Friday Fun Site of the Day - NationalGeographic WildCam

You will not be able to pull yourself away from this. National Geographic WildCam is a live, streaming view of a waterhole (Pete's Pond) somewhere in Botswana, Africa, complete with sound. There were crickets and birds chirping merrily away on my computer this morning, and I was able to view at least 20 birds, an antelope-like thing, and what I think might have been a hippo? It's cool. Best viewing time is 7 AM and Noon Botswana time, and I think that at least on the West Coast, we're about 9 hours ahead of them. However, I saw tons of stuff at 5 AM PST. Also, the site states "in September as Mashatu moves into its summer season, Pete's Pond will see increasing traffic in the afternoon hours from about 4-6 p.m." Which is coming up for me.

Check out the WildCam Africa Video Highlights, learn more about the elephants you will probably see, or do some leopard research.

How did they do this? From the National Geographic WildCam site:

"Linking the live WildCam Africa Internet video camera from one of the most remote locations in southern Africa to a satellite hovering 22,500 miles (36,200 kilometers) above the Earth’s equator was the easy part. The challenge was how to keep baboons from messing with the camera, prevent insects from slithering inside the computer, and protect the whole setup from curious elephants. National Geographic spent weeks looking for someone who had done it before. Trouble was, nobody had. But Cameron Murie came close enough. Murie, who calls himself a “geek in the bush,” operates a computer and information system business in Musina, South Africa. He is also responsible for designing a radio-based computer network linking the various camps at Mashatu Game Reserve. “Things that are commonplace in an urban environment are difficult to achieve in the bush,” says Murie. “A project like WildCam—with a satellite hook-up that provides streaming video—has never been done in this area. Getting a good quality connection here is expensive and challenging at best.”

You can have it running behind your other applications to check on what's coming to the water hole all day - make sure you have your speakers on, because the sound is VERY cool. Water splashes every once in a while, bugs, birds, etc.

Related: I featured Earthcam recently as another fun site of the day - lots of great webcams from all over the world.