Diamonds on the Soles of his Feet

By Michael Morkel

This is great stuff. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Dr Louis Changuion: Historian, Conservationist and Author, Haenertzburg, Limpopo

Pete is a remarkable man, with a wonderful catalytic presence. His ideas have greatly benefitted conservation, rhinos and so many people involved, me included.
Jo Shaw, Senior Manager WWF, Cape Town

Dr Pete Morkel has had an extraordinary life.
Peter Pickford, Wildlife Photographer and Author, Western Cape

Pete has played a significant role in the re-introduction and aftercare of black rhino in Malawi and performed miracles on our small but special population.
Bentley Palmer, Conservationist and Author, Malawi

Brilliant: someone had to write this book sooner or later. Pete has worked and left such excellent impressions in so many places and countries.
Dr Hubert Planton, Vet and Wildlife Safari Leader, France

I commend your idea to put Dr Morkel’s working life into a book... so that one can document his life now and give him the credit that he deserves.
David Bradfield, Conservationist, Wildlife Conservation Society: Afghanistan

Pete has done so much in so many different places, developed so many new techniques and is such a good and caring vet.’
Dr Kes Smith, Ecologist and Rhino Specialist: Kenya

‘Mike has produced a fitting tribute to his brother Dr Pete Morkel relating his many adventures and exceptional dedication to the wildlife conservation effort in Africa and across the world.’

Gail Strever-Morkel: Artist and Author, Western Cape

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michael Morkel
• Release date: Sep 2, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463777022

Book preview

Foreword

When I was a child, and in my early teens, I longed to be a wildlife vet when I grew up. It seemed like the most thrilling and satisfying job in the world. More than three decades have passed since then and I can tell you, sadly, that I never did become a wildlife vet. I eventually discovered that I have neither the brains nor the guts for it. But I got to do the next best thing, which was to work with a wildlife vet for two years. And not just any one.

I first met Pete on June 6th, 2006. That was the day the rhinos arrived in North Luangwa National Park, and Pete with them.

‘I see it!’ someone yelled.

Soon everyone had spotted the plane, blinking in the sun. The small crowd watched it approach, then circle the dusty Lubonga airstrip. The pilot was assessing its length, the terrain, the direction of the wind. Bush strips are not designed for giant transporters, especially not for those with a precious, living cargo. Thankfully, it had not rained for several weeks and the ground was firm. People leaned forward, necks craned, not to miss the moment of its landing. The next instant, the plane lurched towards us and everyone jumped back to the edge of the strip. Red dust boiled up behind the tyres. We all whooped and cheered as the pilot straightened the plane’s course and brought it to a standstill.

Those first few days and weeks, Pete was a remote figure, entirely absorbed in the wellbeing of the ten Black Rhinos. I hung around on the fringes of all the excitement, trying not to get in the way, learning as much as I could about the care and safety of these valuable animals. All had to be fitted with radio transmitters and then released, one by one, into a fenced sanctuary. There were problems. One young female, originally from the Great Fish River Reserve in the Eastern Cape, did not take to the local vegetation and refused to be tempted by treats such as sugar cane. I watched Pete do his utmost to save her, hour after hour, day after day, only reluctantly admitting defeat after she breathed her last. It was clear to me that, for Pete, each rhino was an individual in its own right, with a unique personality.

There were other rhino challenges and Pete met each with resourcefulness, humour and total dedication, always dressed in his trademark faded black shorts, khaki green shirt and matching cap, his sockless feet in battered, brown leather shoes. I don’t think I ever saw him in anything else. The ultimate challenge was, arguably, surviving the crash of his plane in North Luangwa. I still remember seeing him stumble along the dirt track towards me, dishevelled and hurting, his face encrusted with blood. During the long, bumpy drive to the hospital in Mpika he was stoic and calm, troubled not by his injuries or his vomiting, which were severe, but by the fate of his plane and the condition of his passenger, Emile Smidt, who travelled with us. I couldn’t understand much of what Pete said because, unexpectedly, he spoke mostly Swahili.

Not one to suffer fools gladly, once you earn Pete’s liking and respect, you couldn’t ask for a more loyal and supportive friend. His patience while he guided me through the minefield that is monitoring a population of reintroduced Black Rhinos was boundless. Pete never made me feel like the complete novice I was. He believed in my ability to do my job well – or at least never let it show that he didn’t – and I consequently did my best to rise to the occasion. I will be forever grateful for his faith in me. It was Pete, too, who encouraged me to keep writing after I mentioned to him my other long-time dream of becoming an author.

