This is the last post from my recent trip with Coetzer Nature Photography (CNP) in mid-March on the Chobe River. This post shows a selection of Kingfishers which we photographed along the Chobe River.

“We are perishing for want of wonder, not for want of wonders.”

― G.K. Chesterton

Kingfishers are a group of brightly coloured, small to medium-sized birds. There are about 90 species of Kingfisher, worldwide. They all have large heads, sharp, pointed and long beaks, short and wide wings, short legs, and stubby tails. Kingfishers nest in burrows, which are usually tunnelled into the natural river banks. In Africa, the smallest species is the African Dwarf Kingfisher, weighing in at just over 10 grams and the largest is the Giant Kingfisher, which weighs in at around  350 grams.

Civilization no longer needs to open up wilderness; it needs wilderness to help open up the still largely unexplored human mind.

- David Rains Wallace

The main focus of this post is to show you some images of Kingfishers taken along the Chobe river from CNP’s exceptional floating photographic platform. There are some features about Kingfishers which are I think are remarkable and want to share with you. I discuss these features at the end of this post.

Chobe’s Kingfishers

We start with the smallest and work up in size. We did not see any Pygmy Kingfishers, which are identified by their very small size and the mauve ear coverts. These little gems are usually found in woodland areas where they hunt for insects. These midgets are uncommon. The African Pygmy Kingfisher is approximately 12–13 cm in length. It is a very small Kingfisher with rufous underparts and a blue back extending down to the tail. The dark blue crown of the adult separates it from the African Dwarf Kingfisher. The smaller size and mauve wash on the ear coverts distinguish it from the similar Malachite Kingfisher.

Much more common is the Malachite Kingfisher. These minute Kingfishers sparkle in the sunlight. They are excellent fishermen and usually hunt from a reed or branch overhanging the water. They fly at great speed between perches and dive into the water blindingly fast without hurting themselves. We usually see them along the reed beds of the island which splits the river just upstream of the lodges, especially on that part of the river as you return to the lodges passed the Namibian stilt village.

These Kingfishers are only slightly larger than the Pygmy Kingfisher but are conspicuous because of their gem-like vibrant royal-blue coloured back and nape feathers.

We were fortunate to see Grey-headed Kingfishers on two occasions. These elegant little Kingfishers are not often seen along the river as they are insectivores which feed in the woodland areas much like the Pygmy Kingfishers.

The Brown-hooded Kingfisher is about 20% larger than the Grey-headed Kingfisher. It is commonly found along the Chobe river. It is also mainly an insectivore but will occasionally catch fish.

We did not see any Striped Kingfishers although they are resident along the river. They are slightly smaller than the Brown-hooded Kingfisher and have striped breast feathers and a dual-coloured bill, black upper mandible and red lower mandible.

We did not get to see any Half-collared Kingfishers either but there are  two pairs which frequent the branches and reeds overhanging  the river around the Chobe Safari lodge.

The Woodland Kingfisher has stunning cobalt blue back, tail and primary wing feathers. The male and female look the same. Their trilling call is ubiquitous in the woodland areas along the Chobe river. These are also insectivores. 

The Mangrove Kingfisher superficially looks like the Woodland but is only found in the mangrove swamps along the coats and does not have the same black eye strip and its head and neck is greyer. 

The Pied Kingfishers were very successful hunters on the river. The male and female have similar colouring but there breast patterns are different. The female has black bra cups and the male a black waistcoat.

One of the things which always surprises me is how these Kingfishers manage to swallow such large prey without choking.

The Giant and Half-collared Kingfishers are perch hunters, though the Giant is known to hover but not for long and not without a reasonable headwind. The only Kingfisher which regularly hovers is the Pied. You will notice that the Pied Kingfisher keeps its head absolutely still while hovering to establish pin-point accuracy before diving. Pied Kingfishers usually dive with the sun behind them making it more difficult for their prey so see them properly. I have never been close or quick enough to see it, but Trevor Carnaby’s “Beat about the Bush – birds” indicates that Kingfishers keep their eyes open during the dive. The long bill acts like a rifle sight and the Kingfisher has a unique eye structure to accommodate the shock wave when entering the water. Their nictitating membrane covers their eyeballs like built-in goggles. Once in the water the Kingfisher snatches it quarry in its bill rather than stabbing it.

The Giant Kingfisher is frequently seen along the Chobe river during summer. The male and female both have similar colouring but their patterning is different. The male has a russet-brown chest and the female a russet-brown belly. These Kingfishers are noticeably larger than the others but just as striking in colouration as the smaller Kingfishers, with their white, black and russet-browns. They do not have the blues seen in the smaller Kingfishers.. 

We did not get close enough to get great shots of Giant Kingfishers during our five days on the Chobe river but they are much more active in the summer months .

The earth has music for those who listen.

- William Shakespeare

Some remarkable adaptations

Kingfishers are some of the most brightly coloured birds along the river alongside the bee-eaters. These are stunningly adorned birds, but these remarkable birds also have some of the most fascinating natural adaptions.

