SANParks.org Forums

BerkinSA...
A little more explanation about this tusker.
His name is MPENZA.... probably you are one of the last people seen him with both tusks.
Somewhere between your sighting and march 2012 he lost his right tusk.
Your sighting was in december 2011 I guess and not 2012 ...

[quote="BerkiSA"]-Taken on tar road to SHingwedzi coming off H1-6 or H1-7...about 1 km from gate
-02 December 2012
-Big Bull
-Middle aged, maybe 35 years
-Big tusks, right slightly longer and more down facing, left shorter but strighter
-Bull must be +- 330cm at shoulder and tusks prob 1.2 m length
-Bull had a tracking collar around his neck

@ ALL Tusker-mites

Sometimes you have this question for yourselves.... when did I do this or how long ago I started to.... etcetera...
I had this question ..how long ago did I start to comment at this thread about the Big Tuskers ... and funny enough it is 4 years ago , october 2008.
I remember I started with a few pages at my wildlife site and today the special Tusker site has grown to 150 pages in total.
This forum thread just Big Tuskers more then 130.000 views in the mean time....

Just like to say thanks to all helping with sending info and pictures

A vitual glass of beer or wine or champagne with all of you and CHEERS !! and hoping we stay together to go for some more years of Big Tuskers.....

Hi Tusker Mites

This tuskey ellie or up and coming tusker scratching himself on a tree, I saw Oct 6 from the fence at Satara. His right hand tusk is quite a bit longer than the left one. Pumba suggested me posting the pics here after reading my TR, as he might have a name. That would be very interesting. Thanx Pumba!

Hi Aat,

Just to keep you focused on your upcoming tusker hunting safari :-

1] Masthulele in all his glory - you will have a very good chance of seeing him between two and six PM along the Letaba River just North of Letaba camp - I hope you will also see him at close quarters as we did early June this year.



2] Now here is what this post is really about :- Masthulele had two askaries, this is what I call the lead askari as he was the bigger of the two. From the photo it is clear that he is relatively young, virile and in very good condition. Look carefully and you will see his tusks are still thickening at the lip. At this age he has already quite thick tusks and the eventual thickness will be somewhat thicker than today. In another 5 to 10 years this bull will start his tusk growth spurt and his tusks will grow much more rapidly. I am sure this bull will eventually become one of the icons of KNP tuskers and it will be interesting to follow him on Aat's TUSKERSOFAFRICA website once he qualifies as "tusker-to-be".



Aat, Lettie and myself wish you all a very pleasant visit to South Africa and especially to KNP. We trust that many great tuskers will line the roads you will travel.

Lettie & Gerrie.

Is that elephant still alive cause i think we saw it

How do you post pictures on these topics

Saw three nice tuskers on my Oct 2012 trip to Satara.
This guy was seen on the H10 as I was leaving the park.


And this young bull who I think has potential was photographed 3 km south of Satara.


I will post the third one later on once I have finished my editing.

Lettie and Gerrie,
Thanks !! I really hope to see a few tuskers again.... looking very much forward to our trip..well, you can imagine...
Real beautiful picture of Masthulele and I agree with you about the lead Askari. Looks promising and looks a bit like Riceho , upcoming, promising with thick tusks. ( I know it is not Riceho, but just to see there are few of these guys around)
I was and am thinking about some extra pages with relative younger bulls with thick promising tusks. I also have to look at the disk space I am using for the tuskers and the costs for using extra's disk space... I am doing this all without any sponsoring... but the subject was and is in my mind too... following younger promising bulls over the years to see if they "reach" the status of Big Tusker later on..

Super Mongoose,
I can't ID this bull, not known to me as tusker so it is not a named one. It's is difficult to judge the length of the tusks looking at the pictures... Like to store the pictures in my database and see what happens with this one later on.

[quote="Super Mongoose"]Hi Tusker Mites

This tuskey ellie or up and coming tusker scratching himself on a tree, I saw Oct 6 from the fence at Satara. His right hand tusk is quite a bit longer than the left one. Pumba suggested me posting the pics here after reading my TR, as he might have a name. That would be very interesting. Thanx Pumba!

Wilddog5,
The tusker on this picture is ..to my opinion Boyala. His right tusk is broken and the angle of the "shot" can hide this broken tusk. The last picture at his page at my tuskersite shows a almost similar view on him. Maybe you remember if you did see more of him. As far as I know he is still alive.

adw,
Just looked at your 1st picture , to my opinion this is Nwashinangana , based on his tusks and right ear. I think I can see the two "marks" there like Nwashinangana has. His right tusk is a bit shorter then left one and a bit curved while the left tusks is almost straight.
Don't know if you have a few more pics of him and willing to send them in larger format to me?
tuskers@zeelandnet.nl

Second one is not a named one and "judging" his tusks... potential for longer tusks but not that thick (based on the picture).

We saw this nice young man , with promising sized tusks , on 11th October 2012 , at Shitangeni ( just north of Vlakteplaas ranger ) on the H1-7 .
The interesting thing is that he had a big chunk out of his trunk , similar to the tusker Mahrumbini , whom incidently we saw three days later just north of Mopani .



Picture of Mahrumbini following after downloading

Herewith pic of Mahrumbini - he only has one tusk , and also a piece bitten out of his trunk - I suppose by some enterprising croc sometime , somewhere ust north of Mopani , on the 14th October 2012 .




And not so far from him , we were fortunate to see another one of Aat's named tuskers , namely Kaleka - quite impressive that big right tusk . He wasn't very friendly and chased us away with a shaking of his head , etc .

@ ALL

I am very very sorry but I am going to stop most activities at this forum for the Big Tuskers.
I will pm the ones who like requests for ID etc or just simply will comment but no other activities anymore.

I am very disappointed that for all the time I spend for so many for ID work and many others things around the Big Tuskers I am not even nominated for any category for awards this year.

I have done this for 4 years at a row spending so much time with pleasure but I have to conclude that appreciation is far away.

I like to ask the moderators to take away the award I received earlier in 2010 because I am really very very very disappointed ....

regards
Aat