Procavia capensis spotting!

What's round and furry and brown all over?

Why, a hyrax of course!

Commonly known as dassies, hyraxes (hyrax-i?) are a permanent fixture on Table Mountain.

Today, I--along with four other lovely ladies from the house--took the big step of climbing up Table Mountain, one of the New Seven Wonders of the World!*  It was, breathtaking. So beautiful and magnificent. The flora at the top of the mountain was extremely diverse, ranging from the Climber's friend, or Cliffortia ruscifolia, to the Wagon tree, or the protea nitida.

Most importantly... we found this little guy up at the top just nibbling away at some plants--their diet consists primarily of grass and leafy plants, but can also eat insects and grub--and hopping around from rock to rock:

Photo Cred: Ali Magg

While rock hyraxes are supposed to extremely sociable and vocal critters, they were not really in the mood for talking today. Unfortunately, we did not to get to hear any of the 21 different vocal signals that they are known to produce including a high trill that is made when hyraxes feel threatened. A hyraxes "song" (as these vocalizations are called)  can vary by geography and scientists have found that there there exists some kind of a syntactic structure. Most importantly, scientists have discovered that the variety in the hyraxes song can reveal characterizing information.


PB


* By 'climbing up Table Mountain', I meant took a gondola up to the top of the mountain.