Hunting: As their name suggests they are associated with hunting and eating fish. While some species specialise in catching fish, many feed on insects, crabs, small reptiles and worms. Kingfishers catch their prey between their mandibles rather than harpoon their prey. Once they have caught their prey they usually fly to a perch and beat it to death against the branch or rock. This helps break up insect coats, small fish bones, and invertebrate exoskeletons.

Most Kingfishers hunt from a perch and are highly territorial.

Eyesight: According to the British Journal of Opthalmology, evolution has resulted in specialised adaptations to fit specialised niches. Unlike humans, many avian predators, including Kingfishers have two foveae (or centers of focus) in each eye, and these two foveae enable them see both forwards and to the side at the same time. The position of the nasal monocular fovea tends to be fairly constant in all bifoveate birds, but the temporal fovea is different. The two foveae in kingfishers have very large angles of separation which measure up to 52° compared to 15° in Eagles and Kites. This anatomical separation means that the binocular foveae are sighted along the beak much like laser sighting of a gun. The deep fovea has a line of sight that points forwards and about 45 degrees to the left or right of the head axis, and the shallow fovea has a line of sight that points forward but only covers about 15 degrees to the left or right. Of the two centers of focus, the deep fovea has the higher acuity.

Presumably, a Kingfisher will sight its prey with the higher acuity nasal monocular fovea. As the bird drops towards its prey, acuity becomes less critical but the ability to see prey movement, especially in the three dimensional world of water, becomes paramount. The infula or visual streak which connects the two foveae allows the image to swing temporally as the bird drops onto the prey, and if the prey moves, the temporal fovea senses the difference in position and the Kingfisher can adjust accordingly. Their twin fovea allow them to very accurately judge the distance to a prey item by turning their head slightly.

Apart from the unusual configuration of their twin fovae, Kingfishers, as do all birds, have coloured oil droplets located in the inner segments of retinal cones.  Birds have coloured oil droplets with four to five different types of visual pigment. These coloured oil droplets function as long-pass filters which absorb photons below a specific wavelength. Current evidence suggests that oil droplets not only enhance colour vision, but also reduce chromatic aberration and glare.

Many avian species that must look through water for their prey, such as Kingfishers, have a preponderance of red oil droplets. The reason red droplets predominate is not understood, but it is thought that the droplets may help with the glare or the dispersion of light from particulate matter in the water.

Hovering: When hovering 12–15 metres above their prey, Pied Kingfishers have an unusual problem. The simultaneous movement of the fish and of the bird as it hovers would normally create a neurological nightmare. The solution produces a dramatic real life aerial dance for those who have witnessed it. The Pied Kingfisher is the only species that is mainly pelagic, and during its hover before the plunge-dive it keeps its head rock steady relative to the movements of wing and body. Curiously, the depth of the prey will vary the form of the plunge-dive. The deeper the prey, the steeper the dive angle (with achieved speed as high as 4.5 m/s), perhaps to reduce the effects of refraction on the apparent position of the prey.

In order to remain in sync with the fish’s exact co-ordinates the Kingfisher must keep its head almost entirely motionless, allowing the wings and counterbalancing tail do all the work. When ready the Kingfisher strikes, performing a controlled vertical dive to ensure its dart-like bill is the first thing to enter the water. Though sharp and streamlined, it still generates shockwaves through the water that can startle a fish, so speed is of the essence. The difference between the Kingfisher catching its prize or not can come down to a matter of a mere 50th of a second! If the fish reacts within that time, it is likely to dart out of harm’s way and the hunter will go hungry.

Environmental conditions affect which type of fishing behaviour birds use. In windier conditions, the Pied will use hover-plunge most of the time and perch-plunge  when conditions are calm and where there are available perches.

Long beaks: Kingfishers’  long, dagger-like bills are functionally more like rifle sights than harpoons. The shape of the Kingfisher’s beak is perfectly adapted for penetrating the water at high speed without creating a massive turbulence which would reduce the hunting success rate.  They prefer to hunt over still or slow moving water using a favourite perch to scan the shallows for small fish. They rely on their eyesight to help them accurately target a fish, then dive beneath the surface to catch it.

The Grey-headed, Mangrove Malachite and Pygmy Kingfishers have red beaks, while the Half-collared, Pied and Giant Kingfishers have black beaks. The Woodland and Striped Kingfishers have a black upper mandible and red lower mandible. I am still trying to find out the reason for these colouration differences. My initial thoughts are the aquatic Kingfishers have the black bills to reduce glare, but I am not sure.

Feet: While their hunting adaptations are amazing, the Kingfisher’s strangest adaptation is used for digging its nest burrow in a sandy embankment.  Kingfishers use the beaks are their primary digging instruments but their inner two toes are fused together, resulting in what appears be a single flattened toe, which helps with the scrapping of dirt out of the tunnel. This toe characteristic is called syndactyly. It is uncommon and only shared with kangaroos, wallabies, opossums, koalas and wombats.

