Did you know... elephants are right- or left-tusked

Like humans, who are typically right or left-handed, elephants are usually right or left-tusked. The dominant tusk is called the master tusk and is generally shorter and slightly more worn at the tip. The master tusk is the elephants main tool and used more often than the other one.

The tusks are used to dig for water and roots, to debark trees, to move trees and branches when clearing a path, as well as to mark trees to establish their territory and occasionally as a weapon.
The tusks of of both male and female elephants are acutally growing continously - up to 18cm per year. They can reach over 3m in length and weigh over 90kg. Males have usually larger tusks compared to the females who have small tusks, or no tusks at all.

Kruger National Park safaris ex Johannesburg >>

Did you know... the Route 62 in South Africa is the longest wine route in the World

The famous Route 62, stretching from Cape Town via Oudtshoorn and the Garden Route to Port Elizabeth, is said to be the longest wine route in the World. It spans a distance of about 850km. The route, named after the R62 regional route, leads through the wine-growing areas of Wellington, Tulbagh, Worcester, Robertson and the Klein (Little) Karoo. The Route 62 is a mountainous, shorter and more scenic alternative to the N2 highway with  easily accessible towns, nestled along the valleys.


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One of the most famous attractions along the Route 62, besides the wine, the landscape and picturesque towns, is "Ronnie's Sex Shop" in Barrydale. The "shop" is actually a pub that was painted with the name one night as a prank by Ronnie’s friends. Other attractions along the route are, of course, wine tours, but also safari drives, hiking tours, 4x4 routes, cultural excursions, horse & ostrich riding a number of adrenaline tours, such as skydiving, canoeing, caving and much more. For accommodation along the route, click here! Enjoy!

Did you know... Namibia has the world's highest population of cheetahs

According to Namibia's Ministry of Environment and Tourism (MET), the country has the world's highest population of cheetahs. Of the approx. 12,400 cheetahs remaining worldwide, 2,500 - 3,000 cheetahs can be found in Namibia. About 90% of country's cheetahs are living outside of protected reserves, primarily on commercial livestock farmlands. Their usual habitat in Namibia are grasslands, savannahs, areas of dense vegetation and mountainous terrain.
The cheetah is the world's fastest land mammal, reaching speeds of up to 110km/hour. The most specialised of all the 36 species of cats is currently inhabiting 25 countries in Africa as well as parts of the Middle East. Cheetahs are included on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) list of vulnerable species.

Did you know... that a cheetah only has about 20sec to make a kill before its muscles burn out? >>

Did you know... South Africa is home to the world's smallest butterfly

The smallest of all known butterflies, the Dwarf Blue (Oraidium barberae), is found in South Africa and Zimbabwe. The wingspan of the Dwarf Blue, which is measured from where the wing is attached to the body to the tip or apex of the wing, is only 10-15 mm for males and 12-18 mm for females. The butterfly, which prefers savanna or grassveld areas, is found in northern KwaZulu-Natal, in parts of the Free State, in the Eastern Cape and the Western Cape up to the Namaqualand.
There are about 28 000 species of butterflies throughout the world of which slightly more than 660 species are found in South Africa.
The largest butterfly in the world is the Queen Alexandra's Birdwing, which has a wingspan up to approx. 300 mm. This tropical butterfly can be found in the rainforests of northern Papua New Guinea.

Video: 10 little-known Nelson Mandela facts

The people from youtube's channel "alltime10s" have searched the web and other sources and found 10 facts about former South African President Nelson Mandela you might not know. Kudos "alltime10s"!

1. His detractors included Magret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, who both considered him a terrorist.
2. He was given the name Nelson by his schoolteacher. His birth name is Rolihlahla, which means "pulling the branch of a tree".
3. Tripe (edible offal) is one of this favourite foods.
4. While in prison he was allowed one visitor a year for 30 minutes. He could only send & receive one letter every six months.
5. He has honorary degrees from more than 50 international universities.
6. Nelson Mandela was dubbed the "Black Pimpernel" due to his ability to evade police. He variously disguised himself as a gardener, a chauffeur & a chef.
7. Nelson Mandela is the oldest elected President of South Africa. He was 75 years old when he took office.
8. The Cosby Show's Cliff and Claire Huxtable's grandchildren were named Nelson and Winnie in honor of Mandela and his ex-wife Winnie.
9. His favourite musical artists are Händel & Tchaikovsky.
10. Mandela is a minor royal. He is the great-grandson of King Ngubengcuka of the Tembu people.

Black Mamba fact file (video)

Narrated in the very "National Geographic" style (pls change it!), the video about the Black Mamba below is actually quite informative. The mamba, which is named "black mamba" because of the ink-black colouration of the inside of its mouth, is not only world's fastest snake, but also the longest venomous snake in Africa. The snake can be found all over Kenya and Tanzania, in eastern Uganda, in Mozambique, Swaziland, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Botswana, as well as in KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa and in northern Namibia.

