Latest / The MeatEater Podcast / Ep. 728: Dispatches from Africa - Tracking Dangerous Game

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Ep. 728: Dispatches from Africa - Tracking Dangerous Game · The MeatEater Podcast

• 0:29
  Speaker 1: Okay, everybody, this is where it's time right now for
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: uh what do we call these Africa dispatch Tanzania?
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: Did uh dispatches from a Dispatches from Africa? Volume two?
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: What is it? Flop two?
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: That's right, because you're flopping right down. We're on flop to.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: Last night we made a list of how many game
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: animals we've seen in three days. This is our fourth
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: full hunt day in three hunt days. I think our
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: list was ten.
• 0:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, we're at least at ten. And I think
• 1:00
  Speaker 3: we skipped a couple. I think that stuff we missed.
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: And right now we are on If it's ten, we're
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: on number eleven.
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: We're working on number eleven. It's gonna happen.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: So last night, yesterday evening, we were driving through an area.
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: We drove long ways yesterday, yeah, we did. We put
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: some miles so we had a one hundred miles.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: We were driving through an area and the trackers from
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: the truck saw where there had been a herd yep
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: in one of the burned areas. And then we drove
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: a little more and the trackers jumped out and counted
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: where four bulls had crossed this trail. So today we
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: came in in the morning, parked and started walking into
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: that area and like boom found where found three bowls.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: So we got on the tracks and guys, two of
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: our trackers Solmoney Yep, Ellie Money yep, Ellie Mini still
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: with us right now, followed them. They were kind of
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: they were in sort of a flat and moved up
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: a rocky valley wall.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: We bumped them. Yeah, they got that wind.
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: They went climbed out, went to the ridge, climbed back
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: down into the valley we were in, entered this big
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: area of eight foot high grass with maybe a few
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: yards of visibility.
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Maximum.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: The guys tracked and tracked him until eventually you could
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: hear them milling around and they were like there.
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah, well the birds gave him away. The guys heard
• 2:39
  Speaker 3: the birds on them, the packers, they could hear them
• 2:42
  Speaker 3: kind of chattering, and so you know, we knew those
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: buffalo were right there in front of us, maybe fifty
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: yards something like that.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, you just hear them. Oh you could hear him.
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: You put not a prayer seeing them. No, they milled
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: out of there.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: The guys tracked him again, and this is hours of
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: time that go oh yeah, bumped them again, and now
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: you feel like we're just gonna keep hammering on them, keep.
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, absolutely so.
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: I mean the closest we got in that tall grass
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: was like twenty five yards. I mean, I could just
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: I could hear them like right there. Just the only
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: thing I saw was just like a glimpse of one's
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: back line, you know, it was so thick in there.
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: And then you know, from there, they weren't really spooked.
• 3:24
  Speaker 3: They're a little suspicious. They moved off, they kind of
• 3:27
  Speaker 3: came into this miombo here, laid down, and then yeah,
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: unfortunately we were just you know, it was one of
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: those things. Even me, you know, I kind of learned
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: a lesson, Like my concentration was lapsing a little bit. Yeah,
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: and we're kind of like, well, let's just sit down.
• 3:41
  Speaker 3: You know, the tracks were really faint, it was getting tough,
• 3:43
  Speaker 3: and I was like, well, let's just chill out for
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: a while, let the trackers sort this out. And then yeah,
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: we bumped them. I mean, even if we'd been standing
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: with these guys, we likely wouldn't have gotten a shot,
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: but we would have seen them at least.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: But really it played out when I was first talking,
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: you were getting interested in hunting Kate Buffalo and you
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: were laying out like how it works.
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you included everything that happened. Yeah, well, even down
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: you'll find them. You might move them, wait a while,
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: find them again, find them again. Ye keep bumping them along. Yeah.
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: Well even when we were in that tall grass, you know,
• 4:14
  Speaker 3: you saw them kind of zigzagging back and forward, which
• 4:17
  Speaker 3: is an indication they're looking for someone to lay down.
• 4:19
  Speaker 3: You know, they're they're tired of walking, they're ready to
• 4:21
  Speaker 3: lay down. They want to ruminate. So yeah, we saw
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: that several times today and yeah, unfortunately, just bump them.
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: But on the on the good side, when they ran off,
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: they made a considerable amount of tracks, So we've got
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: something to work with this afternoon. So once we wrap
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: up here, we're going to get right back on them.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And you explained to me before you can't do
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: this at off the trackers. Oh no, no.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: It's absolutely dependent on trackers. The other day we were
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: tracking one and I said to you, I'm like, I
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: don't get what they're seeing, and you said, that's the point. Yeah,
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: they can see things that you can't see, not that
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: you don't know how to see, but you're like, they
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: see things you can't see.
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's absolutely right. I mean their skills are phenomenal.
