Back from Madagascar

[chamden]

hi mario, great photos. I just got back yesterday and think i need a holiday again to recover!!! A very busy itinery indeed! but we did see around 23 species of chameleon so it was worth the hard work.

Where was the picture of the bifidus taken?, we could not find this species but saw it at mandraka perieryes place and at tana croc farm.

Also where did you find the gallus, we found a few of what im 99 % was gallus female but we couldnt find any males which was frustrating.

How did you get on at ranomafana with the bridge being destroyed by the cyclone?

 

[Mario]

Hi Chamden,
yeah we must do the other Trail in Ranomafana... the Trail to the Bamboolemur was not possible about the broken Bridge, thats why we didnt find cal. glawi and also no oushagnessy and crypticum this time... the bifidus we find in Voizazana there we find also the yellow giant parsonii... the gallus we find in Voimana... and also many bloodsucking-animals, the malthe we find early in the morning in Mantadia near Andasibe!!!
We was not in Mandraka... last time when i was there (August last year) it was shit... only some old parsonii and nothing special... we find in voizazana also cuculatum...but no cal. furcifer this time...
You find 23 cham-species, is very much... congatulations!!!

 

[chamden]

Hi Chamden,
yeah we must do the other Trail in Ranomafana... the Trail to the Bamboolemur was not possible about the broken Bridge, thats why we didnt find cal. glawi and also no oushagnessy and crypticum this time... the bifidus we find in Voizazana there we find also the yellow giant parsonii... the gallus we find in Voimana... and also many bloodsucking-animals, the malthe we find early in the morning in Mantadia near Andasibe!!!
We was not in Mandraka... last time when i was there (August last year) it was shit... only some old parsonii and nothing special... we find in voizazana also cuculatum...but no cal. furcifer this time...
You find 23 cham-species, is very much... congatulations!!!

Thankyou mario, we saw 26 or 27 in total but 3 or 4 were in parks so we couldnt count them.
We did the bamboo lemer trail to the top of the mountain at ranomafana but from the other bridge down in the village and there were only two of us so they were willing to take us, it was a very hard and vertical climb in places and was much harder than i expected it to be. And we didnt see much anyway. The best chams we saw were around 20km from ranomafana and we found both male and female Parsonii parsonii and one female Calumma balteatus.

I know what you mean by the blood sucking animals, i must of had 20 leeches on me at one point and think they must of stole at least a pint of my blood.lol. They were every where!!!!!

The highlight of the trip for me was Furcifer minor, with them being so restricted to certain areas and the access road being so dangerous due to bandits finding a small but healthy population of these was an amazing experiance!

 

[Mario]

some Pics from Masoala....
we go there also next Year at the Herpeto Research Expedition 2011

more Infos: http://www.tanalahorizon.com/index.php?id=115

 

[kameleons jvo]

beautiful pictures