Elephants and friends at Kruger Park

by Diana Studer
- gardening for biodiversity
in Cape Town, South Africa

We headed all the way up North to see his animals at Kruger Park in September this year. (To be honest, sitting at a waterhole, waiting, for animals - is not my choice). Burchell's zebra mother and foal were very skittish as she taught him - look right and left then right again, make sure the traffic has obediently come to a complete halt, listen out for speeding idiots! (Sad baby giraffe incident is under investigation)

Zebra crossing
Zebra crossing

Happy electric car waited silently (but ready to move at once if needed). We watched a herd of elephants among trees ... then crossing ... the road ... last mother and calf waited till she was ab-so-lutely sure.

Elephant crossing
Elephant crossing

Waterbuck with white ringed rump. Neither a wildebeest nor a hartebeest, tsessebe are found in Northern savannah woodlands. Donkey lady is a female kudu. Striped white ladies are nyala. Impala (lion food) with a vervet monkey. Leaf ears - steenbok.

Antelope at Kruger
Antelope at Kruger

Male nyala, took one wary look at us and fled!

Wary nyala
Wary nyala

When you see cars queueing, you slow down. Which side are they looking at? What can they see? Once it was lions. This time it was a leopard, after lunch, carefully washing her face clean.

What are they looking at? A leopard!
What are they looking at?
A leopard!

Elephants came in all sizes from the bull and mothers, down thru the teenagers to the babies.

Elephants in all sizes
Elephants in all sizes

They like to drink fresh water straight out of the dam, tall with a trunk is so convenient. The littl'uns have troughs, or the natural pools I prefer - since they are accessible to all the creatures.

Elephants at water
Elephants at water

Battered and scarred the face of this buffalo.

A battle scarred buffalo
A battle scarred buffalo

Dark fork tailed drongo. Party colours for the lilac breasted roller. Ruffled by the tail wind a saddle-billed stork. Chunky yellow-billed hornbill (we have a wooden one on our patio as a souvenir of his tour guiding days)

Kruger birds
Kruger birds

A lone elephant.

Lone elephant
Lone elephant

Two wasp or handmaiden moths on our final tent. A pod of hippos waiting for summer rain - which has arrived - floodwaters cutting off Sable Height camp! Those logs on the shore, are crocodiles. Marabou storks (his nickname when overlanding to meet me in Cape Town). Some careful synchronisation required to get a giraffe down to water to drink. Sturdy and square the warthog.

and other animals at Kruger
and other animals at Kruger

Closing the day with an evening bath at the waterhole at Punda Maria in Kruger Park.

Evening bath at Punda Maria waterhole
Evening bath at Punda Maria waterhole


I invite you to join us at Elephant's Eye on False Bay. Please subscribe as you prefer
via Feedly,
or Bloglovin,
or Facebook 

Pictures by Diana and Jürg Studer

Teal blue text is my links.
To read comments if you are in email or a Reader,

Thanks for comments that add value. Maybe start a new thread of discussion? BTW your comment won't appear until I've read it. No Google account? Just use Anonymous, but do leave a link to your own blog. I would return the visit, if I could...

I welcome comments on posts from the last 2 months.

Comments

  1. Your range of wildlife, like flora, is wide! Our wildlife is pretty tame by comparison: coyotes, raccoons, opossums and skunks here with some mountain lions (cougars) in the foothill areas.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Oh wow. These photos are stunning. I'm afraid I don't see much more that a stray deer around here. xo Laura

    ReplyDelete
  3. Most enjoyed the photos, but also your deft and concise captioning, encouraging me to look and look again. Thank you for encouraging a slow-down on more than one front.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Amazing. He certainly got his animals!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Good to see so many animals around, what a great trip. I did an English course last week, the teacher had emigrated vom Cape Town.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Amazing photographs! You are very brave. I especially love the one with the elephants in all sizes.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Wow, loved those photos! Thank you for sharing them.

    Looking on a map, distance to Kruger from Cape Town is about the same as distance from San Diego to Portland--that is a long trip. I'm learning a lot about SA from your blog. (Everything is more interesting when there are flowers.)

    ReplyDelete
  8. Fantastic photos, Diana! We don't have animals like that around here and it is nice to think of them in a park and not in a zoo. Kruger Park is a magical place.
    Amalia
    xo

    ReplyDelete