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: They can do and the mental concentration and energy it
• 5:10
  Speaker 3: takes to stay on those tracks in this sort of thing,
• 5:13
  Speaker 3: you know, where you've just got leaf litter on the ground,
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: they can track those buffalo through here. I mean yeah,
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: even after all my years in the bush, I wouldn't
• 5:21
  Speaker 3: have a hope of being able to do what they
• 5:23
  Speaker 3: can do.
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: So do me a favorite ask uh ask Elimani. When
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: he picks up a piece of grass and looks at
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: it and shows you and shows his partner, his other
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: tracker the grass, what are the things he's like?
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: What is he looking at?
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: What are the indicators he's looking at when he picks
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: up a piece of grass?
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, any mighty, come Outnajua mar my johnny o
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: Nasi gwangalia.
• 6:09
  Speaker 4: Jasa and come on in bi fleshy knows Jana come
• 6:19
  Speaker 4: on in b Yes, coming.
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: So he's he's when he when he picks up a
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: piece of grass, what he's looking for is like if
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: it was broken or if it was damaged when it
• 6:35
  Speaker 3: got trodden on by the buffalo. He can tell based
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: on like whether it's dry, whether it's still wet, whether
• 6:43
  Speaker 3: it's got some water on it from like the dew
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: in the early morning, when that actually occurred when those
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: buffalo passed through there. So he'll look at a piece
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: of grass and he'll be able to tell based on
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: its condition exactly when those buffalo passed through.
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: Ask him what is his favorite animal track?
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: Sasa coma, una, penda, kuinda wan yama, gani, culico one,
• 7:10
  Speaker 3: yamen guini.
• 7:12
  Speaker 4: Bogos.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: Number number So yeah, he's buffalo is number one. He says.
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: All the others are kind of easy in comparison, Bogo,
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: which is buffalo is number one.
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: How old was he when he first started studying how
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: to track?
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: Okay olianza, couchifunza, screaming.
• 7:47
  Speaker 4: Winds. Come ayand Pierre and Michelle and assume well bi.
• 8:04
  Speaker 3: So he used to live He used to live near
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: a game reserve called Musswa Game Reserve which is near
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: the Serengetti Uh. And he was he was a kid basically,
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: and he was a poacher. So he used to hunt
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: with a bow and arrow and poison. Oh yeah, he
• 8:20
  Speaker 3: used to hunt with poisoned arrows. What was his favorite
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: thing to hunt?
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: Them?
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: Lasamani wulipender.
• 8:30
  Speaker 4: As as a money with your maijie and watching my thing,
• 8:35
  Speaker 4: said a bit in Noblemiji.
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: So his favorite was buffalo and what he used to do, Yeah,
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: what he used to do was he'd build a small
• 8:50
  Speaker 3: blind near a water hole very close, and when the
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: buffalo came in to drink, he'd hit him with those
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: poison arrows.
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, when he looks at like oftentimes they'll find a
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: dropping buffalo dropping, he'll scratch it. Yeah, what clues are
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: within that when he scratches the surface?
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: What what? What sorts of things does he like to see?
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: How does it?
• 9:19
  Speaker 3: When?
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: Is it two days old? One? Is it one day old?
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: On a dropping okona mafigalia, niniku gosu.
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: Leni on a pitah si.
• 9:35
  Speaker 4: Jew ohangai kuna in a peppo in acca nat thistancy
• 9:42
  Speaker 4: in a coca Kiss again ya do do your schoom
• 9:46
  Speaker 4: vi video pita.
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: So what he does when he when he scratches it
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: like that, he's looking at how dry it is and
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: whether there's any bugs in there. If there's bugs in there,
• 9:58
  Speaker 3: it's a it's been a couple days for sure, if
• 10:01
  Speaker 3: it's if it's very wet. If there's just a very
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: thin layer of dryness from the wind, then he knows
• 10:07
  Speaker 3: it's fresh.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: Oh okay, gotcha, that's what that is wan to rise
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: like an outside layer to it.
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, the outside layer is drying in the you know,
• 10:16
  Speaker 3: in the sun and the wind. So he's actually when
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: he kicks it, he's looking at the thickness of that
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: of that outside layer to know like how long it's
• 10:24
  Speaker 3: been there. And then yeah, he said, if he sees bugs,
• 10:27
  Speaker 3: no good.
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: If you're if your track and a ball or a
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: group of balls, and you bump them once, bump them twice,
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: bump them three times, does it get less encouraging or
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: more encouraging?