Pete enjoys people and is both an astute observer of human nature and a charismatic and entertaining storyteller. Many is the evening he regaled my husband and me and others with tales of his adventures, more often than not ones in which he was the butt of the joke. He and Estelle also received my family into their home in Ngorongoro with tremendous hospitality; my parents still recall that visit with pleasure. But his finest quality – and one which is becoming increasingly rare, it seems to me – is his integrity. Pete is not afraid to make himself unpopular, and will confront an unpleasant, career-threatening situation head on, if it means sticking to his principles. For this I admire him greatly.

I realise these words are likely to embarrass Pete. Perhaps if I’d worked with him for longer, got to know him better, I would have unearthed some of his faults along the way. After all, no-one is perfect. But I didn’t, so I won’t apologise for only having good things to say about him. It was nothing short of an honour to work with Pete and I feel privileged to be able to call the best wildlife vet in Africa my friend. It more than makes up for not being one myself.

Jessica Groenendijk

14 March 2018

***

We have had the great privilege of knowing and working with Pete for over 20 years in various countries and situations. My first experience with Pete was darting an injured Black Rhino on foot in the Lerai Forest of Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania – also known as the ‘Garden of Eden’, due to the high density of wildlife. The rhino could hardly move due to his injured foot, remaining in one place for days, so we decided to intervene and called Pete to dart and treat the animal. This was going to be a simple operation owing to his seeming immobility. However, when the dart hit, he forgot all pain and charged us where we were now lying as flat as possible in the low vegetation and then disappeared hastily into the thickets of Lerai. The backup vehicle promptly got stuck in the mud, and with this being not only the dominant bull in the crater, but also one of the last remaining rhinos, now drugged and likely to go down in one of the many marshes and pools which litter the area, l could already see heads roll. Nevertheless, Pete took off at full-speed after the rhino, flushing elephants and buffaloes as he ran and reached the animal just as he went down in a shallow marsh. While we held the rhino’s head above the water, Pete treated the wound and revived the animal. A few days later this important bull was moving normally again and continued to live for many years.

No doubt there are many other incidents such as these, involving Pete and wild animals, which can be recounted across the continent – from the Pygmy trackers in the rainforests of Gabon collaring forest elephant, to the nomads of the Ennedi Plateau in northern Chad capturing an escaped ostrich on foot between the Saharan dunes. It was also in Chad where Pete played a major role in saving the unique large herds of elephants, not only in Zakouma National Park, but also in the rest of the country. More than 70 elephants were fitted with satellite tracking collars over a six-year period to assist with locating and protecting these special populations; Pete carried out all of these operations . . . on foot. On the northern shore of Lake Chad, in the middle of what is now Boko Haram country, I sat for almost three hours in the relative comfort of a spotter plane flying overhead, watching Pete stalking, darting, tracking and eventually collaring a massive bull fondly called ‘Mandela’ by the locals. Temperatures were nearing 50°C, yet even from my elevated vantage point, I could see that Pete was enjoying absolutely every step of the operation. Pete is today well known and respected all over Chad, and in the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania you can talk to any ranger involved in Black Rhino protection and they will recall with high respect some adventure with ‘Dr Pete’. It is the same in many other African countries. Pete has influenced countless young conservationists over the years and continues to do so today. There is always a thrill, and some adrenaline involved with Pete’s adventures and operations in the field, which I am sure you will experience in the chapters to follow.

Rian Labuschagne

Introduction

This is the story of my younger ‘boet’ Pete, or Dr Peter van der Byl Morkel to give his full, rather grand name. It’s a story I have been encouraged to write by family, by Pete’s colleagues, associates and friends, by those who have seen him caring for the animals he has dedicated his life to, and by those whose lives have been encouraged and enriched by simply knowing Pete. At the outset of the research for this biography he was described to me as ‘probably the most experienced rhino vet in the world’. At the time I wasn’t sure I could believe that, even though it was expressed by a colleague, Dr Hamish Currie, who had studied with and known Pete professionally for over 35 years. At that stage I simply did not know my brother well enough. In a way, he was a bit of an enigma and as an intensely private person he hadn’t spoken about or shared with his immediate family much about his life as a vet, what drove him and some of the incredible experiences he had had.

