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- June 24, 1967 Serengeti Plains, N.E [northeast] of Lake Magadi. Tanzania
Up this morning at 6 and Bristol [Foster] + I took a short walk
as the sun rose. Saw a number of species of birds new to
me. After breakfast Tom [Hugh?] Lamprey took me for a 2 hour
flight around the park making the monthly census of big game
with particular reference to movements of the species.
Wildebeest 350,000, Zebra 250,000, Buffalo 40,000, Thompson [gazelles]
a guess 750,000, Grants [gazelles] 50,000 [+/-], Eland 2-3000 Giraffe 5000
Topi 10000 [+/-] Congoni [Kongoni] a few, Oryx 1, Defassa waterbuck a
few thousand, Black rhino [rhinoceros], 1000 lion [+/-] Schaler [George B. Schaller] has 160 more
Cheetah 100-150, wild dog 100-150. Elephant 2200, hyena 2000
Total about 150/sq [square] mile in 5500 sq [square] mile.
We saw perhaps 200000 wildebeest, perhaps half
that number of zebra. 30-40 eland, 50 [+/-] elephant,
7-800 Buffalo + an assortment of other species such as Topi,
Congoni [Kongoni], about 2-300 giraffe. When we came to the airfield in
the AM. [morning] the mound area of the air strip was covered with Thompsons
gazelle while there were none in the surrounding long grass. They are
a short grass animal. The main game herds have moved from
the grasslands into the bush as they do at this time each
year. However we found about 50 thousand mixed zebra
+ wildebeest just N [north] of Lake Magadi + still in the grass.
The elephants were in open timber + had been uprooting
acacia. [Dr. Hugh] Lamprey tells me that they uproot 6% of the
trees in the park annually.
After our return we had a short visit with
the Schalers [George B. Schaller] discussing his lion study. He says that there is
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