WILDLIFE BLOG

It's been a while since I wrote anything on here! Sukey has been keeping us busy but we're enjoying being parents! From our house, we have a stunning view over a drying lagoon. A few days ago, one of the females in a family which regularly pass through came into oestrus. Males from all around showed up and began pursuing her around the place. Boys being boys, there was a fair amount of pushing and shoving [...]

My apologies for my long silence. Any of you who follow my FB page will know that 6 weeks ago, my daughter Sukey was born, so I've been a little busy! Here's a recent photo of Sukey with Kirstie while we were on holiday in Cornwall, and one of me with her on the beach. But onto other things. I have managed to find some time to get out and about with my camera while there's [...]

The Gymnogene (or Harrier Hawk) is odd among the raptors because it doesn't conform to the normal stereotype for a bird of prey. Slightly scrawny, with a small bill, and long gangly legs, it doesn't look much of a threat to anyone. But it's learned to capitalise on a under-used food source - baby birds in inaccessible nests, and insects and other invertebrates hidden in crevices in trees. I watched an adult bird feeding at a [...]

Surely the most elegant of all birds, I spent a long time enjoying watching a pair of Southern Crowned Cranes. After a while, they moved around so that the light was behind them and I was able to take some photos of them foraging in the grass.

It's been cloudy almost every afternoon that I've been in the park this week. It makes me realise that I do miss the guaranteed afternoon golden light of the dry season. But there are some situations which work well in overcast conditions, provided you can get enough light into the camera to ensure a sharp image. This stumpy-tailed Zebra is well-known to us and lives on a grassy corner just inside the gate. And this big [...]

I was going through some folders of old images the other day, and came across this sequence of a lion pride feeding on a hippo carcass! Not sure why I hadn't posted them before, but here they are, in all their gory detail...

Christmas feels a little different here in the Luangwa. Hot and sweaty is the order of the day, with the high chance of rain being the only similarity with a UK Christmas. Here a roosting flock of Egrets gave us our Christmas tree. The hippos don't seem too impressed however. Happy Christmas everyone. Ed

.....have well and truly arrived now. There is long green grass everywhere, the lagoons are filling and the chorus from the birds is deafening as they prepare for breeding. I took a nice drive in the park a few days ago and was pleased to see that there's still plenty of game around. Traditionally, people think that animals move away in the rains, because they don't need to access water at the river, but in fact, [...]

You would think that with all the nice new grass around, the elephants would be content to feed and not pay much attention to anything else. Not so with this young bull who showed considerable bravado and aggression towards me when I tried to take his picture. Of course, with elephants it's their sense of smell which informs most of their decisions and my scent was drifting towards him on the wind. I took some photos [...]