fcotterill
Well-known member
- Post score: 17
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The Cape Peninsula, at the southern tip of Africa, has become a top environment to enjoy the privilege of seeing caracal - Caracal caracal. Sightings have increased over the past decade, particularly on Table Mountain and even in periurban settings of the Cape Town suburbs - including suburban gardens. These sightings have also proved useful data for researchers: cf http://www.urbancaracal.org/ . One of the tagged caracal - Hermes is his research name - has become a film star with regular sightings. The only other places that come close are the Kalagadi, also Etosha Pans region, and parts of Kruger NP. In the Masai Mara, Federico Veronesi was really fortunate to follow a mother and her two cubs over an extended period. ALl the years of fieldwork and hiking in Zimbabwe and Zambia, I've never seen a Caracal, but I have seen a total of two Serval cats!
Compared to very rare sightings in savannas, I've been privileged to meet several caracal out walking - well over ten encounters in past 5 years. Several have been far distant for photography. Two sightings have included kittens, in one case a mother crossing the road close to where I type this. All my sightings have been on a winefarm, where they are far less habituated to people - being persecuted. These wily cats are mostly nocturnal and make expert use of cover, and they tend to hide in riparian fringe and other semi-natural vegetation. I've paced out several of the photographic events afterwards, and most are over 60 m from the camera! This stresses out a teleconverter rig; but then.... well, a 800 f5.6E FL is both heavy to carry and at a very hefty price. These shooting distances testify to the shyness of these cats, and they have also disappeared quickly. In contrast, many of the citizen science photos and video footage have been taken on smartphones, but many of the individual cats encountered by hikers - in Table Mountain NP - are definitely more tolerant of Homo sapiens.
This large male had his territory overlapping one of my main trails, so we met up on at least 5 occasions. In this encounter he not only hung around, but came closer to me lying down. The closest images were still @70m with 500 f5.6E PF+TC14 III on a Z7. So I could crop the image: still not the ideal. The cat could see me lying prone in long grass in a camou gillie-suit and was clearly curious as to my identity. These predators possess phenomenal hearing and are very alert - camouflage is no guarantee, but I'm fairly sure silent-shooting helps, or at least minimizes disturbance. (those dark objects are the waterberries, Syzygium guineense.
These two kittens were denning close to an access road, so I set up before sundown with D850 and a 800 rig ie 400 f2.8E + TC2 III under camouflage. They still knew I was there, perhaps the big lens mouth was too obvious. One kitten did creep closer in curiosity, but then they both vanished quickly. And I left them in peace.
Compared to very rare sightings in savannas, I've been privileged to meet several caracal out walking - well over ten encounters in past 5 years. Several have been far distant for photography. Two sightings have included kittens, in one case a mother crossing the road close to where I type this. All my sightings have been on a winefarm, where they are far less habituated to people - being persecuted. These wily cats are mostly nocturnal and make expert use of cover, and they tend to hide in riparian fringe and other semi-natural vegetation. I've paced out several of the photographic events afterwards, and most are over 60 m from the camera! This stresses out a teleconverter rig; but then.... well, a 800 f5.6E FL is both heavy to carry and at a very hefty price. These shooting distances testify to the shyness of these cats, and they have also disappeared quickly. In contrast, many of the citizen science photos and video footage have been taken on smartphones, but many of the individual cats encountered by hikers - in Table Mountain NP - are definitely more tolerant of Homo sapiens.
This large male had his territory overlapping one of my main trails, so we met up on at least 5 occasions. In this encounter he not only hung around, but came closer to me lying down. The closest images were still @70m with 500 f5.6E PF+TC14 III on a Z7. So I could crop the image: still not the ideal. The cat could see me lying prone in long grass in a camou gillie-suit and was clearly curious as to my identity. These predators possess phenomenal hearing and are very alert - camouflage is no guarantee, but I'm fairly sure silent-shooting helps, or at least minimizes disturbance. (those dark objects are the waterberries, Syzygium guineense.
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These two kittens were denning close to an access road, so I set up before sundown with D850 and a 800 rig ie 400 f2.8E + TC2 III under camouflage. They still knew I was there, perhaps the big lens mouth was too obvious. One kitten did creep closer in curiosity, but then they both vanished quickly. And I left them in peace.
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40 years looking! As Marc says, Kruger has them but to see them is another story. As much as I love the big cats, the small cats are my favorites! Caracal and Serval both are astounding jumpers. I'm sure you know Secunda has one of the largest serval populations outside parks due to Sasol land.