Biomimicry: After several failed attempts to sufficiently mitigate the noise of high-speed trains, the designers took a cue from nature. Noting that the usual shape of the Kingfisher’s head, large with a long, narrow bill, which enabled it to dive from the air into the water with minimal splashing. The designers ran a series of wind tunnel tests, ultimately concluding that the design of the kingfisher’s bill was ideal for transitioning from air to water, and could also be used for reducing the air friction and sonic boom caused by speeding trains moving into and out of tunnels. Mimicking the design of the Kingfisher for the nose cone of future train engines, the Shinkansen trains have successfully overcome the problem of compliance with Japan’s strict noise pollution standards.  By looking at the wonders of nature, which is always all around us, the bullet train designers were able to take the lessons they had learned and solve an important problem. It makes you wonder what other problems have answers to be found in nature, right in front of our eyes and just waiting to be discovered.

Preen oil: Like ducks and other waterbirds, the feathers of a Kingfisher are smeared with a special preen oil that helps to keep them waterproof when diving into the water. After any activity which might make feathers dirty, like digging a nest burrow in a sandy bank, they always take a quick bath to keep their feathers in good condition.

As you can see there is much more to our feather fishers than meets the eye.

The voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.

- Marcel Proust

Seek to understand nature, marvel at its interconnectedness and then let it be

Have fun

Mike

Excuse the play on words in the title. No sane person would wade in the Chobe river. It is seething with Nile Crocodiles, some of which are ‘shudderingly’ massive. At first thought you might regard waders as a common and a somewhat boring group of birds. You could not be more wrong.

“To see a World in a Grain of Sand
  And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
  Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
  And Eternity in an hour.”

― William Blake, Auguries of Innocence

Waders are ubiquitous along the Chobe river. This group includes Storks, Flamingoes, Cranes, Egrets, Spoonbills, Openbills, Sandpipers, Rails, Gallinules, Ibises, Avocets, Herons and Hamerkops. You will be astounded at the complexity in their flight, their behaviour, their different methods of hunting and how they all work together along the river. Since this post is about the Chobe river, I have excluded any discussion on seashore waders.

For starters, waders have a number of distinctive characteristics:

• Long legs: All wading birds have long legs and long agile toes.
• Long bill:  Most waders have long bills and many have specialised bill shapes for specific feeding techniques.
• Long neck: Many have long, agile necks which can extend significantly when attacking prey.
• Elaborate plumage: Many develop elaborate plumes during breeding season especially Herons, Egrets and Cranes. Larger waders are conspicuously coloured while small waders usually have good camouflage.

Waders also have an number of common distinguishable behavioral traits:

• Foraging: Many waders can stand motionless for long periods while hunting waiting for prey to come within striking distance. Their attack mode is often achieved by extending their necks at high speed and stabbing their prey.
• Communities: Many waders rest at night in communal  roosts and move around in mixed flocks.
• Diurnal: Most waders are diurnal, meaning they are active during the day. Some are crepuscular being most active at twilight and others like Night Herons are noctural.
• Flight: Most waders fly with their long legs extended back passed their tail feathers. Some waders with especially long necks either extend or contract their necks in flight. Herons and Egrets tend to retract their necks while Storks and Cranes extend their necks during flight. It is thought that they do this for axial balance in flight. Herons and Egrets retract their necks to achieve balance as their centre of gravity which is located at or close to the shoulder joint which articulates with the axial skeleton. Herons and Egrets are much lighter and have less body mass behind the wing. These waders are relative light-weights for such tall, long-legged birds compared to Storks and Cranes.  They  vary the length of their neck in flight so the mass of their heads and bill to balance the weight of their long legs and body at their centre of gravity.

“It doesn’t stop being magic just because you know how it works.”

― Terry Pratchett The wee free men

I have arranged the wader images in this post from smallest to largest birds.

Eleven Sandpipers are found in southern Africa, with seven being coastal birds and four being found mostly inland. All four inlanders are summer visitors and palearctic migrants. Of the inlanders, the Common, Curlew and Wood Sandpipers are most widely dispersed and most frequently seen. The Green Sandpiper is usually found in Zimbabwe and the eastern parts of Botswana and the Limpopo province in South Africa. The next two images are of a Common Sandpiper which has a diagnostic white pectoral region showing above its folded wing. This little bird could be mistaken for a Wood Sandpiper but it does not have a distinctive white eyebrow of the Wood Sandpiper.

The Sandpiper has a short bill for probing  the mud and sand along the water’s edge. It is not a stalker and stabber like Herons and Egrets.

I am always awed by the fact that these small ( 20cm ) birds can not only fly to Europe and back but can accurately navigate that long journey each year.

“In my travels I found no answers, only wonders.”

 ― Marty Rubin

Of the rail family, I have only ever seen Black Crakes and Allen’s Gallinules along the Chobe River. This trip we were fortunate to see a pair of Allen’s Gallinule adults with two chicks. The adults are exquisitely coloured birds. Their camouflage from above must be excellent given their greeny-brown back and wing feathers which must blend in well in the reeds.

In nature there is a reason for everything. On the boat, we wondered what the reason was for  young Gallinules having black and white striped beaks. None of us knew. The adults have large red feet which enable them to easily traverse the reeds.

Many Cattle Egrets can be found along the Chobe river feeding on insects disturbed by foraging Elephant and Buffalo or on insects attracted by Hippos. The pinky-beige feathers on its crown, neck and back are the Cattle Egret’s breeding plumage. Egrets, similar to Herons and Bitterns and even Parrots and pigeons,  have specialised feathers which produce ‘powder down’. The ends of their feathers fray creating a powder which is spread during preening and is thought to improve the preening and waterproofing of the bird’s feathers.

