The African night is not a quiet night. There are crickets chirping. And owls hoo-hooing. The buzz of moths to the outhouse light. Occasional monkey squeals. And sometimes elephants snapping trees. And the sounds of nearby farmers, beating their drums to scare away the elephants (or ‘njojos” as they’re called in Rutooro).
Sometimes the sky is clear and the Milky Way spreads out from the outhouse on one side to the elephant-fence on the other. Occasionally the moon comes out, and the few clouds catch the light and look like a scene out of the Junglebook. And sometimes, there are no stars and in fact there is no sky, but only a thick blanket of clouds and it gets very, very dark. And on those nights, if you shine a strong flashlight into the tree branches, you may find creatures that you have never seen or even heard about. There are Genets, which are like a cat with a long weasel snout. There are Pangolins, which are like anteaters crossed with a tank. The small, fluffy Bushbabies (or Galagos) sometimes sit still and wrap their tails around a branch, and sometimes bounce around, with only the red-orange reflections of their eyes to give them away. There are monkey-sloth Pottos and sometimes prowling Civets. The Chimpanzees have all gone to bed, in their nests high in the branches, and will not get up until morning. We are usually safe and snug in the mosquito net, but last night we went out prowling of these interesting creatures- Check out the photos (The Bushbaby is mostly all eyeshine up in the treetops but we had a great look at the Genet!).
Sometimes the sky is clear and the Milky Way spreads out from the outhouse on one side to the elephant-fence on the other. Occasionally the moon comes out, and the few clouds catch the light and look like a scene out of the Junglebook. And sometimes, there are no stars and in fact there is no sky, but only a thick blanket of clouds and it gets very, very dark. And on those nights, if you shine a strong flashlight into the tree branches, you may find creatures that you have never seen or even heard about. There are Genets, which are like a cat with a long weasel snout. There are Pangolins, which are like anteaters crossed with a tank. The small, fluffy Bushbabies (or Galagos) sometimes sit still and wrap their tails around a branch, and sometimes bounce around, with only the red-orange reflections of their eyes to give them away. There are monkey-sloth Pottos and sometimes prowling Civets. The Chimpanzees have all gone to bed, in their nests high in the branches, and will not get up until morning. We are usually safe and snug in the mosquito net, but last night we went out prowling of these interesting creatures- Check out the photos (The Bushbaby is mostly all eyeshine up in the treetops but we had a great look at the Genet!).