SANParks.org Forums

Hello people

I have an idea . Whoever is going to the park at the same time can pass on their BB pin so if there is a good predator sighting close by bb the other people so they can come see it

What do you think ?

There is currently a Blackberry group going with about 30 members or so.
I used to be in the group until about a week ago when I cancelled it.
The sightings that were sent to us was really very nice and helpful, but there are some problems with it as well.

Unfortunately every posting, or conversation by the group will be received by everybody else.
In the end people were talking about birthdays and starsigns and posting webcam pics and this and that, making the experience highly irritating.

Unless I did something wrong on my side to receive all the messages, I eventually decided that I would rather be without the info.

@Shabs - its a good idea and one we used very effectively when working the Skukuza area...to give you some idea we worked the area in 3 cars and drove the roads and some highlights were (apart from things like sleeping lions):
We called in the 1 car to mating leopards on the S4 and hyena sighting on kill.
In return we were called into 2 Wild Dog sightings south of Skukuza.

If there is a problem with it, it is that you start rushing around, so we found that it was nice just to practice this activity around Skukuza and leave other parts of the park for the slow normal drives.

@Bundi and Sawubona, I can only imagine how irritating that can be, trying to get reports and having all that rubbish going on. If one wants to be serious about spotting animals and sharing sightings for maximum gain it must be done efficiently and I say this with having experienced 2-way radios and working as a team to find animals, we found you keep to what its intended for and you will get maximum results.

After all if you are blabbering on about star signs etc you aren't looking outside or for animals and you actually spending lots of your time talking nonsense on bbm in the park...what a waste!!!

I couldnt agree more...we are very strict about going 50km/h at an absolute maximum but really if something jumps infront of your car at this speed its still too fast to stop in time!
So I couldnt agree more, this will have extremely negative impacts as people will be speeding from sighting to sighting...personally although we've used this form of sharing sightings I would be happy if there were no cell phone signal in the park anywhere...as technology increases however, we will start seeing more and more people using these methods...which is sad really!
I guess its also not too often that Im in the park with other friends so for me it wont happen every time..

We are on the group and we are finding it fantastic!
Its been a great way to meet people and we have arranged a meet up in the park in sept/oct time.
As for the alerts being annoying, just turn them off?

I'm in that group but haven't had all that stuff that Bundi mentioned. We'll be in the park in October and will see how it helps then, but I have already vowed that we are not going to chase sightings. If something good has been spotted and it's close by we might give it a try, but otherwise we will leave it for others to enjoy!

I'm the one currently running the Kruger BBM group, as far as I am concerned, all those that joined have no problems with the way its run, its informative and quite entertaining!

It is a Social group at the end of the day, with Kruger National Park being the main interest, fair enough there are some off topic discussions now and then, so what? Just ignore it or like MaryMattMillie said, just turn off your alerts!

Use it, don't use it...simple!

Also on the BBM group and love it. Agree with Gunner,use it, dont use it.

The group is great, informative and gets to be like a mini meet...by phone . As for the alerts...yip turn them off . I find the sightings a great way to know where the animals have been spotted and if you think logically, rushing to see a sighting seen an hour ago....you not gonna find the animals there 9 out of 10 times and then there is the fact that you gonna miss things trying to get there. I feel it is nice and informative, so keep it going Gunner

Ok so this sounds cool...how does one join the group then?

I will turn the alerts off

o-dog, pm me you bbm number
and come on over to the fun side

For those of us that are not able to go to the Park every weekend the BBM is our way to enjoy the Park.
Every night I sit with my Wife & look on the map where the sightings have been seen.
So the next time we get to go to the Park we will try these roads, some of which I've never been on.
There is no cell reception in some parts of the Park anyway so it will not work.
My rule for the Park is to enjoy it, hence the reason I turn my phone off.
This is just how I feel & does not represent the views of the BBG.

As I mentioned in my earlier post, it was the "alerts" that irritated me. If somebody can tell me how to switch them off, I would like to join again, because the posts from RONAN=GUNNER of the daily sights was great.

My pin is 27430023

Also on the group and love it.
Yes we do sometimes go off topic, i know as i am also guilty one.
Asked about shoes to use in the bush.
Thought it might be the right place as we all are like minded people and we love the bushveld.
But for me things like this makes the group more fun coz we interact on different things.

when on the "home" screen open the menu, select group details and scroll all the way to the bottom of the page and change "turn of all notifications for this group" to yes.

BBM group is fantastic...

besides for the fact that our sightings on my last 5 trips or so have improved tremendously thanks to the group, not in terms of the exact animal seen but helps with choice of roads to travel!

in july the group was alerted about 3 leopards seen on the low water bridge that morning, we tried our luck and BAM what do you know, we had the most spectacular sighting of these 3 leopard, one of the best possibly for me in the kruger..soo yees without the group, we wouldnt have seen these 3 beautiful creatures on the bridge. 1 in a tree early afternoon and a mating pair putting on a show for us on the bridge itself.

besides for the sightings, have met some amazing people as well.

so thanks to gunner for this great idea!