Cuidado. Elefantes

I guess elephant warning signs are more interesting than brown signs for stately homes or yet another reminder of an adverse camber. This is a few hundred metres from where we're staying as elephants are found in the forests and swamps around, even though the area is quite fragmented and used by people. There is inevitable conflict between certain wildlife species and farmers, which is a standard component of many conservation projects. I'm yet to understand the extent of the conflict here and would like to know whether the elephant population is resident or passes through depending on the season. The forests certainly seem abundant enough to support them as long as there is water, which there is in some swampy areas.

As I walked to breakfast, the ornithology group that had been up for a few hours trapping birds to ID, asked whether I wanted to release a tambourine dove. It hopped onto my palm and flew away in a microsecond, fooling us all that it had been content and relaxed, cocooned inside someone's hands.

I successfully fended off Masunde, one of the staff from our partner organisation, who has been lobbying me to invest as a partner in a camping shop he wishes to open in Chimoio, the provincial capital. It perhaps isn't the daftest idea as various tourists and organisations spend time in the bush, and most equipment to buy in Mozambique isn't up to scratch for the climate. Being a recent arrival without much available capital, I politely declined the idea.