Our favorite bird is the secretary bird. On our recent trip to Pilanesberg, seeing a secretary bird was no. 1 on our wishlist. Our second day in the park gave us a nice sneak preview: a secretary bird far, far away. The next day got better: first we saw a secretary bird flying. Then we saw one in a field but behind a lot of shrubbery. After lunch, we tried again, and we hit the jackpot. Two secretary birds, and we were able to follow them for a while. Walk walk, stamp stamp, munch, walk walk. Beautiful creature!
Category: wildlife
Misty morning
If you follow my posts, you know that I love misty mornings. So you can imagine I was happy this morning in Pilanesberg! The antelope in the foreground is a tsessebe.
Kudu
Sometimes I think that actually I want to be a painter or good at drawing. Instead I just play with my photos till they please me!
Elephant
The first elephant we saw on our recent trip to Pilanesberg was steadfast in his conviction that the road was his – and his only – to walk on. He was right, of course!
Mapoza male Lion
Mapoza is a stunning lion and the dominant male of a pride in the Thornybush Game Reserve. His right eye is cloudy because of either a birth defect – a congenital glaucoma – or an injury early in his life. Whatever the cause, it hasn’t hindered his success in life!
Of all the photos I took during our trip at KwaMbili Game Lodge, this is my favorite. As a friend said: His right eye is his spirit eye with which he looks into the world of the ancestors. That’s absolutely believable!
Mrs. Buffalo
Where the male buffalo’s horns touch each other on the forehead, the female has skin and hair. The horns are no less intimidating though!
Saving rhinos
Rhino populations have been under heavy pressure from poaching. They are poached because some people believe that the horn of a rhino has medicinal qualities, and trade in rhino horn is very lucrative.
In the past years, there has been an effort to dehorn rhinos in several South African national parks and game reserves. A dehorned rhino has no value to poachers, so this is an effective way of protecting them – and the incidences of poaching have dropped significantly as an effect. For the rhino it does not seem to matter much. Fights over dominance can still happen, even without a horn, and may even be safer for the parties involved.
Still, it’s sad that we have to do this to protect a species!
World Leopard Day
Apparently it is world leopard day today! Leopards are such special animals – solitary, secretive, hard to find and absolutely stunningly beautiful. I didn’t nearly see enough leopards on our recent trip to South Africa 🥲 but this one, just waking up, time to get moving, silhoueted against the sunset-sky was really special.
Buffalo
You wouldn’t say so, because buffalo traverse in large herds, but they are actually quite hard to find. After an afternoon speeding from one end of the Thornybush Game Reserve to the other, we finally found this old, angry, solitary male glaring at us after he had to get up from his personal spot on the beach. Hrmph.
Awesome wonder 