We went out yesterday evening and didn't start until about ten at night looking for a panther genet. It's one of the most beautifully marked furs of any animal in the world and it's hard to say what family it is, but probably in the small cat family. They look more like a fisher from North America but they have the markings of a panther or jaguar. As far as I know, they've only taken two of these in over five years here in Ghana. 

So we went out and right off the bat spotted the cutest bush baby up in the trees, which is really cool. We were hunting with a local guy named John who's a really good hunter. We've been hunting at night with spotlights and it's like these guys have a sixth sense. He'll be walking along, hardly even looking, then all of a sudden he'll stop and turn his headlamp up into the tree and point at something and it'll be a bird sitting on a vine, or a bat hanging upside down. Eventually John spotted two red eyeballs, but we had to make sure which animal it was and make sure it wasn't a palm civet, which we already have. So we got in right close to the tree and the guide said it was a panther genet. I actually missed the first shot at it and it ran way up into the top of this huge, old growth tree in the jungle. For half an hour we waited quietly and flicked on the light again and then I barely saw it out of the corner of my eye. I shot again with the shotgun and missed my second shot and then it ran out onto the end of the tree limb and I took a third shot and finally got it. It is absolutely beautiful. I'd say it's one of the most beautiful animals in the world, not just in Africa. It's probably only about five pounds, so it's not big but it's spectacular. It's spotted with a body that's lean and low but with a two-foot long tail with a ring around it like a racoon. It's one of the coolest animals that I've ever seen. 

We got in this morning at 3am and woke up at 8am and drove around doing some cultural stuff. We saw some little villages and all in all, it was a cool day and tonight we're heading out again to look for frogs. Everything is going good over here. 

The Next Day...

We've changed camps now. We drove about 3 more hours away from the capital city of Accra to the ocean where we're going to be hunting one last night for cain rat and the giant pouched rat. The ocean here is absolutely spectacular with miles of white sand beaches and beautiful warm water. We were actually body surfing today in the water. We go birding in the mornings and evenings and then into the water during the day and then all night long, we go hunting. Somewhere in there we sleep for a few hours if we're lucky. 

Last night we wanted to go out hunting all night but the one guide was drunk, so he couldn't take us out. This was actually ok with me because I quite enjoyed the extra sleep. Last night we went to a village and we bought giant crayfish, or lobsters, that are 1-2 pounds each. We got a feast of them and brought them back into our little room and ate them. Our rooms are thatched, little cottages overlooking the ocean - it's spectacular. 

We've been doing really good on the birding too. There have been some really cool looking birds and I'm actually really enjoying it. It's really fun collecting the birds and is one of the few places in Africa that you can get bird licenses for virtually all the birds, other than the raptors and the parrots, so we've been busy collecting those. It'll be an interesting experiment to see how it goes, which is why my taxidermist, Gord Brown, is along to do all the skinning of the birds, and also an experiment from Steve's side to see if we can do a full bird safari and eventually bring some clients in. 

So anyways, that's all. We've been having a ton of fun and the hunt's almost over. We'll be heading to Accra tomorrow night and then we have to spend all day Friday getting all the permits in order for export and getting the hides all prepared. Hopefully they'll let me do a little bit of shopping in the antique market and then we fly home Saturday night. It's been a great, amazing hunt - I've really enjoyed it. Ghana is a wonderful place and I'm glad I got to hunt in this country.