I’m sure most would have expected me to start with elephants for my first post in a series on babies in the bush; and I was tempted to. We spent time with so many large herds, and saw so many young elephants, I am spoiled for choice with images. But, I decided that I would start with something different, and chose to focus on animals with hooves instead. My timing was wrong to see tiny impala, but I did see a fair number of young giraffe, waterbuck and zebra during my travels.
I hope you enjoy my selections, and wishing you an excellent week ahead.
This giraffe was acting a bit like a crossing guard for several youngsters crossing the road in front of us. Not the best images, but great to show the size difference between the babies and the adults. I only wish there had been an impala in the shot too, to really show how large the young giraffe actually are.Fulfilling the cross guard role as another youngster moved from one side to the other. There were about a half dozen giraffe in this group in total.A herd of zebra pause to allow the littlest one a chance to suckle.A young waterbuck blending quite nicely with the autumn tones of the bush. Mom was nearby grazing.A zebra and her foal pause to check out our vehicle, before carry on slowly strolling through the bush.One waterbuck mama acting as babysitter for a group of youngsters. They were all lounging close to the dam at Chitwa Chitwa, while other members of the group were grazing or drinking.Little and large.
Happy Canada day to my friends and family. I know I should have been out capturing the beauty of my own country, but the day has been pretty rainy and miserable, so instead, I offer you today a trio of baby elephants.
Wishing everyone a fantastic week ahead!
Wait for me!!!The tenderness shown towards the baby elephants is heartwarming, every time I experience it.If this happy baby doesn’t make you smile, you are definitely visiting the wrong blog! The joy that this little one shared with us, and the excitement about the stick, was contagious. Everyone on our vehicle was grinning ear to ear.
I was fortunate to see lots of youngsters during my latest travels. While the young elephants are definitely my favourite to watch, especially when they start waving their tiny trunks around trying to act tough, all the young animals in the bush are a delight to see.
Here are just a few of the sightings that I had.
A giraffe calf having a late afternoon milk break.We spent some time with this pair of rhinos while they grazed away the early morning. Here the young one had just turned to look as another vehicle was heading in to take over our viewing position. Moments later, the head was back down and he was happily munching on the grass again.A pair of lion cubs suckling.A young leopard doing a very accurate impression of a sulky teenager.Got milk?
I had some good opportunities during my travels for some animal portraits. Here are the first couple that I have worked through, just in time for monochrome Monday.
Have a great week everyone!
I only had one cheetah sighting during my past trip, and it was an interesting one. We had the opportunity to watch this female try to get close enough to a group of impala to begin to hunt, but her cover was blown.One of the many leopards that I was lucky enough to view this past trip.A side view of a lioness.
Did you know you can find these images, and other like them, in my gallery? You can see an evolving collection of my favourite images there, and even order a print or two if you choose.
It’s Father’s Day today, and as my Dad is always really excited for the opportunity to see rhinos, I decided that would be a good topic for my post today.
I was incredibly fortunate to see rhinos most days on my past trip, and lots of youngsters included in the sightings. They are still a species under tremendous threat, but it is heart warming to see them peacefully going about their lives, unaware of all people who are working tirelessly behind the scenes to try and keep them safe.
I have been on properties that have dehorned all of the rhino, and on properties where they have been left intact, and horn or not, they are magnificent creatures.
I hope you enjoy my selections for the day, and wish everyone a fantastic week ahead.
One of the many rhino youngsters seen while travelling; this one keeping an eye on us while Mom grazes.A rhino cow and her calf. This was actually one of my sightings where I saw two of the “big five” at one time. This pair was watching a buffalo bull ambling past.Like elephants, I think rhinos are wonderful subjects for black and white images. The details of their thick, textured skin really stand out in monochrome.Sporting a thick coating of mud to protect from the sun and to dislodge parasites.We were looking for the tracks of lions when we drove up to a small waterhole and found at least eight rhino having an afternoon gathering. They quickly disbursed into the bushes; I am still amazed at the opportunity to see so many of these animals all at once. Previously, the most I had seen at once was three.A pair of rhino moving through the bushes, grazing along the way.A pair of rhino grazing as the sun began to set.
I switched it up a little this week (monotone, instead of monochrome) as I really liked the natural blue colour that this image had.
While out on a morning game drive on from Lion Sands Tinga Lodge, we came across a baboon troop that was just starting to stir in the treetops. Some youngsters had begun to play, and a few members were already on the ground. They were in a large tree at the edge of the river, so even though sunrise was only minutes away, it was still rather dark.
This mother and her infant caught my eye, nestled into the fork of the tree; just a simple moment, but one I was glad I could capture, and remember again.
When I am out on safari, I like to ask the rangers and trackers what their favourite animal is to watch, or what they would like to see while out on a game drive.Usually, the answer is one of the larger predators, or elephants.But I had a first with our last guide, Harley, while staying at Chitwa Chitwa.His favourite animal is the kudu.
Kudu are a truly impressive animal, especially the males with their huge spiralling horns.They have enormous ears that rotate around like satellite dishes, to aid them in picking up sounds while they are in amongst the trees.
Here are a few kudu images for today.It seemed as good a topic as any!
If you’d like to learn a bit more about kudu, here is the Wiki page for them:
A kudu cow and calf.A classic model pose!A trio of kudu leave the Chitwa Chitwa dam under the midday sun.A kudu bull heads back into the relative safety of the tree cover.A kudu cow just before she ducked deeper into the bushes. Getting an unobstructed view of these animals is definitely a challenge.
First off, I must apologize for not posting for the last couple of week. I had the best of intentions while away to keep up with my regular posting schedule, but that fell by the wayside pretty quickly as I relaxed fully into holiday mode. I’ve been back a little over a week and am just now getting into organizing photos.
It may surprise some that the first images I am posting are pretty crappy photos, but I was so excited about the sighting that I had to share them. This was my 6th trip to Africa, and after hoping and wishing that one day it would happen, I finally saw honey badgers. Not only that, I saw them on my very first game drive of the trip!
We were in quite a dark, tree lined area near Lion Sands River Lodge, and these two honey badgers shot out of the bushes onto the road, ran in front of the vehicle chattering amongst themselves, and then disappeared back in to the bush. All told, we probably had a view of them for 30 seconds or so. The images that I captured were only in a 6 second window. So while the images aren’t great, at least they are proof that I finally saw the elusive honey badger. We actually had one run across the road in daylight while at another camp towards the end of the trip, but that was literally a blink and you miss it moment, and I didn’t even have time to get my camera up to my eye before it was gone.
I edited these images using both On1 Photo Raw (for basic corrections) and then using Topaz Studio and the new Topaz Denoise AI program. The Denoise AI was able to get the best out the image that I could. These won’t be featured images printed for display around my house, but they are a wonderful reminder of an amazing game drive filled with interesting sightings (I’ll share some of the other interesting creatures at a later date, as for now, duty calls and I have a lawn to mow).