We found  a small group of Black-crowned Night-Herons down near Serondela. These birds are crepuscular and noctural so you are only likely to see them in the late afternoon when they become more active. For the rest of the day they sit in deep shade, probably sleeping. Night Herons,  just like Green-backed Herons, mainly operate during the late afternoon and at night.

This Green-backed Heron was hunting from a low branch hanging over the water near Serondela. It is astounding how long they can stretch to attack their prey. They are also very wary and do not let you get too close so that 600mm lens is a necessity. The Green-backed Heron has been known to bait it prey with insects

Squacco Herons are ubiquitous along the Chobe river. They operate along the river’s shoreline, on rafts of water-lily pads and in the reeds.

These small but beautiful Herons tend to fly with their necks retracted and are mainly daytime hunters, catching small fish and insects. The Squacco, and the seldom seen Rufuous-bellied, Heron sway their heads from side to side. It has been suggested that the purpose of this swaying may be to disturb prey, as well as to adjust for the slight parallax, helping the Egret to visually localize the prey. You will also see Little Egrets doing the same thing.

One of the most striking of the small Herons is the Black Heron which was previously called the Black Egret. It has dark charcoal-grey feathers and its bright yellow feet give it the appearance of having stepped in some wet yellow road-marking paint.

What makes this bird unique apart from its stunning colouring is its hunting technique. It uses its wings as an umbrella. It is thought that fish and frogs swim into the shaded area under the umbrella formation of the wings associating the shaded area with protection.

The Little Egret is identified by its size. It is pure white and has black legs and yellow feet. It also looks like it has walked in a puddle of wet yellow road-marking paint. These are stealthy hunters which operate along the river’s edge, preying on small fish, frogs and insects.

A yellow-billed Egret flew passed us but kept a weary eye on us.

This Yellow-billed Egret was carrying a small frog its bill, an opportunity which had not gone unnoticed by a following Carmine Bee-eater.

“We can never sneer at the stars, mock the dawn, or scoff at the totality of being.”

― Abraham Joshua Heschel

You can find four types of Ibis in southern Africa, the Bald-headed, Glossy, Hadeda and Sacred ibis. All but the Sacred Ibis are commonly found in the northern and eastern regions of southern Africa. The Bald-headed Ibis is usually only found in the Kwa-Zulu Natal and Mpumalanga provinces of South Africa. Up close, the Sacred ibis looks quite prehistoric. The Ibis, and particularly the Sacred Ibis,  was venerated and often mummified by Ancient Egyptians as a symbol of their god, Thoth -the God of Knowledge, Hieroglyphs and Wisdom.

This bird is usually silent unlike its Hadeda cousin, which can be politely termed raucous. It feeds on fish, frogs, small mammals, reptiles, insects and smaller birds. It also uses its bill to probe the sand and mud for invertebrates such as earthworms. During this trip I saw more frogs caught than I have ever seen on any other trip on the Chobe river. The next two images show a Sacred Ibis which had caught a large frog and was having quite a time subduing it. Eventually the Sacred Ibis managed to kill the frog and swallow it whole, head first.

The next image shows the Scared Ibis’s crop bulging with the frog it has just swallowed.

Although the Sacred Ibis is an accomplished forager, it is not adverse to a bit of stealing. Interestingly, we saw the Sacred Ibis, Little Egret and Black Heron all working in concert along the river’s edge The Black Heron was the smallest, so had to take special care to hang on to the food it found.

The Great Egret is much larger than the Yellow-billed being almost a metre in height, a third larger than the Yellow-billed Egret. Apart from their larger size, they have a much deeper gape which extends to just behind the eye and their legs are all black. Their beaks can be green in the case of a juvenile, or yellow when non-breeding but is black when breeding.

The Openbill Stork is usually only found in the northern parts of Namibia, Botswana, South Africa and Mozambique and throughout Zimbabwe. We only saw the occasional Openbill this trip but at other times the sky has been filled with thousands of these Storks – a really impressive sight. We saw no Yellow-billed Storks. The Openbills are medium sized waders characterized by their large bills, with mandibles which do not meet except at the tip. The upper mandible is straight but the lower one has an downward  facing  curve in it. 

This stork feeds mainly on freshwater mussels and snails.

The Openbill detects the snail by sight and by touch, catching it between its mandibles. It then pushes its lower mandible’s tip into the shell, in order to remove the operculum and cut the strong muscle. Finally, it extracts the molluscs while holding the shell with the upper mandible tip against the ground.

You are likely to see Saddle-billed Storks along the river’s edge. They are usually hunting for fish, frogs and insects. This male Saddle-bill, distinguished by its black eye and yellow wattle under its chin, was disturbed by us  and decided to move to a quieter place without so many ‘big clicking eyes’. The female Saddle-bill has a yellow eye ring and no yellow wattle under her chin.

I hope you enjoyed wandering along the Chobe with waders, realising there is much more to this group of birds than is commonly understood.