Did you know... that a cheetah only has about 20sec to make a kill before its muscles burn out?

The cheetah, which is inhabiting most of most of Africa and parts of the Middle East, is the fastest land-living animal. It can get as fast as up to 120km/h on distances up to 500m and has the ability to accelerate from 0 to over 100km/h in around three seconds. More facts about the cheetah and its hunting in the following video:

Video: National Geographic presents some interesting facts about lions >>

Video: National Geographic presents some interesting facts about lions

National Geographic presents some interesting facts about lions in general and lioness "Ma di Tau" in particular in their promotional video for their movie "The Last Lions".
Example? Lions can devour 55lbs (25kg) of meat. That's the same as an average American adult eating 120 burgers in one sitting.

Did you know... that no two zebras have stripes that are exactly alike

A zebra has typically vertical stripes on the head, neck, forequarters, and main body, and horizontal stripes at the rear and on the legs of the animal. With each striping pattern unique to each individual, zebras can, according to some researchers, recognize one another by their stripes.

While some experts believe that the stripes are mainly for identification, others believe that the stripes may have different functions:

• The zebra's main predator, the lion, is color blind. Theoretically, a zebra, camouflaged in tall grass through the vertical striping when standing still, may therefore not be noticed at all by a lion.
• Zebras are herd animals and so the stripes may help to confuse predators. A number of zebras standing or moving close together may appear as one large animal, making it more difficult for the lion to pick out any single zebra to attack.
• The zebra's disruptive colouration may also be an effective way of confusing the visual system of the blood-sucking tsetse fly.
• the stripes coincide with fat patterning beneath the skin, serving as a thermoregulatory mechanism for the zebra

btw - zebras are black animals with white stripes!

Did you know that ... the tongue of a giraffe can be as long as 45cm?

Giraffes are the tallest land animals. They are approximately 4.3m to 5.2m tall, although the tallest male recorded stood almost 6m. Their neck is in average about 1,8m long and weights close to 300kg. Despite its long neck, the giraffe has only seven vertebrae, exactly the same number as man and most other mammals.
A giraffe's legs are usually around 1.8m long. These long legs allow the animals to run as fast as 60km/hrs over short distances and  at around 15km/hrs over longer distances.

Each giraffe has a unique coat pattern.

Giraffes use their height to browse on mainly leaves in treetops that few other animals can reach. Their favorite leaves are from the acacia tree. Acacia trees have long thorns that keep most animals from eating the leaves. But those thorns don't stop the giraffes! They simply use their 45cm tongues to reach around the thorns. An adult giraffe can eat approximately 30kg of leaves and twigs daily, but can survive on just 7kg.
The average weight for an adult male giraffe is 1,200kg while the average weight for an adult female is 830kg.
Wild giraffes have a lifespan close to 13 years while those in captivity live up to 25 years. Female giraffes give birth standing up, so that their young are falling more than 1.5m to the ground at birth. These infants can stand in about half an hour and run with their mothers an incredible ten hours after birth.

Did you know... why the white rhino is called "white rhino"?

There are some theories around, but the most obvious one is based on a mistranslation of the word "wijd" (referring to the width of the rhino's mouth) from Dutch to English. "Wijd" in Dutch, or "wyd" in Afrikaans, means "wide" in Englisch. So early English-speaking settlers in South Africa misinterpreted the "wijd" or "wyd" for "white" and the rhino with the wide mouth ended up being called the white rhino. Other popular theories suggest the name comes from its wide appearance throughout Africa, its color due to wallowing in calcerous soil, because of the lighter colour of its horn or even because of the many bird droppings on their bodies. Black rhinos are actually not black at all. The species probably derives its name as a distinction from the white rhino and/or from the dark-colored local soil that often covers its skin after wallowing in mud.

The tongue of a chameleon is as long as its own body length and sometimes even longer...

The Chameleon is a generally slow-moving animal. Therefore, it has adapted an extremely long tongue to make hunting easier. The tongue extends out faster than human eyes can follow, at around 26 body lengths per second and hits the prey in about 30 thousandths of a second. The tongue itself is quite a complex arrangement of bone, muscle and sinew. At the base of the tongue of a Chameleon there is a bone and this is shot forward giving the tongue the initial momentum it needs to reach the prey quickly.



The creature can unfurl a tongue twice its body length in 0.07 second. At the tip of the elastic tongue there is a muscular, club-like structure covered in thick mucus that forms a suction cup. Once the tip sticks to a prey item, it is drawn quickly back into the mouth, where the chameleon's strong jaws crush it and it is consumed.