I can’t remember if I posted one of these pics from Punda Maria restcamp in Kruger in Jan 2018. It’s far in the tropical North of the park. The waterhole you can watch from inside the camp is full of amazing visitors. Without having to be worried about gate-closing times, you can also catch them in the best evening light.
Birds of prey. Look at me getting ambitious with some amateurish cutting. These were all filmed in Kruger years ago. Featured birds: African Fish Eagle, the fearsome and mighty Martial Eagle, the Giant Eagle Owl (now called Verreaux’s Eagle Owl), the Bateleur - the skymaster - and the… Wahlberg’s Eagle? Fun fact: I know how to talk to Giant Eagle Owls. That Owl was responding to me talking to it. ...
Young lions being sweet. This is a bit unusual to see. 90% of the time lions do nothing at all. 8% of the time they’re terrifying murder-machines that set our ancient alert system on defcon GTFO. All their other behaviour fits in that last bit. If this seems a weird environment for a wild lion outside India, this is what the bushveld looks like after heavy rains. Kruger is mostly described as, “savannah woodland,” with plenty of large trees. This was in December 2013. ...
Handsome boi. Wait for it… I thought I’d lost these clips. One of those times where you see something spectacular between entering Kruger and getting to camp. This was on the way to Pretoriuskop from Numbi Gate, I think. 2014. Prolly should have cropped this for insta. Oh well.
This hefty chap standing guard as the herd comes down to the river. Shot this in Dec 2013. One day I’ll learn Da Vinci and make some small films from the footage I’ve shot in Kruger.
An old chap chewing on a grass stem.
After three days on the road it’s great to finally arrive at the best place on Earth.
Mad kitter. I’ve shot a lot of wildlife footage over the years but I’ve never done anything with it. Maybe it’s time to actually cut some of it together - even though the gear I used is pretty primitive by todays standards.
Not my best pic from the trip. But you can’t beat this for excitement. We were given bad instructions on where to look for this leopard - so out of 35 mins we spent there we spent about 5 mins actually looking at the animals. But shortly after we did spot them, this little leopard kitten stuck up it’s little head and I grabbed a couple of pics. This also shows you why people use such enormous lenses for wildlife photography. This was with a long lens (500mm) and a 1.4x extender. And this is still a crop of only probably 40% of the image area. On a phone this leopard cub would have only been a few pixels. ...
Crested Barbet. Not uncommon to see in Johannesburg gardens. I managed to photograph a few things that got close enough for my Pentax 67 film camera. I’ll have to wait and see whether any of them worked out. I might try it again though. It’s a lot of fun to use and the clatter of that enormous shutter is very satisfying.