Wildlife up close - cheetah

It's really hard to sum up what a cheetah is. Sleek. Elegant. Powerful. Like a bird.

huh? did I just say that? like a bird? well, they chirp like a bird (cheetah cannot roar or purr, just chirp). but it is more than that; there is an elegance and energy about them that most closely matches that of a falcon. well, at least I think so.

Although I love cheetah, I feel somewhat unqualified to really express what a cheetah is so I think I am going to go across to SAPhotographs and ask Joan to guest write something (she is a BIG fan of cheetah and has lots of experience with them). I have a whole series of cool cheetah photos, so if she obliges then I'll post her insights with those photos.

Back to the close-ups. So much of what makes a cheetah special are its feet (and permanently exposed claws), hence there is lots of that here:

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

If you have not seen any of the "Wildlife up close" digiscoping series, then here is a bit of an intro (from the first Cape Buffalo post):
So one of the great things about digiscoping is that one has a huge focal length to play with, so one can really get up close and personal with some pretty impressive creatures. In my time in Southern Africa, I was able to get a whole pile of close-up macro-style images of a variety of wildlife.
What I would like to do is to create a collection of the best "Wildlife up close" images but I would like you to help me out. Each post will feature a different species of African wildlife and I would like to vote for your favorite (or against your least favorite).

So far, we have had:

Cape Buffalo

White Rhino

African Elephant

Lion

Burchell's Zebra

Primates

Wildlife fur/skin collection - still not solved

Please vote for your favorite, and at the end of the series, I will randomly choose a winner from each post in the series and send them the original full-sized image they chose. In two weeks I will randomly choose a winner from all those that voted in a particular post!

Have a wonderful day,

Dale

Wildlife up close - wildlife fur/skin edition

So I really enjoyed the "Wildlife Up Close" digiscoping series - I loved taking the photos and I loved sharing the photos with my blog friends. So far I have posted six posts in the series, which pretty much gets me to the end of the decent super-up-close photos that I took while in southern Africa this last (austral) winter. I wish I had taken more, and although I had four great encounters with Leopard (and have leopard digiscoping photos here and a digiscoping/no digiscoping comparison of a leopard here), I never managed to get any really good close-ups of leopards (to complete my Big 5 close-up ambitions). But you will never catch me close to complaining about the spectacular experiences I have shared with the leopards of the bushveld...

this penultimate wildlife up close post is a little different: you need to guess what mammals you are looking at (you can identify the birds as well if you want, but they are not the focus) and then choose your favorite one.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

If you have not seen any of the "Wildlife up close" digiscoping series, then here is a bit of an intro (from the first Cape Buffalo post):
So one of the great things about digiscoping is that one has a huge focal length to play with, so one can really get up close and personal with some pretty impressive creatures. In my time in Southern Africa, I was able to get a whole pile of close-up macro-style images of a variety of wildlife.
What I would like to do is to create a collection of the best "Wildlife up close" images but I would like you to help me out. Each post will feature a different species of African wildlife and I would like to vote for your favorite (or against your least favorite).

So far, we have had:

Cape Buffalo

White Rhino

African Elephant

Lion

Burchell's Zebra

Primates

the final Wildlife Up Close post will be on Cheetahs - and I have some great shots of them!

Please vote for your favorite, and at the end of the series, I will randomly choose a winner from each post in the series and send them the original full-sized image they chose. In two weeks I will randomly choose a winner from all those that voted in a particular post!

Have a wonderful day!

Dale Forbes

Wildlife up close - primates

Primates are - to European tastes at least - very very exotic creatures. South Africa has three large primates, the Vervet Monkey, the Samango Monkey, and the Chacma Baboon. This post doesnt really fit with the rules of the "Wildlife up close" digiscoping series, but I will put it in there because it is somehow related.

Young Vervet Monkey

Samango Monkeys

Young Chacma Baboon drinking at sunset

Adult male Chacma Baboon

If you have not seen any of the "Wildlife up close" digiscoping series, then here is a bit of an intro (from the first Cape Buffalo post):
So one of the great things about digiscoping is that one has a huge focal length to play with, so one can really get up close and personal with some pretty impressive creatures. In my time in Southern Africa, I was able to get a whole pile of close-up macro-style images of a variety of wildlife.
What I would like to do is to create a collection of the best "Wildlife up close" images but I would like you to help me out. Each post will feature a different species of African wildlife and I would like to vote for your favorite (or against your least favorite).

Please vote for your favorite, and at the end of the series, I will randomly choose a winner from each post in the series and send them the original full-sized image they chose.

Happy voting and good luck!

Dale Forbes

Wildlife up close - zebra

there is so much about the burchell's zebra that just says "Africa".

So, getting back to the "Wildlife up close" digiscoping series, I have a few shots of some zebras taken near Satara camp in Kruger National Park. Winter time is the dry season in the park, and the majority of the zebras and wildebeest (gnus) move up to the Satara area because of its "sweet veld". It is not that the grass is in any way sweeter than in "sourveld", it is just that sourveld areas have a higher average rainfall (usually more than about 600mm per year). This relatively higher rainfall tends to leach the nutrients out of the soils, so although the vegetation grows really well in these areas in the wet, growing season (summer), the nutritional value of the grasses in these areas is in winter very low.

