The Bunker Diaries Part 2: Flittering Bats, Disembodied Clatters, and Would You PLEASE Stop That Infernal "Peep"ing!

In the dark, claustrophobic pause between sunset and moonrise, we listened as the bats – precision flyers extraordinaire – swooped in and out of the observation window, their just-audible chirrups announcing their (insect) genocidal intent with every visit. Outside the hide, movement at the pan had ceased, the last visitor a scrub hare that paused for a quick drink before bounding off into the bush.

(If you missed Part 1 of this series, you can find it here).

Settling in for the long haul

The lull gave the four of us time to set up for the almost 12-hour wait until sunrise. Night shifts were agreed, balancing the realities of trying to maintain solo alertness with the need to get meaningful rest and maintain good humour. FOMO is a thing on these counts, especially since many of the desirable sightings are of nocturnal creatures, so we listed which animals would necessitate a wake-up nudge. Before settling down for the night, surreptitious exits from the hide for “comfort breaks” – carefully scanning for wildlife that we might frighten away – doubled as welcome leg stretch opportunities.

The bull giraffe we saw when we arrived around midday never came for a drink and did not offer a better photo opportunity.

By day, fiery-necked nightjars are almost invisible as they sleep in leaf litter (photo from Bulawayo, not during game count).

After the muffled rustling of sleeping bags of the first sleepers, and the furtive sounds of coffee pouring of the watchers ceased, the full symphony of night became apparent. Night watching is a full sensory experience: shifts in wind direction are detected with your cheeks, the nature of sounds in the dark identifies the perpetrator, and the warm odour of larger mammals acts as a proximity alert. I am sure that the strong smell of human hung like a dome over the hide, too, making wildlife wary of approach.

Un-silent night

Hampered by our human night vision, we become increasingly dependent on sound. A fiery-necked nightjar – aptly called the Litany bird – started calling soon after sunset. Its rolling “Good Lord, deliverrrr us!” dominated the steady alto of the crickets. From the woodland on opposite sides of the pan, occasional attenuated “prowp”s betrayed the presence of two African scops owls catching up on the day’s news. The bass track of red toads started up unexpectedly (it felt early in the season for them to be calling!), their raucous croaking spacing calls eventually falling into synchronous rhythm.

Even with the full moon, the low-contrast monochrome scene made us reliant on movement to detect wildlife. Most mammals had drunk around sunset and were nowhere in sight, but a pair of spotted thick-knees (dikkops to southern Africans) arrived mid-evening and spent most of the night near the waterhole. Watching their antics was entertaining – they’d run along, plover-like with torsos parallel to the ground, and then suddenly stop and stand bolt upright like a university professor struck by a sudden great notion before frantically pecking at the ground at some luckless invertebrate. However, their presence became wearing with their incessant “peep”ing call: a rapid peep-peep-peep that would lose energy towards the end and tail off. As the night wore on and enthusiasm for being awake staring into nothingness dwindled, the desire for them to just be quiet for a while became almost overwhelming.

Although not seen or heard at the count, spotted eagle-owls occur in the area (photo taken in Bulawayo).

Red toads were unexpected companions (photo from Bulawayo, not during game count).

A small herd of zebra – hypervigilant and skittish – lurked beyond the pan. Occasional snorts preceded panicky, flatulent, hoof-clattering gallops into the treeline. They would edge closer again, grazing beyond the trampled radius of the pan, before being frightened into flight again by invisible threats. This continued for hours until, eventually, in the wee hours of the morning they overcame their fear and drank cautiously, ears flicking in all directions throughout each long, siphoning gulp.

Why is being the only one awake so irritating?

As the night wore on and I grew more tired, I found the torture of listening to the steady breathing of my sleeping family increasingly maddening. The “graveyard shift” from midnight onwards is tough: there is very little movement, it’s cold, and your body and brain frequently nudge you to remember that it’s normal to be horizontal and unconscious at this time. Even though I’d had a sleep stint earlier in the evening, I was grateful to hand over the watch to my spouse a little after 2 am.

Apart from the thick-knees, a confused turtle dove that called to the moon at intervals and occasional bouts of frog calls, all was quiet and still. So still, in fact, that it took an ear twitch for my husband to realise a rock near a path was in fact a hunkered-down African wild cat.

Dawn beckons

I slept. And when I woke up (after the cat had left, of course), the atmosphere had shifted. A few birds were already testing the acoustics of the cool pre-dawn air and it felt like the world was beginning to stir. After a quick foray outside for a comfort break – an uncomfortable experience in the chilly air! – a restorative hot cup of tea marked the beginning of a new day as colour began to seep into the sky.

Knowing that we’d soon be busy with datasheets again, we tidied away our bedding, stretched as best we could in the limited space, and awaited the first wave of thirsty visitors.

Part 3 of this series is coming soon; link to follow!

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[Photos (c) The Rambling Zimbo.  Camera body: OM System OM-5 Mk1; Lenses M.Zuiko 75-300 4.8-6.7 II and M.Zuiko 12-45 f/4 Pro. Post-processing in DXO PhotoLab 8].