Over the last six years, I too have been on a voyage of discovery and it has been a bit like peeling an onion: with each interview, Pete has revealed a little more about his growing up, his life with animals and his thoughts, motivations and his real concerns about conservation. I can now say that I have gotten to know Pete, his family and some of his professional colleagues and friends a little better. I have enjoyed the journey and the discovery process and, as I have grown closer to the other members of my family, I have developed a great respect for the discipline and the commitment that Pete has made to the wildlife of this continent in particular. I would rather you be the judge though as to Pete’s character traits and abilities as I tell his story. Sometimes, as you might appreciate, because ‘blood is thicker than water, I have had to be careful to preserve my objectivity. Pete is certainly no angel and those who know him well are candid about his quirks and rougher edges, his temper when frustrated, his lack of intolerance for time-wasters and self-servers, and what some have described as his selfishness, putting animals and their care above all else, indeed often before the emotional needs of those closest to him.

As I write these words, it is a few days after Pete jetted off yet again, this time with his loving and ever-supportive wife, Estelle, to go to Uganda to assist with the care of a small, desperately threatened rhino population protected behind the fragile game fence of the Ziwa Rhino Conservancy, situated some hours north of the capital Kampala. Prior to this assignment he had been assisting, for nearly two months, with the dehorning of rhino in Namibia, a controversial action at the best of times, as that beautiful and dramatic country faced a critical upsurge in rhino poaching and the death of countless precious animals. In the weeks prior to that he spent time in Zakouma, with Rian and Lorna Labuschagne, supporting their efforts to conserve the threatened populations of elephants in Southern Chad. And so the experiences and assignments mount. I will come to many of these as I tell Pete’s story.

Before I begin though, allow me to backtrack a bit to share with you how I came to make this project such a central part of my own life over the past six years or so. It all began on South Africa’s Heritage Day, 24th September 2012. At the time I was living in Pretoria busy with consultancy work. It had been a depressing couple of weeks. My own marriage was floundering for a second time to a woman I still loved very much. I was battling to cope emotionally and was drinking a bit too heavily for my own good. The Marikana Massacre had also just taken place in August and many questions were being asked as to what sort of society we were or had become and how we had drifted as a nation from the lofty ideals and prestige that we enjoyed during the Mandela years. They were certainly unsettling times.

I recall a debate on the radio that morning when listeners were challenged to think about the meaning of ‘heritage’ in our beloved, yet troubled country. The debate got me thinking and, after a reflective walk through the leafy suburb of Irene in Pretoria later that day, an idea started to form. I knew from my own personal perspective that I needed a project as well to restart my life, to provide me with a new personal focus and a sense of purpose once more. I was badly in need of some good self-help therapy as well.

I was thinking that on my very doorstep, Pete and the work he had being doing in the wildlife management field for some 30 years already was really at the cutting edge of what might be thought of as real heritage. But even after all those years I really didn’t know much about Pete’s work and the incredible commitment he had made to try to make a difference in his field. He never spoke about it much and our own lives had taken us on such different trajectories. He was modest about his achievements, which to him entailed just getting on with life and doing what he loved best.

Two other small events also started to crystallise my thinking. I had seen Pete a short while previously on a television programme about rhinos, and although I cannot recall the details of the particular broadcast, I do remember Mum phoning from Cape Town with a hurried instruction to tune in and watch Pete. And then, the very next week as I was returning in the late afternoon from a business trip to Cape Town, tired from a demanding day and an early flight in the morning, the shorts being shown on the aircraft’s display screens were discussing the plight of rhinos in Africa and, yes, there was Pete again. My heart swelled with pride and tears formed in my eyes. I had to share the moment with someone. I tapped the stranger to my right on the arm and told him that we were watching my boet. I don’t know what he thought. He was one of those serious travellers who didn’t want to engage in conversation with a stranger.

Soon thereafter I phoned Pete, who for once had returned home for a few days of quiet time with Estelle in Kakamas, their home in the Northern Cape at the time. I put it to him and said I had been thinking about writing his story. His response was that he would think about it, but I thought I detected that he was quietly ‘positive’ about the idea.

Over the Christmas break from the office in Pretoria, I detoured for a few days via Kakamas on my way to Cape Town to spend Christmas with Mum; a long detour but worth every ounce of the effort to discuss my idea a bit further. At the time, Pete informed me that he was still thinking about our earlier discussion . . . but then, in the early new year, his telephone call finally came. He had discussed things with Estelle and the response was affirmative, so I now had the green light to get on with the project. I remember very clearly what he said though: ‘Let’s just take it slowly and see how things go.’ In some ways, I now felt like Atlas with the responsibility of the project on my shoulders. I had made the commitment to Pete and the family and now I had to make it happen.

Chapter 1

Chause: A close encounter

I didn’t have access to a helicopter so I had to dart on foot. I would have to do my best sneaking up job, although that wasn’t easy as it was very open grassland. . .