In sweetveld, the lower average annual rainfall (usually less than 450mm)

So what this means for mobile grazers like zebra and wildebeest is that it is best to be in the sweetveld when there is a food crunch, and best to be in the productive sourveld in the growing season.

Here is a happy-snappy tourist shot of some zebras:

(this photo does not count for voting)

If you have not seen any of the "Wildlife up close" digiscoping series, then here is a bit of an intro (from the first Cape Buffalo post):
So one of the great things about digiscoping is that one has a huge focal length to play with, so one can really get up close and personal with some pretty impressive creatures. In my time in Southern Africa, I was able to get a whole pile of close-up macro-style images of a variety of wildlife.
What I would like to do is to create a collection of the best "Wildlife up close" images but I would like you to help me out. Each post will feature a different species of African wildlife and I would like to vote for your favorite (or against your least favorite).

Please vote for your favorite, and at the end of the series, I will randomly choose a winner from each post in the series and send them the original full-sized image they chose.

Happy voting and good luck!

Dale Forbes

Wildlife up close - lion

the lion

need I say more.

it is one of those creatures completely bound up in our imagination - with images of power, and grace, and fear...

1. the distinctive black behind the ears

2. normally hidden, the claws come out to control their prey (in this case a wildebeest)

3. eye reflecting the car we are hiding in, trying not to get eaten. it gives you an impression of just how far away we are and how big a pseudo-telephoto lens that digiscoping kit is

4. a scratch

5. lions sleep a good 23.5hrs a day. I dare say, many a safari visitor to Africa has only seen something like this - a single lazy paw up in the air, body hidden in the grass. lazy creatures.

6. yummy

Please vote for your favorite, and at the end of the series, I will randomly choose a winner from each post in the series and send them the original full-sized image they chose.

Happy voting and good luck!

Dale Forbes

Wildlife up close - elephant

The african elephant Loxodonta africana is truly an impressive being - their power, their size, their majesty is indescribable.

And yet they are at the heart of a burning management and ecology question that says alot about how we see ourselves and our relationship with the earth. Have you read the blog post on elephants and their management in kruger national park?

This whole series of shots is of a young elephant that stuck right up against his mother's side. The light was so good that I could not help taking a whole pile of photos of him.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

Please vote for your favorite, and at the end of the series, I will randomly choose a winner from each post in the series and send them the original full-sized image they chose.

Happy voting and good luck!

Dale Forbes

Wildlife up close - Rhino

So the second species in the "Wildlife up close" series is the White Rhino Ceratotherium simum - a species that just a few decades ago was reduced to just a few hundred individuals in ONE game park in northern KwaZulu-Natal: now called the Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park.

Now, thanks to concerted conservation efforts, the species is doing really well in South Africa. Hluhluwe-Imfolozi is a game park that is very close to my heart and somewhere where I have spent a good deal of time on foot; in touch with the land.

The images I have chosen include two of the ears - something that really characterizes the species and sets it apart from the black rhino Diceros bicornis.

two photos of the same white rhino taken three weeks apart in the same area of Kruger National Park (Berg en Dal camp)

The hind quarters are also so characteristic of the species. but not that photographically wowing. and rather hard to get a decent shot of. this is my favorite of the bum shots.

this is not really a close up, but I have included it because it is still not a classic wildlife photo - no faces. no classic poses. just chopped off bodies and bums ;-)

Here is a photo of the same youngster in different light and in a classic pose.

you can't vote for this photo

Please vote for your favorite, and at the end of the series, I will randomly choose a winner from each post in the series and send them the original full-sized image they chose.

Happy voting and good luck!

Dale Forbes

Wildlife up close - Cape Buffalo

Hello everyone,

So one of the great things about digiscoping is that one has a huge focal length to play with, so one can really get up close and personal with some pretty impressive creatures. In my time in Southern Africa, I was able to get a whole pile of close-up macro-style images of a variety of wildlife.

What I would like to do is to create a collection of the best "Wildlife up close" images but I would like you to help me out. Each post will feature a different species of African wildlife and I would like to vote for your favorite (or against your least favorite).

The first creature is the Cape Buffalo. It might look like a cow, but this beast has a real temper and a nasty streak. There is good reason why it is one of the five most dangerous animals to hunt in Africa (hence the term "the big five")

All photos digiscoped using a Swarovski Optik STM80HD scope, new 25-50x Wide eyepiece, a Swarovski Optik UCA digiscoping adapter, and a Canon EOS 1000D.

Now what I was trying to do with each animal in the series is to somehow only photograph a very small section of the animal, but yet still capture something of the essence of the animal. All images are full sized and uncropped - if you would suggest a particular cropping then go for it!

THIS PHOTO DOES NOT COUNT FOR THE VOTE
but I thought I would include it to give you a better idea of what they look like from farther away.

Please vote for your favorite, and at the end of the series, I will randomly choose a winner from each post in the series and send them the original full-sized image they chose.

Happy voting and good luck!
Dale Forbes