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TOWARDS
the end of last year as Ranger Dixon and four guests were arriving back from the morning
walk a squealing baby warthog was waiting for them in the drive-way. When the warthog saw
Dixon she immediately ran up to him and waited at his feet. Dixon picked her up and so
became part of life at Djuma.
Pendrae immediately accepted the role of surrogate mother and introduced Nomfu, as she
came to be known, to a life of luxury! Nomfu, which means "nose" in Shangaan,
has become accustomed to dog food, human attention and even occasionally sneaking onto
Pendrae's bed!
Nomfu was very young when she arrived and had to be bottle fed, but soon wild soon. It is
remarkable how fast she learns and in my experience one the more intelligent animals I
have known intimately. Warthog love to dig, but recently it became an almost fatal habit
for Nomfu. She was digging at the bottom of the garden when she fell into the septic tank!
The first we heard was a squeal like only a pig can and I can tell you she was not as
happy as the proverbial pig in ….! It took much persuasion to convince a staff member
to tie a rope around Nomfu and pull her to safety. We obviously had to clean her and so
had to pin her down and scrub her down, this was one insult too much and she squealed blue
murder!
While we were cleaning her three new guests arrived, the looks on their faces! Later, when
all had calmed down and the new guests had recovered their sense of humour, they admitted
that they thought they had arrived as we were preparing dinner! To their relief there was
no warthog on the menu that night!
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