 LESSONS FROM NATURE

I learnt from the sun
That light has to be spread,
The breeze taught me
How to be cool all the time.
The trees inspired me to be colossal in giving.
As I discovered serenity from water
And the vacuum made me understand
How to live with nothing around.
The earth taught me how to nurture
The very people who trampled it.
Fire made me realize the importance
Of being pure and yet involving.
I learnt from space the virtue of
Being BIG and yet unassuming .
For nature had all virtues a man needs to learn
In all its elements.

– Mahesh Jambunathan

Seek to understand nature, marvel at its interconnectedness and then let it be

Have fun

Mike

This is the fifth post from my recent trip with CNP to the Chobe river. This trip has become an annual pilgrimage.

“And this, our life exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in running brooks, sermons in stones and good in everything.

One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.”

 – William Shakespeare

No trip to the Chobe would be complete without a few images of the ubiquitous Fish-Eagle. The abundance of food dictates that the Chobe river area attracts many raptors. We also usually see a few African Harrier -Hawks, African Hawk-Eagles, Eagles, Goshawks and a number of Vulture species.  This trip we did not see any Goshawks, Hawk-Eagles or Vultures close up,  but we were fortunate enough to see a Western Banded Snake-Eagle on two occasions thanks to the eagle eyes of birders, Russell Warren and Stefan Swanepoel, on our boat.

The Fish-Eagle is a large, distinctive raptor. The female is bigger than the male and has a wingspan of about 2.4 m, almost 20% longer than the male. Her body is around 65cm in height.  The adult has very distinctive colouring with a white head, neck and chest and a chestnut-brown belly and leg feathers. It has large, powerful, wide black wings. This bird’s feathers have a distinctive lustre. Its face is yellow and featherless and it has a yellow cere and black beak.

The Fish-Eagle, as its name suggests, is predominantly a fish hunter. Although this species mainly feeds on fish, it is an opportunistic hunter which is known to take a wider variety of prey. Waterbirds make up 30% of its diet. It also steals food from a wide range of predators and is known to harass Pel’s Fishing-Owl, Storks and Herons for their food. Lou and Veronica Coetzer have some wonderful images of a Fish -Eagle snatching a White-faced Whistling Duck and another grabbing a Banded Mongoose. Fish Eagles are also known to prey on Lesser Flamingos where the supply is plentiful.

The Fish-Eagle hunts from a perch. Once prey is sighted, it launches from its perch, swoops low over the water, and at the critical moment pushes both feet forward to seize its target with its powerful talons. Its feet have rough soles which combined with their powerful talons enabling this Eagle to grasp slippery aquatic prey. Small fish are lifted up into a tree and eaten up on a branch but larger catches are dragged through the water to the shoreline. The Fish-Eagle uses its wings as paddles to propel itself through the water to the bank while holding onto its large prey with its talons.  It is estimated that only one in seven or eight fishing attempts are successful. The African Fish-Eagle rarely spends more than a quarter of an hour per day actively hunting but when it does the action is dramatic.

With its distinctive plumage and evocative cry, the African Fish-Eagle is probably the most recognised bird of prey in Africa. Perched majestically on a dead stump sticking out of the river or in a high branch of a tree overlooking the water, the contrast between the white head, neck, chest and tail, and the chestnut belly, and the black wings, is unmistakable.

Much less striking is the almost scruffy appearance of the immature African Fish-Eagle, with its generally dark-brown  with white mottled plumage. After the first year, the plumage begins to resemble that of the adult, but will take at least four to five years and numerous moults to reach full maturity. On occasion, from a distance, I have mistaken a juvenile Fish-Eagle for an Osprey, but the Osprey has a white chest and belly and a black eye stripe. Ospreys are not often seen along the Chobe river.

Adult African Fish-Eagles are normally seen in pairs, but on large productive lakes and rivers, nests and roosts can be only a few hundred metres apart, and many birds can be found together in one area, as can be seen in the Okavango. The clear, ringing call “weee-ah hyo-hyo-hyo”, is made with the head thrown back. This must be one of the most evocative sounds along African rivers and lake shorelines. The male has a higher pitched call than the female.

Calling and dueting, whilst perched or soaring, is an integral part of the breeding display. At times it is combined with dramatic aerial dives and falls, with pairs interlocking talons in mid-air. I have seen the calling while perched together and I have seen them calling with their heads flung back way up in the sky with massive cumulus clouds as their backdrop, but I have never seen their aerial displays.

“Knowledge can be communicated, but not wisdom. One can find it, live it and be fortified by it, do wonders through it, but one cannot communicate and teach it.”

 – Hermann Hesse

We regularly see African Harrier-Hawks patrolling the section of the river between the Kasane lodges upstream to the Chobe Game Lodge. Not only have these avian hunters got striking colouring but they have unique legs and are probably the birds most hated by the other birds along the river because they are adept nest raiders.

The African Harrier-Hawk, previously known as a Gymnogene, is a medium-sized raptor, roughly the size of a Fish-Eagle but more slender in build. Its upper parts, head and breast are pale grey. Its belly is finely barred with black and white feathers. It has broad pale grey wings, where its primaries are fringed with a broad black band, and it has black spots on the wing coverts. It has a broad white band across its black tail.

