News Update from March 2005
This course had a full compliment of 8 students. Only one week before the course began though we had three vacancies still available. I have to admit I was very relieved to get all three bookings on the Monday prior to the start of the course. There was quite a mix of nationalities this time round. Other than the local students we had people from, America, Holland, UK and Australia.
Sadly two of the students failed to reach the required standard in both this course and in the FGASA exams. There was one other student who attempted to write the FGASA level 2 since he had the required experience, but sadly he missed out with 68%. The other 5 successfully passed their FGASA exams and our congratulations and best wishes for the future go to them all.
The drought conditions continue to worry us and despite some late rains in April the bush is looking very barren and confirms our suspicions that we are in for a very hard winter. The wildebeest and zebra that were resident in the area of the centre have moved away looking for better pasture, although they do come back every now and then to their home area. The elephants started to make an appearance during the course again, but we didn't have to much luck locating them. We had several frustrating attempts of tracking them down to discover they had already beaten us back towards the river. We had some close sightings of giraffe close to the centre which were also special moments.
The one aspect that this course will always be remembered for is the great number of snakes that we encountered. On average we must have had 1-2 snakes on a daily basis and on some days many more than that. We saw all sorts of different species from boomslangs, to pythons, cobras and many others. Our highlight was possibly locating a 4m python on one of the walks. We must have spent almost an hour observing her and enjoying this special experience. Sadly today there are not so many large pythons left, and so this was a real treat. We also had a great time with a 2m Snouted Cobra that I removed from my own garden and took down to show the students. This was a very large powerful snake and I think most of the students appreciated this.
