gosling-guzzlers in this part of the world!

More new birds seem to be discovering our birdbath…including a Yellow Spotted Petronia, above (which is a type of sparrow, and is common in Tsavo) and the strange stub-tailed Northern Crombec which is now visiting our little acacia tree by the birdbath to forage for tiny insects along its branches (below).

Sandpipers are on the river again, back from their travels to Europe, the first of the migrants to return.

Remember Slim, the Black Tipped (aka Slender) Mongoose? Well, he’s still around and today I put out the remnants of a roast chicken for him.

To my surprise, the Ground Squirrels were the first to the carcass and started voraciously gnawing away at the bones (above).

What surprised me even more was that the squirrels seemed to enjoy eating fatty bits of flesh from the chicken too. Whatever next?

As soon as Slim appeared (below), he quickly made off with the whole carcass, obviously intent on having the feast all to himself. With so many squirrels about (I counted at least eight in the vicinity of the chicken today), who can blame him?

Part of the reason for the squirrel glut is that I’ve started putting out maize for whatever animals and birds want it – and it’s attracting dozens of squirrels as well as doves and francolin…even the sharp little dikdiks have found it and come each evening to have a free meal.

On a completely different note, the yellow Aloes in our balcony flowerbeds are flowering for the first time, which will probably bring in the sunbirds we see flitting around in the acacia trees around the house. I must try to remember to take a photo before I rush off on another trip again...

The end of 2007 already! How quickly this year has gone, and yet, when looking back, how much has happened…moving back to Kenya from Scotland, getting married, settling into Kulafumbi…

Christmas was fun, and surprisingly social for us, with some friends staying for several days, others dropping in for just one night, others for lunch, and others for sundowners. We may live in the middle of nowhere, but sometimes you wouldn’t believe it! Our friend Rob arrived in his microlight, and landed on the beach in front of the house…the aircraft provided hours of fun on the mornings when the weather was good enough to fly, which was actually only a couple, because it’s been mainly overcast and drizzly in the mornings, clearing later in the day to become hot and humid. We mixed elements of a traditional Christmas (big turkey) with elements of the unconventional, like our Commiphora Christmas tree. It was full moon on Christmas eve which was lovely…

December 24th provided an amazing sight: we saw a hippo under the reeds opposite the house, which looked like it had some dried grass on its back. Upon closer inspection, we realised this was no dried grass but a tiny baby crocodile! And then we saw another one, and then a third, trying to climb up onto the hippo’s back…it was the most extraordinary sight. The baby crocodiles obviously thought the hippo resembled a boulder to rest on, and clambered aboard. When the hippo moved, the little crocodiles fell off, but within a few seconds, were scrabbling back up again. Because of the distance, it was difficult to get a clear photo, but hopefully you can make out the crocodiles in the pictures.

On Boxing Day, we walked down the riverbank to take a look at the hippos who are always there at Hippo Bend. I’m not sure if it was because we had Rob’s dogs, Raymond and Natter, with us, but the hippos were quite restless today. There were two youngsters play-fighting, while their mothers bit the water (which is a sign of nervousness) and started displaying their large teeth. We were quite a distance from the hippos, so it may not have been us at all triggering this behaviour – but there was certainly something going on making the hippos uptight. One hippo, further downstream, looked rather funny as it surveyed us on our way home…

The creepers, which I photographed in all their greenness a few weeks ago, are all flowering down on the riverbank now. There seems to be a predominance of yellow flowers – all slightly different shapes and shades. I also notice that the smaller Delonix trees are flowering more prolifically than the larger ones, which is interesting.

We had visits from the genet cat and from Slim, the black-tipped mongoose, both delighted with all the Christmas scraps of turkey and ham… A swift came and slept on our mosquito net again – this happens when the birds are disturbed by something at night, and then head for the lights in the house…they always seem to end up clinging to our mosquito net (instead of a cliff edge, where they’d normally hang to sleep). On the subject of birds, the Egyptian Goose parents are around, but there is no sign of the goslings – they were here one day, and then gone the next – they have obviously flown the coup…

All in all, it’s been a fairly quiet time on the river, with just the usual residents passing by: the baboons and the vervet monkeys, the impala and the waterbuck, and the ever-present profusion of dik-diks…

The end of the year inevitably inspires a moment or two of contemplation and retrospection…This year, I leave you with these two images of Kulafumbi, which in the period of a few short weeks transformed itself from semi-desert to jungle, testament to the cycles and endless rebirth of Nature.

Now, as the old year ends and the new year ushers in, the bushland is turning yellow again; although the rain is still around in pockets, before long, the dry times will set in, and we will await the arrival of the long rains, due to start falling in four or five months’ time…until then, the vegetation will hunker down, the wildlife will return to the river, and we will continue to observe and marvel at the changes brought daily to our doorstep by Nature’s ever-changing mysteries…

The last evening of the year receded with a rainbow and thunder, and the most extraordinary yellow light, bathing the river in gold…

Happy New Year to you all, and best wishes for a peaceful and fulfilling 2008…

See more photos of our first Christmas at Kulafumbi...
View more pictures illustrating how Kulafumbi has changed through the seasons...
Browse more crocodile images...
See more photos of creeper flowers, and other wild blossoms of Kulafumbi...
See more Hippo and other Big Game shots...