Ngorongoro

Within the Ngorongoro Conservation Area lies the renowned Ngorongoro Crater. Ngorongoro was a huge volcano that collapsed inward millions of years ago, leaving a 18 km wide volcanic crater (caldera). It is the largest intact unflooded caldera on earth. Our lodge was amongst the clouds high on the crater rim at around 2300 metres elevation. As we drove down the winding track through the lush rim forest to the crater floor 600 metres below, we joined this troop of olive savanna baboons. Baboon troop coming through Baboon troops are complex societies that travel about 6 km per day together in search of food. Baboons eat an enormous variety of plants supplemented with shellfish, insects and even small mammals like hares and infant antelope. A lodge manager told us that baboons keep stealing his telephone satellite dish. He did not know what the baboons did with all the equipment. Perhaps they are establishing BaboonTel.com. Baboon spotting I think baboons, Africa's most widespread primate and the largest of the monkeys, could serve as a ready excuse if I lived in Tanzania: "Sorry I'm late, there was a lot of baboon traffic." Baboons have even blocked roads to protest senseless killing. Mmmm... parasites Grooming - removing parasites and dead skin from another baboon - is an important social activity which relaxes and unites members of the troop. Savanna baboons form long lasting male-female friendships, a behaviour seldom observed in animals. Baboons join forces to protect infants; few predators dare test a troop's defences. This cooperative defence lets troops wander with impunity and use their opposable thumbs to thumb their snouts at the lions. Flocks and herds The crater floor is a self-contained world apart, likened to Noah’s Ark in its preservation of animal diversity in a relatively small area. Here roams the densest permanent concentration of wildlife on earth (including 25,000 large mammals), enjoying year round water and abundant food. Lake Magadi, alkaline due to its bed of soda (sodium carbonate), occupies the lowest part of the crater floor. Greater, lesser, they are all flamingos The lake supports thousands of flamingos and other birds. Here are greater and lesser flamingo mingling, along with some other birds. The greater flamingo is larger and has a pink bill with a black tip. A filter feeder, it preys on invertebrates which it sifts from the bottom mud using its bent bill. Lesser flamingos, recognizable by their darker bills, primarily eat spirulina, a blue-green algae found in the shallows of alkaline lakes. Flamin-go-ing Flamingos live and travel in large groups. In this picture they are flamingoing away. One of the last black rhinos Ancient and massive, the Rhinoceros is considered Africa's most endangered species. The high commercial value of their horns has led to intense poaching. The black rhinoceros has declined from a continental population of more than 100,000 in the 1960s to 2,500 today. Less than 50 survive in Tanzania. This is one of seventeen black rhinos living in the crater. Seventeen, which includes two fertile females repatriated from South Africa in 1997, may not sound like many but it is only due to intensive conservation and anti-poaching efforts that any remain. The sheer crater walls act as a natural barrier and help give them, one of the last viable free-ranging black rhino populations, a fighting chance. Other Tanzanian rhinos live behind protective electrified fences even more formidable than the Quebec City "Wall of Shame". Bull elephant Peering down from the rim, we could discern dots moving in the distance of the crater floor. Inside the crater, we met up with these bull elephants. Elephant families stay in the highland forests surrounding the crater and do not venture into the crater. Males leave cow herds at 12 years or later, depending on when they reach puberty. Once on their own, bulls alternately wander solo and associate with other bulls. It must be musth Male elephants experience a highly sexual state called musth, indicated by dribbling from a swollen, partially extended penis. (Elephant penises curve forward and up when fully erect.) I don't know if this is the case with this old bull and his "fifth leg." Maybe he's just daydreaming or happy to see us. Ngorongoro is not a National Park -- certain human settlements and activity are permitted. When the British established the Serengeti National Park in the fifties, they evicted the Maasai tribespeople who had moved into the non-tsetse infected grasslands 150 years earlier. As compensation, they were offered refuge in nearby Ngorongoro, already occupied by fellow Maasai. No other Maasai were allowed to move in and no increase in their livestock was permitted. Unlike many of Africa's conservation areas, the Ngorongoro Authority manages a complex mix of wildlife, vegetation, water, Maasai pastoralists and their stock, not to mention all them pesky tourists. Although a small percentage of the population, the Maasai (promoted as "photogenic" in tourism brochures) are the ethnic group best known to visitors to Tanzania and Kenya. Most Maasai maintain a traditional tribal lifestyle and live off their livestock: primarily milk but also meat and blood. Some Maasai generate income from tourism including charging photographers, offering tours and accommodation in their villages, and trading. I did not take any pictures of Maasai, but don't worry, there's plenty. After the crater, we explored the Olduvai Gorge excavation site, known as the "cradle of humanity". Many important fossils have been unearthed here, beginning with a two million year old human skull found in 1959 by Mary Leakey. We didn't find anything good, though. Wondering where the lions are?