The handsome bushbuck is the smallest of Southern Africa's medium-sized antelope. You can view them on most safaris in South Africa, Botswana, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
Need Advice?Male bushbucks are a dark brown color, with slight white stripes down from their back to the middle of their sides and white dots along their sides in no specific pattern. Only males have horns. Females are a reddish-brown color all-round, with subtle white stripes from their back down to the middle of their sides.
The natural range of these antelope covers most of Africa. They inhabit Zambia, Mozambique, and parts of Botswana, Zimbabwe, Angola, Namibia, and South Africa. In South Africa, they are common along the east coast of KwaZulu-Natal up to the Limpopo River in the north. Bushbuck occur throughout the Kruger National Park.
The bushbuck is the most widely spread of all African antelope species and is also healthy regarding its populations within its distribution range. Over one million of these antelope inhabit Africa. It is mainly due to their ability to forage, live and survive within the rainforests of the Democratic Republic of the Congo as well as neighboring regions – staying in a rainforest is typically a very niche ability, with few forest inhabitants replicating their success elsewhere. Their populations are decreasing in areas where newly established settlements have grown, but their conservation status remains "of least concern," according to the IUCN's red list.
They predominantly browse and enjoy the leaves of shrubs, fruits – especially wild figs – and flowers, although they also eat new grass. Because of this, they are well adapted to forest life and are found in areas characterized by thicker vegetation. They favor areas where water is plentiful, and plants grow prolifically – although they can obtain enough water from licking the dew off leaves in the morning. And are not as reliant on water sources as some of the bigger antelope species that often need to drink liters of water daily to survive.
Unlike most other antelope species in its family, such as kudus and nyalas, bushbucks do not form any group or herd. They live solitary lives and are not territorial. Observations of bushbucks in Kenya suggest that a few individuals share the same home range – as many as 12. Compared to other hooved animal species, their atypical behavior ends when it comes to mother and young. As with most antelope, mothers and their young regularly keep each other company before and after the juvenile is independent.
We recommend the following National Parks and Private Reserves for the best chances of spotting the bushbuck on safari game drives and bush walks.
Because of their solitary lifestyle, they have a lot of alone time and are not social animals. Studies in the Port Elizabeth area of South Africa have shown they spend most of their day resting, followed by feeding and roaming. At night, they seemed to graze more rather than browsing on leaves and fruits from shrubs and woody plants, but would still rest a considerable amount, laying down rather than standing to blend in with the environment and avoid predators spotting them.
They like touching each other and spreading their scent as a pre-reproduction ritual, resting their heads on each other, urinating, rubbing against each other, and making mating calls. After they successfully breed, the female will carry their offspring for up to 7 months and then give birth to a single calf in the thickets. The calf will remain there for up to 4 months and only leave its mother once it reaches puberty at around 11 months.
When predators are close, their odd spots and stripes come into play, camouflaging them very effectively. For the most part, they are undetectable if they want to be. Lions or hyenas pass within a 10m radius of a bushbuck after dark and walk past, not even noticing the presence of easy prey nearby. If their 'stand still and blend' strategy does not work, they go to the more common flight strategy, sprinting to the nearest cover and flashing the bottom white part of their tails.
