Page 23 - FWG_Issue 2_March_2022

Nature

Along the Sabie – Best place in South Africa to see lions

of drought, dried up – all, that is, except member who recalled a flood reaching Reserve and around Pretoriuskop and that,
the Sabie. Uniquely, the Sabie has never there in 1900 – a flood that appeared to be because of the presence of predators, they
stopped flowing. If ever it does, it would be as high as the Millenium Flood. could carry guns.
nothing less than a national tragedy.
Last year again saw a memorable flood This dismayed Stevenson-Hamilton, for
It was partly this threat that, in 1998, along the Sabie. farmers had been clamouring for the
caused National Parks to launch the Kruger reserve to be opened up for hunting. For
National Park Rivers Research Programme The Sabie is by far the most biologically, a time, sheep grazed there and Stevenson-
– the largest and most comprehensive hydrologically and geomorphically Hamilton, in trying to hold off the pressure
multidisciplinary river research programme researched river in South Africa. It was of the hunting lobby, suggested the reserve
ever undertaken in South Africa. intensively monitored during the Rivers be allowed to make money by capturing
Research Programme by scores of scientists young animals for zoos here and overseas.
The 10 years of seminars produced vital new in various disciplines and, for years, updated In those days, soon after World War 1
data – but too late to influence the building data were sent to around 100 scientists (1918), giraffe landed in England would
of the Injaka Dam whose impoundment who have developed a more than academic fetch £1 000 and a hippo would fetch £600.
was completed the following year and interest in the Sabie’s health.
whose impact will take years to assess. In In fact, out of desperation, for a time
fact, directly after the dam was completed, Kruger Park has continued facilitating the warden did just that even though
in 2000, Mpumalanga was hit by the seminars and appraisal meetings to make sure he abhorred having to compromise the
Millennium Flood, which was said to be a that what is happening and what is planned conservation ethic. He hoped a time would
‘one in 100 years flood’. for the Sabie River supports their vision for come when the government would proclaim
South Africa’s flagship tourist attraction. Their the Sabi Game Reserve a national park.
Some hydrologists believe that floods of vision has been described as “to maintain
this magnitude are more common than is biodiversity in all its natural facets and fluxes That’s exactly what happened. In 1926,
realised. Months after the Millennium Flood and to provide human benefits . . . in a manner the government took over the Sabi Game
an old staff member at Skukuza pointed which detracts as little as possible from the Rerserve and the Shingwedzi Reserve
out a mark painted by Lt-col Stevenson- wilderness qualities of the KNP”. further to the north. The first tourists
Hamilton, Kruger’s first warden, on the arrived at the new ‘national park’ in 1927.
Selati railway bridge that spans the Sabie I have been re-reading Stevenson- The gap between the two protected areas
at Skukuza. The mark showed the height of Hamilton’s book, South African Eden, and in was filled in 1944 when Eileen Orpen
a flood in 1950. There was little difference it he gives an account of how, when he was bought seven farms and donated them to
between the two levels. Later, somebody living at Skukuza not long after World War 2 the government.
recorded that Stevenson-Hamilton, in 1950, he was told that certain farmers were to be
was shown a landmark by a Shangaan staff allowed to graze sheep in his Sabi Game Stevenson-Hamilton retired as the park’s
first warden 20 years later. He died aged 90
in White River in 1957.

Fourways Gardens • 21 • March 2022