Boer mounted troops at sunset. These highly mobile commandos were expert at hit and run attacks against the British, taking advantage of their knowledge of the terrain to make surprise attacks and then disappear from their pursuers once the British received reinforcements.
To counteract them, the British would parcel out the landscape with hundreds of strong points and barbed wire fences. And, to their future shame, would round up Boer civilians into concentration camps in order to deprive the soldiers of support from the local population. Many Boer farms were burned to the ground by the British as part of a scorched earth policy to deny the Boers supplies.