It also has a bare facial patch which is variable in colour, which is usually seen as bright yellow. When it calls near the nest, this patch becomes pink, and during display, face becomes various shades of orange to almost red. Its eyes are dark brown. It has a hooked short black beak. Its feet and legs are yellow, but uniquely they are double-jointed and its feet are small. This enables this avian hunter to be surprisingly dexterous.

An unusual trait of this species is its double-jointed knees, which enable it to reach into otherwise inaccessible holes and cracks for prey. The African Harrier-Hawk is omnivorous, eating the fruit as well as hunting small vertebrates. It has the ability to climb, using wings as well as feet. It is known to raid the nests of cavity-nesters such as Pygmy Geese, Oxpeckers, Barbets and Wood-Hoopoes for their fledglings.

You can see the Brown, Black-chested and Western Banded Snake-Eagles along the Chobe. I have seen a Black-chested Snake-Eagle but it was not close enough to photograph. I have been on the river  quite a few times with CNP but have never seen a Western Banded Snake-Eagle. Snake-Eagles have a distinctive shaped head and diet compared to Hawk-Eagles and Eagles. The only other southern Africa raptors who regularly eat snakes are Bateleurs and Secretary Birds.

““Here and there awareness is growing that man, far from being the overlord of all creation, is himself part of nature, subject to the same cosmic forces that control all other life. Man’s future welfare and probably even his survival depend upon his learning to live in harmony, rather than in combat, with these forces.”

 -Rachel Carson

The  Snake-Eagles have a distinctive wide head with large piercingly  eyes. The Brown and Black-chested Snake-Eagles have menacing large yellow eyes while the Southern and Western Banded Snake-Eagles have light-yellow to whitish irises.  Snake-Eagles are stocky and aggressive hunters. The Southern and Western Banded Snake-eagles are much more secretive than their Black Chested and Brown cousins, remaining relatively hidden in tree canopies of heavy woodland and forest areas .

The Western Banded Snake Eagle is a greyish brown, as is the Southern Banded Snake-Eagle but the latter has conspicuous brown and white barring on its belly and top of its legs. The Western Banded has a short black tail, with broad white centre band and a fine white terminal band. It’s beak is black with deep yellow cere.  It is found in northern Botswana and along the northern border of Zimbabwe. The Southern-Banded is found mainly in Mozambique.

Snake-Eagles are specialist snake hunters but also supplement their diet with small reptiles. Their tarsi are covered in thick scales which protect them from snake bites. They are not immune to the venom but they also have a thick covering of breast and leg feathers which helps protect them from snake bites. They all hunt from a perch but the Southern and Western Banded Snake-Eagles are also known to catch snakes in trees.

Snake-Eagles are thought to be nomadic, so do not breed in the same nest twice, though little is known about the Southern and Western Banded Snake Eagles breeding habits.

We did not see vultures close up and only saw one Marabou Stork late one evening as we were returning to the lodge. This is not the right time of the year for Yellow-billed and Black Kites and we did not see African Hawk Eagles or any of the Goshawks. I can only assume there was so much food around that they did not need to stay close to the river.

Next week I will post a series of images of another type of avian hunter found alongside the river, waders. I hope you enjoyed the trip down the Chobe river looking at a select group of the many raptors which can be seen along the river.

“Without wilderness, we will eventually lose the capacity to understand our country. Our drive, our ruggedness, our unquenchable optimism and zeal and elan go back to the challenges of the untrammeled wilderness.

If we lose wilderness, we lose forever the knowledge of what was and what it might, with understanding and loving husbandry, yet become.

These are islands in time, with nothing to date them on the calendar of mankind. In these areas it is as though a person were looking backward into the ages and forward into untold years. Here are bits of eternity, which have a preciousness beyond all accounting.”

 – Harvey Broome

Co-founder, The Wilderness Society

Seek to understand nature, marvel at its interconnectedness and then let it be

Have fun

Mike

This is the fourth post from our recent Chobe trip with Coetzer Nature Photography (CNP). The first post showed the Jacana’s, the second described some of the experiences we had with the  ‘river horses”. The third was a little calmer after the aggression shown (towards each other) by the hippos and showed the moods of the Chobe river at dawn and dusk.

This fourth post aims to show you a small selection of the beautifully coloured avian gems which you can see along the river. The river has a tremendous wealth of avian life. This post purposefully excludes raptors and waders which will be the focus of two further posts.

For man, as for flower and beast and bird, the supreme triumph is to be most vividly, most perfectly alive.

D. H Lawrence

One unexpected treasure was this sighting of a Brown-throated Weaver. It is uncommon and usually only found in the northern Botswana rivers, and in eastern Mozambique and Kwa-Zulu Natal. This is breeding season so the brown neck is vividly coloured. This is the only weaver I have seen along the Chobe even though most of the weavers are found in northern Botswana. Each weaver has a distinctive shaped nest. The Brown-throated tends to build its nest on reeds and papyrus leaves. The main chamber of the nest looks like that of a masked weaver but without the tunnel entrance. I have only seen individual Brown-headed Weavers but they are supposed to be sociable like so many of the weavers which build their nests in colonies.