‘One day we received a call that there was a Black Rhino behind the Old Oldeani Mountain: a great big mountain that goes up to some 10,000 feet behind Ngorongoro [Tanzania] on the southern side between the crater and Lake Eyasi. A report had come in from the local Maasai who had seen the rhino. We didn’t know what it was: perhaps a rhino that had always lived there, as there had been rumours of some rhino living outside the crater. As it turned out, it was Chause, a young adult, who had wandered out of the crater during the previous night.

‘Anyway, we got our kit together, got the truck out, the dart gun, all the bits and pieces we were going to need and got going. But by this stage, there were a few hundred Maasai collected on the slopes who had come to watch the action. I didn’t have access to a helicopter so I had to dart on foot. I would have to do my best sneaking up job, although that wasn’t easy as it was very open grassland with no tree covering. Anyhow, I got within darting distance, about 30 metres and I darted Chause. Then the action started. He chased me down the mountain slope with all the Maasai shouting and clapping their encouragement – and then he stopped, and I stopped. And then he chased me again and I ran for all I was worth. This happened another two or three times until he finally fell down.

‘We loaded Chause onto a sledge and took him down into the crater. It was a hell of a job actually due to the very steep road into the crater and with the rhino on the back of the truck. We made it down safely and placed him into one of the rhino holding bomas. These hadn’t been used for a year or two. However, when standing up, after being administered the antidote, you could see where Chause had knocked his knee when he had fallen earlier. We assumed he had damaged the nerve activating the muscles of his leg and would therefore have partial paralysis in the injured limb. But even though he was basically operating on three legs, he was easily strong enough to go up to the wall of the boma and, after a few swipes of his head, he was able to crash through it before he disappeared off to one side.

‘At this stage, we decided that before we tried to capture him again, we would have to give the boma our full attention, which we spent the whole night doing by obtaining extra poles and strengthening it. By the following afternoon, the boma was to my satisfaction and I was confident that we were not going to have another unwelcome breakout. Again I went out to dart Chause, again on foot. He had wandered off about a kilometre and a half and he was just lying there sleeping. So I thought, this is going to be easy this time, plus he also won’t be able to run very fast with his sore leg. I’ll sort of walk up to him and give him a shot – which is exactly what I did.

‘But in fact, whatever damage had occurred to his one leg had sorted itself out over the last 24 hours, and he came at me like a rocket. I was sprinting as fast as my legs would carry me with the rhino literally two or three metres behind me. I got a quick glance in and there he was, with that bloody great horn of his about to poke me in the backside. At that very moment, if you can believe it, I tripped! As I took that last glance back, I must have stepped in a hole in the ground, lost my footing and fell. The rhino nearly ran right over me. Fortunately, he ran slightly to one side, and then he ran past me and on for another 30 metres or so before he realised he was no longer chasing me. He again turned in my direction, but in the meantime I had regained my feet and been able to run a further 20 metres or thereabouts away from him. Luckily, I was far enough away that he didn’t chase me a second time. And then down he went after the tranquiliser dart had done its thing – and Chause was finally moved into the boma once more.

‘Well, if can you believe it, after administering the antidote, he simply walked through the strengthened wall of the boma a second time. By then we just decided to leave him be and he wandered off to go and browse.

‘Thinking back on the sequence of events that day, I think the lads (the Maasai) were quite impressed by all the action that had played out before them. They were sitting on top of a vehicle, a Land Rover, about 80 metres away. They had watched me walk up to a sleeping rhino and dart him the first time – and then off the boss dashes with the animal right behind him . . . and just at the right time, he dived down on the ground and the rhino dashes past him! They were probably thinking, that’s a bit of skill that . . . an old hand at work . . . but it really wasn’t like that at all. It happened just as I have described the incident and my trip occurred at the right time I guess. It might have looked good to the outside observer, but it was a mighty close shave that day. It was by the grace of God that I survived that one.’

Chapter 2

The Early Years

‘We had an incredibly lucky childhood. And although we didn’t grow up on a farm, our experiences were rich in bush experiences.’

It was an early spring day, the 15th of September 1960, in the eastern highlands of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). The air was still cool in the early mornings but it warmed appreciably as the day progressed. It was the beginning of spring and the Jacaranda and Flamboyant trees of the small neighbourhood of Fern Valley were in their first bloom. The Morkel family had recently moved into the neighbourhood, where our parents had chosen to rent a house after our recent arrival from the north, then known as Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia), where David, Claire and I had all been born. Fern Valley, perhaps as its name suggests, was a beautiful part of the world. Unspoilt, mostly Msasa bushveld stretched to the mountains in the distance both in front and behind the plot we called home in the first ten years of Pete’s life. It was a setting and a set of circumstances that would provide the raw material for many of Pete’s formative childhood memories, as well as providing important moulding influences for him later in life.

