Monday, June 27, 2011

Leopard (Panthera pardus)

Agile and Stealthy predators, they are very successful due to their opportunistic hunting behavior. Common compared to the lions but difficult to see, you can find them in a wide range of habitats, but being solitary and well camouflaged you may pass many on a game drive and never know about it. We believe this female to be the one we saw with two cubs, she is very relaxed, hopefully this will rub off on the cubs and provide us with some great sightings in the future.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Shorty

Pictured here with a very guilty look on his face! Shorty the Vervet Monkey is a regular visitor to Sand Rivers Selous, he recommends the breakfasts, lunches, tea time snacks and is a big fan of our fresh fruit!

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Kite spiders

Don't worry they are only 1.5cm at the widest and are not dangerous to man. The males are much smaller and have to be very careful not to eaten by the female! They must have to tread carefully while dating!

Monday, June 13, 2011

Fishing

The mighty African Fish Eagle, an expert at catching fish, but they will even take small crocodiles! Here one can be seen with a fish called a Nkupe.

Saturday, June 11, 2011

Feeding time


We had the pleasure of seeing the Collared Sunbird feeding its chicks in the camp this morning, the adults frantically searched for small caterpillars under leaves and hidden in gaps in the bark of the trees.While the two fledglings constantly begged by calling and flapping their wings. As with humans I am sure they hope the fledglings grow up quick so they can get a bit of peace and quiet!

The brilliant optical phenomenon of iridescence seen on the Collared Sunbird's feathers makes them change colour as they zip in and out of the bushes.

Thursday, June 9, 2011

"Did you get bitten by a snake"


Taking a boat safari from Sandrivers will get you up close and personal with many of the birds that nest in the banks. The birds seem to be very tolerant of the boats, one day we had a Beautiful Malachite Kingfisher land on the boat a few feet from us! Above is a photo of a Giant Kingfishers just out side its nest and some Eland on the plains..

Today we were doing a bit of exploring on foot, near Lake Tagalala we came across a heard of Zebras, as usual they ran off. From where we were it looked like one of the Zebras was lying down and not moving. We decided to go over and have a look. As we came with 10m of the Zebra we saw an ear twitch. It seemed like it was very weak or maybe it had sustained an injury. We came to within a few feet of the young Zebra and decided to nudge it with our feet, but no reaction, then once more, but still nothing. Rem who I was with bent down and said to it, "did you get bitten by a snake" at that moment the Zebra woke up and bolted away giving us a major increase in heart rate! Then we had to laugh, poor thing was only fast asleep! He trotted off and joined his rather concerned mum.

One of our other walks out had the great luck of seeing 3 leopards in one morning, a mother with two tiny cubs, great news, hopefully we will be seeing more of them!

Friday, June 3, 2011

Blurring the lines

The Zebras here in the Selous lack the shadow stripes, giving them a vivid look. They are called Crawshay's Zebra.

If the light is not very good, then you can try some different photography techniques, such as slowing your shutter speed down and panning, sometimes you can get lucky.