You will find three species of Coucal along the Chobe river, the White-browed, Senegal and Coppery-tailed. We saw a White-browed but it was fleeting and we could not get a worthwhile image of it. The next image is of a Coppery-tailed Coucal in flight. They have broad wings which enables them to lift themselves out of the thick reeds with relative ease. The long tail helps them to balance in the grass and reeds. Coucals have reversal dimorphism where the females are bigger and more brightly coloured with bigger beaks than the males. They are also thought to be polyandrous, meaning the male looks after the chicks.

It is amazing to see how adept these Coucals are to skulking through the reeds forging for insects, small reptiles and even bird’s eggs and nestlings. Make no mistake these are serious predators.

It is difficult to tell the difference between the Senegal and Coppery-tailed at a glance by colour alone. The Coppery-tailed is materially bigger than the Senegal Coucal. This Coppery-tailed Coucal was taking a meal for its almost fully fledged juvenile.

Surprisingly, we did not see many Red Bishops in the reed beds along the river. I would have expected to see many more Bishops, red and yellow and yellow crowned.

Another gem which can also be seen  along the river is the Pygmy goose. These are the smallest of the geese found in southern Africa. On the CNP boats they have become nicknamed the ‘pocket rockets’ or ‘turbo geese’. The reason being that they take-off from the water like rockets and its takes some skill to capture a pin-sharp image of them in flight, getting the head and tail pin sharp is possible after numerous attempts, but getting the wing tips pin sharp – now that is a step up on the difficulty scale.

I once had a sparrow alight upon my shoulder for a moment, and I felt that I was more distinguished by that circumstance that I should have been by any epaulet I could have worn.

Henry David Thoreau

The male Pygmy Goose has spectacular colouring with a black crown, emerald green neck/nape, white face, yellow bill and ochre breast and side feathers. The female is dimorphic and has a distinctive black eye sash. This time of the year has been coined the ‘Jacana season’, it could just as well have been called the ‘Pygmy geese’ season. Pygmy Geese are true geese in that they nest in holes in trees rather than on the ground like ducks. Geese differ from ducks in that they have a developed hind toe and claws which allows them to perch on branches in trees.

This male’s body and head were pin sharp but even at 1/4000th of a second shutter speed the wing tips  were still not pin sharp.

On our last morning down at Pygmy goose bend, we were waiting for the ‘pocket rockets’ to return to their resting place on a fallen tree trunk. While waiting we heard a small band of ‘cackling widows’ which flew into the tree next to us. These Green Wood-Hoopoes, cackle away sounding quite similar to Arrow-marked Babblers. These Wood-Hoopoes use their long red beaks to find grubs and insects under the bark. The male tends to have a more curved beak but there is no sexual dimorphism. They are though co-operative breeders and tend to move around in family groups.

Chobe is known for its plethora of Bee-eaters. One Bee-eater of two which is not seasonal is the White-fronted, not White-throated as Russell correctly pointed out. The White-throated Bee-eater is found in west and central Africa. It is an exquisitely green, blue and orange coloured with a distinctive black and white striped  head. The Carmine and Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters migrate north during the colder months as the insect activity dies down along the river during winter. Most Bee-eaters move north to warmer climes to improve their insect hunting success.

I have a particular penchant for Carmine Bee-eaters as my life long ‘shamwari’ Mike Condy’s Dad John Condy took us youngsters out to Beatrice about 20 miles south of Salisbury (now Harare) in the Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) to see a colony of Carmine Bee-eaters nesting in a sand bank on the side of the Hunyani River. I  have never forgotten that day. The colours, noise and vibrancy of that colony of Carmines have stayed with me for the last fifty years. I still get a thrill when I see these exquisitely beautiful Bee-eaters.

A Carmine was following this Yellow-billed Egret because it had grasshopper in its beak and ever the opportunist was waiting for the Egret to drop it.

When the boat is moving on the water, the swallows fly around  it and even land on it at times. Flying birds are always a challenge and there is no better practice ( I didn’t say success) is to try and photograph these swallows flying passed the boat. Les Penfold and I tried to capture Wire-tailed Swallows as they flew around and passed the boat while we were moving. I never got a decent pin sharp image. I don’t know whether Les got one. One trick I did learn is that these little beauties like to rest of the reed leaves. 

When the wind is blowing towards the reeds and into our faces, this is the perfect position as the swallows have to fly into the wind and so slow down and then have to steady themselves before they land upwind on a reed. That moment just before landing is the when us amateurs have an opportunity to capture images of these quick little gems.

Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters are highly sociable and are often found flocking with White-fronted Bee-eaters. After the Carmines I think these are the next most exquisitely coloured Bee-eaters. I have only ever seen them on the Chobe River. Bee-eaters never seem to taste their food and can swallow invertebrates. They have two stomachs, the first provides chemical digestion and the second mechanical digestion. Once the digestive process is complete the Bee-eater has powerful contractions to regurgitate the remains of the exoskeleton of the insects it eats. Birds do have a rudimentary tongue and ability to taste to avoid noxious elements to prevent them being poisoned.

Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters have an extremely large range and are long-distance migrants; nesting colonially in sandy banks in the semi-deserts of northern Africa and subtropical Asia, whilst wintering in open woodland or grassland in sub-tropical Africa.

