I've been out of the loop for a while and this may already have been discussed, but I just heard that there was a very damaging fire at Senuko Lodge in the Save Conservancy earlier this year.

Anybody know the details of what happened; what burned; and has it been repaired?

Not that I am in a position to go there anytime soon, but Senuko remains one of my "dream hunt" destinations.

I was hunting adjacent property in October when the fire occurred. One side of the road was our area. The other side was Senuko. It was a big fire and burned a lot of property. It burned some but not all of their facilities.

I wouldn't have wanted to hunt there immediately after the fire. My opinion is that as long as they have rain, it will not impact the quality of the hunting.

I think you'll find that the camp has been repaired by now. They started work on the rebuild soon after the fire.

As for fire damage to the bush and quality of the hunting is concerned, no need to worry about that at all because new growth appears very soon after a fire burns through and in many ways the burn benefits the grass quality etc and attracts more game. Which is why so much of the Selous burns by 'accident' every year.

FYI- Universalman that posts here was hunting Senuko with Andy Hunter when the fire occurred.

He may well be able to provide more details or perhaps even pictures.

I was in Zim in December with Gordon Duncan that was present in the camp atm of fire - if I remember correctly (I may stand corrected) - the fire was coming from the side of the camp watering hole and was pretty under control - tho it was very hot and all the things were bone dry and pretty heated up, so eventualy wind picked some sparks and carried them over the watering hole somee 50m away toward the camp - roofs of the upper parts of the camp (dining lodge, bar, kitchen and the highest chalet) caught fire - guys manged to pull some stuff out but it was a matter of minutes when it was all over...

Hunting and operating of the camp didn't suffer and to my knowledge burned part of the camp is under re-construction as we speak - I have no doubts it will be fully renewed when the season starts.

I did not realize that it was a bush fire. I thought someone was smoking in bed or the kitchen stove set the lodge on fire. How much land was scortched?

It must have really been a hot bush fire, as is not the lodge built up on a kopje off the surrounding plain?

It was a super hot fire. Although we don't get fires like the US or Australia, we are not as geared to combat them as the US fire dept and some get way out of control. A while back, three guys were burnt to death by a serious blaze here in the Save, and it was just good fortune that it wasn't more. I remember fighting fires in the Chiredzi Conservancy for days...

David

Someone told us it was started my some people cooking in the bush.

They had no fire brakes.