Mum was heavily pregnant expecting number four. Grandma had come up especially from Port Shepstone on the South Coast in South Africa to look after the rest of the brood while Mum was in the nursing home. Things were a bit strained on the home front as Dad and Grandma were not the chummiest of mates. But we were all going to have to make the best of it for a while, Dad included, even if that required him to have an extra brandy or two in the evenings to mellow his nerves, something Grandma didn’t exactly approve of.

Mum was expecting a rapid dash for the nursing home if she wanted to give birth in a hospital bed. As a good Catholic, Mum had never enjoyed the benefits of planned parenthood. She’d had David, our eldest sibling, in October 1956 and now it was September 1960 and number four was on the way. As Mum always proudly tells it, ‘It was four children in less than four years.’ I just don’t know how she managed.

As Mum relates, ‘Claire had arrived very quickly, so I thought that number four would just pop out like a pea. In anticipation of that, I asked your Dad (who was an agronomist and travelled a lot to advise farmers in the surrounding districts) to take me into Umtali (now Mutare), where I had arranged to stay with Olive Barry who lived opposite the Lady Kennedy Nursing Home. When Olive went on duty, she left me in the hands of the gardener, who was given strict instructions that he should get a wheelbarrow ready in case the madam couldn’t make it across the road on her own.’ Nevertheless, despite the forward planning and the enquiring attention of the gardener, Mother Nature did not cooperate as anticipated. Mum was later collected after Dad had seen his farmers for the day and they travelled the ten kilometres back to the quiet life in Fern Valley.

After preparing supper for us all and settling the family into their beds . . . yes, you’ve guessed it, the contractions commenced. As Mum explains again, ‘At 1 am, things really started to happen. Dad grabbed a bottle of brandy and off we shot back to the nursing home. Then things went quiet for a while so we sat in the car park and every time I experienced pain Dad would have a swig of brandy. Eventually I realised things were happening so I waddled across the road as fast as I could make it, got myself onto the labour ward table and almost immediately Peter was delivered.’ That was the 16th of September 1960 and the birth of one Peter van der Byl Morkel, as he was named and would be baptised a few weeks later by the parish priest.

As Mum relates, ‘I always remember, he was 21 inches long, the normal being 20 inches. He weighed 6,4 pounds . . . he was quite small really.’ After some weeks of difficult feeding and constant upset tummies, it was discovered he had an allergy to breast milk but after being put on a soya milk formula things started to improve. Even so, as Mum observes, ‘He was a thin miserable little baby . . . but he was very sweet.’ Later, as a young lad, ‘He had rather thin legs with knock-knees and a pigeon-toed walk, just like his grandfather Frank Morkel’, but, in Mum’s words again, ‘he was a dear little chap’.

Dad and Mum had met at a Grey’s Hospital social dance in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. Mum was busy with her nursing studies at the hospital and Dad was studying agriculture at Natal University (now the University of KwaZulu-Natal) on the Pietermaritzburg campus. Dad had been born in Mongu, situated on the banks of the Zambezi River in the western province of Zambia. He had travelled by barge up and down the river and railway line, from Livingston, situated on the mighty Victoria Falls, to school at Bishops in Cape Town from the tender age of five. There he had an exceptional athletics and rugby school sporting career and won a scholarship from the Northern Rhodesian government to attend university. His first choice had been to study to be a vet, a decision he was persuaded out of by his parents who argued that he had a much better chance of winning a scholarship if he pursued agriculture; a decision he accepted as he understood the importance of winning the scholarship to his cash-strapped folks, but a decision which he regretted later. Dad also loved his animals.

Mum, on the other hand, had been born in Miri, Sarawak, Borneo, where her father had worked as an engineer for Royal Dutch Shell. After early schooling in Borneo, and later in the UK, she and her mother evacuated from Borneo to Australia just prior to the Japanese invasion. Grandpa, however, was asked by the British authorities to remain behind to assist with communications, having developed quite a reputation as a communication specialist and a radio ham of considerable repute prior to the war. He was known affectionately as the ‘Golden Voice of the Pacific’. On Christmas Eve 1941 he was captured, and, turning to his trussed companions on Christmas morning the following day, he wished them all a very happy Christmas. Reportedly, his good humour that auspicious morning was the last thing his comrades appreciated. Nevertheless, it was probably that indomitable spirit, a keen sense of humour and a dogged determination not to give in that kept him alive