Briefly check out busted exclosure, continue baiting study. Captivate field assistant with an enthusiastic telling of last night’s buffalo-flat tire story. One assistant asks me how many brothers and sisters I have, and we end up comparing family sizes. One field assistant has 11 siblings, the other has seven. Both mention that they don’t want as many kids (one has three kids and says ‘that’s enough’ – the other says he wants two or three). One makes the statement “people in US rich, and have few kids, people are here poor and have many.”

Successfully submit conference Abstract, going to wait to see if they select if for an oral presentation. Coordinate sampling with another project, going to do some ant species identifications for them. It’s a beautiful night and decide to so another game drive. We took a different, ridiculous small vehicle which reminds me a clown car.

We try to lure in animals by making dying animal noises. We park the mini-car in a big clearing and call out the window. Wait awhile and hear some elephants trumping a little way away. Eventually a white-tailed mongoose sauntered up to the car for a look, and then took off.

We head along a road with high grassy banks, take a sharp turn, and almost run into an elephant. It wasn’t full grown but it towers above us. We (both us and the ele) freeze and the driver and I are in full silent panic. If the ele gets pissed it could gore the car and/or crush it like a tin can. As we rev the car to get out of there we spook it and it runs away. I can safely report that my adrenaline is in full working order.

On the drive back we spy lots of Bushbabies. As you stop to look at them they eject themselves off the thick bushes – it looks like they’re spring loaded. One jumps on the end of a branch, toward the car, and for a few seconds we get a great view of it. Then it ejects itself, but finds itself in the middle of the road. Instead of using all its limbs to run, it takes huge bounds on its back feet, looking like an ultra mini-kangaroo bouncing across the road.

Finish the night drinking beer on the veranda of a friend's banda. It was a full moon in a cloudless sky and I’ve never seen more distinct moonshadows. In the distance the lions were roaring – a sound so deep and primal I can almost feel it resonate in my bones.