Friday March 31, 2023
Another week has gone by, another day at sea, passing the southern end of the very large island of Madagascar, which we could see from our balcony. So near yet so far. It seems like it is an amazing place and on the “bucket list”.
The first Lecture was by Gavin Robinson the African Wildlife expert and today the topic was – Ostriches. They are amazing birds that can reach 8 feet high, run at high speeds, weigh a lot and can strike a deadly blow with their legs. The only way they can be captured is by netting (shooting a net over them) from a helicopter and then having a ground team darting them in the leg. There are many interesting aspects to these birds, some of which are: males are black in color, females are brown; the myth about burying their head in the sand is indeed a myth and propagated as observers at a distance see them with their head on the ground for 10-15 minutes at a time. What they are actually doing is picking up seeds from the ground, then they raise their necks to allow the food to go down the neck. If you are close to an ostrich and appear to be about to get attacked, just lie down in a fetal position and wait for it to go away, you will never outrun it and it can be vicious. They have very large eyes and thus excellent eyesight, but have a very small brain. They perform a dance before mating in which the male struts its feathers and if the female does not approve, she will walk away, but if she does approve, then she will let her wings fall to the ground, lie down and pick up sand and throw it back down, waiting for the mating to begin. After mating the male digs a nest and the female drops one egg every 3-4 days and will lay up to 60 eggs in the nest. The male, being black, will sit on nest during the night and the female, who is brown, will sit during the day thus sharing the camouflage. The egg has to be moved every few hours as air sack needs to be formed and if not moved the contents will stick to the side and the baby will die. Gestation periods are 42 days for an ostrich egg before hatching, as compared to 23 days for chicken eggs and 90 days for crocodile eggs. It takes approximately 23 chicken eggs to form 1 ostrich egg which makes really terrific omelets! The egg is very strong and a human can stand on it without breaking. Ostrich babies, at birth, imprint on mind the first color they see and think it’s the mother. Thus, in farms, If the first thing it sees is a person in a yellow outfit, that same color has to be worn for the first three months of the baby’s life. It has to be kept at 32C, and the first 3 months are critical. Most don’t survive 3 months, but if they do, they will likely survive 50 years unless attacked by a predator or get some disease. They have a very high weight to food ratio, which is the same as giraffe and can grow 25 cm in height every month, and for every 1 kg food they eat, they gain 1.5 kg. Ostrich farms exist for leather and meat for human consumption and usually are sent to the abattoir when they are 9 months where they are slaughtered for meat. If it is ill, it thinks that by eating foreign objects, it will somehow get cured, usually though it has the opposite effect. It can run at 70 kph for 15 minutes and has 2 “fingers” on each feet, the big one has a hook and it kicks forward causing a devastating blow against other males or attackers and it will viciously fight to protect the females (typically 8) in the harem. The predators are tigers and other fast moving carnivore cats. The largest population of ostriches is not is Africa but in Argentina where they race them. People that live in the Bush us the Eggs to carry a lot of water and they can last up to 5 years, so they are buried in caches to be used when needed. A really fascinating talk, by an extremely experiences man who has been working with these animals all his life. Tomorrow he will talk about hippopotamus (from the Greek “ippos” and “potamos” meaning “river” and horse” thus it is known as the river horse).
The second lecture was by a very interesting South African explorer – Riaan Manser who spoke of the odyssey he underwent on his 2+ year adventure cycling the 34,350 km by himself on one bicycle around Africa. He spoke of the various adventures including being jailed several times and coming very close to being killed by a group of 15 year olds. He teased us also talking about other adventures like rowing a Kayak around Madagascar, and rowing across the Atlantic with his wife. He will share more of these adventures in the coming days. The third lecture was by the interesting Tennis player / coach / referee – Andrew Jarrett speaking about his life as a referee, not just at Wimbledon and the Grand Slam events, but at the many other events all around the world where he has been asked to be the referee, many of which have very different ethics. In one case, the chair umpires showed up 4 minutes before the game; in other cases, there were no line judges or line judges showed up at different times during the course of the match etc. This is all at the professional level and are important tournaments unto themselves. Very interesting.
The evening was a Gala / black tie dinner – Roaring 20’s followed by the show – The Four Harps – 4 young male Irish singers that were brilliant in harmony and did a terrific show.
Roger & Anne Travels 