• 10:42
  Speaker 3: Well, from my perspective, it gets I would say it
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: gets slightly less encouraging. You know, you're you're definitely winding
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: them up every time. You're kind of you know, they're
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: becoming like more tightly wound. So they're going to put
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: themselves in like thicker, darker cover. They're going to start
• 11:01
  Speaker 3: to really kind of be very switched on, as opposed
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: to if you haven't bumped them at all and they're
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: kind of just in dreamland, they're just chilling out, which
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: isn't to say that approaching them super easy. They're still tricky,
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: but yeah, when you've bumped them a few times, it
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: definitely it starts to get pretty marginal. And that's where
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: I think what we've done today, giving them that little
• 11:24
  Speaker 3: bit of time between each kind of bump to chill out,
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: can help with that. Like, particularly now we've given them
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: a couple of hours, they're going to be pretty desperate
• 11:32
  Speaker 3: to ruminate and lay down. So with a bit of luck,
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: that'll work in our favor. But generally speaking, yeah, if
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: you just keep pushing them like that, it gets kind
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: of marginal and borderline dangerous to depending on the situation.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: When Alimane was a boy, was he even aware that
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: you could have the job he has now? Was he
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: aware that this was a job and would he have
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: wanted this job as a boy?
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: Lana uli dua kusu campunia wain dagi nah no campuni.
• 12:13
  Speaker 4: Not kazi kazi any.
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: Course your.
• 12:28
  Speaker 4: India like k.
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: So he had no idea. He didn't He didn't know
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: about this industry. He didn't know about the job. He
• 12:40
  Speaker 3: he only came to learn about it later when basically
• 12:44
  Speaker 3: when this company started in in Maswa, hunting there he
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: became aware of it, but yeah, all he knew was poaching.
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: And this is this might be an awkward question since
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: you guys worked together. But what does he like think
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: of the job?
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: Does he like the job? Is it just a job?
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: Like?
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: What's what's his take on it?
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: When when a pinda ka Sam, Yeah, he likes it
• 13:19
  Speaker 3: and he likes working with me. But he's just saying
• 13:21
  Speaker 3: that to be nice. I think I really chap his
• 13:23
  Speaker 3: ass sometimes.
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: Well I hope he knows. I want you to tell
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: him that I have every moment of watching those guys
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: work is like pure joy to me, Like I really like,
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: like I really really like following those guys in the
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: woods on.
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: A semma an a pinda kazi sanaa Come.
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: I, he says, thank you very much. Tell him this.
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: I hang out like I know people my friends I
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: have I hang out with like very good hunters in America.
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: Unless there's snow, okay, unless there's snow on the ground.
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: For us, tracking is just that you can tell something
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: came through, or you can tell something frequents an area,
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: or you can tell it routinely comes through. But unless
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: there's snow, we never follow an animal.
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: So I'm an sma and a jua watuwangihi medakani winda
• 14:34
  Speaker 3: palepia howskana come bilaluji ohi oh barau awas cut bisa.
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: Never never, unless there's snow our ways bisa, cut bisa.
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: And I think he would enjoy snow a great deal.
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: I think he'd hide it. I sema uh kona tluji
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: nina sema.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: So we're gonna we're gonna pack up. Yep, We're gonna
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: go back to where we lost the track. And then
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: how when do you call it?
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: Like, how do you like?
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: It's three third, it's gonna be three thirty pm, sun
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: sets around what six thirty?
• 15:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you know that's that's a hard question to answer.
• 15:36
  Speaker 3: It's kind of my prerogative. I would say, if we
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: bump them again hard and they go snorting out of
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: there like they did last time, it's probably time to
• 15:44
  Speaker 3: to to.
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: Hang it up.
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: But in an ideal world, we'll find those things sleeping
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: and they'll have chilled out a good bit since that
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: last bump, and we can make a play on them.
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: And then last question, if we if let's say we
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: blow them out bad mhm tomorrow do we just forget
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: them and go find other ones that haven't been disturbed.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: Not necessarily, Not necessarily, I like this area.
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: If we really, I mean, if we blow them out
• 16:10
  Speaker 3: bad and for example, they go up on that escarpment
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: again and they just bline it to a different valley,
• 16:15
  Speaker 3: then yeah, it's probably not worth coming back here. With
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: that being said, yesterday was four balls. You know, this
• 16:22
  Speaker 3: is three balls. One of them is either it's either
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: a different group or one of them spun off and
• 16:26
  Speaker 3: gone on his own. Plus there's another herd in this
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: valley too, So I'm not I by no means going
• 16:31
  Speaker 3: to give up on this place. And that's why I've
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: told the guys not to burn it, which was sort of.
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: We haven't gotten into the burning yet, and we need
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: to get into the burning and another dispatch.
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: But the burning is the greatest thing in the world.
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, it's heavenly.
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, being able to just flick matches in the right
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: places and yeah, well it'd be like it's slow moving,
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: low intensity grass fires. Yeah, they don't damage the trees.
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah you're out. Yeah, the old dead grass.
• 17:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah, the decadent grass. A few days later, new grass
• 17:05
  Speaker 3: comes up. Yeah, I mean the burning really appeals to
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: the little boy and all of us.
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: It's a hell of a lot of fun, especially when
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: you when you look and it's like you make like
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: these perfect new grass.
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: Growth areas, and then there's animals. There's animals. Yeah, yeah,
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: that helps them too. No no, it's super cool, very
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: like not destructive. No no, no, no, very restorative. Al Right,
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: it's you guys, ready to go. Let's do it.