Thursday, 15 March 2012

Hluluwe - Imfolozi Park, 14 March 2012

Went to Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park yesterday.

Started off slowly but had an awesome starting sighting.

We saw this Burchell's Coucal soon after going through the gate right next to the road, great sighting!

Thereafter we saw this African Harrier-Hawk flying straight towards us and landing in a tree next to us.
You can really see the yellow around the eye which is a key id feature of this bird. Was really awesome!

We stopped at a tree because there were jumping around in the tree and our instructor said something is wrong cause the birds were going mad, later we found out it was called mobbing, and then we spotted a African Rock Python in the tree which is what the birds were going mad for. Didn't get a picture unfortunately. 

Just before getting to the one river we came across a elephant which was awesome. It was a lone bull just eating checking us out. Was awesome!
Great sighting of the elephant, one of my favourite animals. You will find out which are also when I bring them up when I see them.

Saw some great game like impala, zebra, nyala, wildebees and giraffe.

Saw this White Rhino marking his territory by scratching his dung in his midden, obviously the dominant make in the area.
You can see his midden under his back feet. They will have a couple of these in their territory. You can see the square-lip of the White Rhino clearly in this photo.

On the way back, heading toward the gate to leave we were driving and some guys saw guineafowl running across the road but no one saw the hyena walking behind the guineafowl. So there there was a Spotted Hyena walking away from us. Was amazing!
Looking back at us in the road. 
After this photo the hyena went to the grass next to the road and did something called anal pasting which is how they mark their territory. Had never seen that before so was amazed! 

We thought the day was done but then someone we passed told us about some lions nearby so we decided to check it out.
And there were 3 sub-adult Lions( 1 male and 2 females)chilling in the grass sleeping.
This was 1 of the 2 females lying down eyeing us out.
This was the other female eyeing us out too. There was a male bu the was hidden behind a bush so couldn't get a photo. These lions were the last part of the day but the made a great ending to a great day.

All in all it was a amazing day ending extremely well with the Spotted Hyena and the 3 Lions. Great day in the bush with great people.

Till next time

No comments:

Post a Comment