The larger the island of knowledge, the larger the shoreline of wonder.

Huston Smith

Little Bee-eaters are second species of Bee-eater to be a permanent resident along the Chobe. These exquisite midgets are found throughout Botswana, Zimbabwe and the northern part of SA and Mozambique. 

It was late afternoon down at Elephant Ally and this Water Thick-knee was foraging along the water’s edge for insects. These are mainly nocturnal birds so only become active late in the afternoon. Thick-knees are nocturnal as are Owls and Nightjars. You might be interested to know many ducks and geese, coursers and night herons are also active at night, both feeding and moving to feeding grounds. Being active at night negates the need for bright colours, in fact they need camouflage during the day.

The name Thick-knee is misleading as that so-called knee which is enlarged is in fact an ankle. Thick-knees also have no hind toe so cannot perch which is why you will find them standing on the side of the riverbank. Nocturnal birds tend to have loud and not melodious calls for territory and mating purposes.  Thick-knee’s have a haunting call heard most often at night.

“It is not required that we know all of the details about every stretch of the river. Were we to know, it would not be an adventure, and I wonder if there would be much point to the journey.”

Jeffrey T. Anderson

I have included this Allen’s Gallinule in this post rather than the waders because of their superb colouring. The Purple Gallinule is more common than the Allen’s Gallinule but we saw quite a few pairs of Allen’s Gallinules this last trip.

This solitary juvenile Allen’s Gallinule was tucking into what apparently must have been a feast.

This is an image and the first Cuckoo I have seen along there Chobe river. This looks like a African Cuckoo, mainly because of its yellow eye-ring and cere and does not have the  russet collar or orange eye ring and cere of the European Cuckoo.

A new thing I learnt from Russell Warren was that Cuckoos tend to go silent after breeding and before migrating. So when you do not hear the Red-chested and Didericks Cuckoos from March, it does not necessarily mean they have already migrated they may still be around.

We must begin thinking like a river if we are to leave a legacy of beauty and life for future generations.

Laura Gilpin.

At this time of the year you will see localised flocks of Broad-bordered Grass Yellow and Monarch butterflies along the Chobe river bank. They make a very attractive setting for animals and birds. This White-crowned Lapwing was intent on trying to eat as many of these Grass Yellows as it could.

This White-crowned Lapwing caught a Grass Yellow butterfly and was dunking it in the water presumably to swallow it more easily. This Lapwing let go of the Grass Yellow for a split second and it escaped.

The White Crowned Lapwing is found along the Chobe  together with the Red billed Francolin which is also found in this area and no where else. This Red-billed Francolin came down to drink in Elephant Ally but all the baboon activity and the odd bombastic young Elephant made this Francolin very weary.

The Broad-bordered Grass Yellows added an interesting and colourful addition to the scene around this Red-billed Francolin.

Yes, you are seeing double. These two juvenile African Jacanas were perfectly in sync. 

For birders, the Chobe river is a very rewarding destination. If you are a birder and photographer, you will keep returning – a paradise found.

”  I have not yet lost a feeling of wonder, and of delight,

that the delicate motion should reside in all the things around us,

revealing itself only to him who looks for it.”

Edmund Burke

Seek to understand nature, marvel at its interconnectedness and then let it be

Have fun

Mike

After the post about Hippo aggression I thought you might like to see the calmer side of the Chobe river. I have included images from our dawn and and dusk outings. We are usually back at the lodge between 10h00 and 15h00 getting some sustenance, relaxing and editing.

Each morning we would get together around 06h15 for a cup of coffee and a rusk. Of course, all the photographers had their kit loaded on the boat just after 06h00 and were chatting by the time coffee arrived.

Dawn is a time when nothing breathes, the hour of silence.

Everything is transfixed, only the light moves.

Leonora Carrington

We usually pushed off from the jetty at 6h30. The sun was still behind the ridge at the entrance to the park on the east side of the river as we travelled south. The next image shows the peace and tranquility of the river caressed by the early morning’s soft pastel colours. This image was taken just passed the army camp travelling up stream.

One of the advantages of being on the Chobe river at this time of the year is that there was a lot of cloud build up. The next two images were taken down near the first bend where the pump draws water. The shafts of light shining luminescent through clouds were magical. Thanks to Louis Swart for lending me his 14-24mm lens to get the shot.

“I see my light coming shining from the east into the west”

Early in the morning as we entered the Chobe National Park, there were times when the river was sublimely serene. The water could be so still that its surface was mirror-like reflecting the warm pastel colours of the early morning sky. It is times like this when I am in heaven on earth.

‘Silence is a source of great strength’

Lao Tzu

Passing through the first bend, where there are remains of a dilapidated camp under the trees, we often see at least one pair of Pygmy Geese as we travel west passed the island to the open part of the river.

Pygmy geese, or ‘pocket rockets’ as we call them take off without warning and fly very fast challenging photographers’ tracking skills, certainly on the first few days, until you get your eye in. Having said they give no warning, normally the female in the pair takes off first so you need to focus on the male.

It is unusual to see an Elephant drinking first thing in the morning. They usually come down to drink later in the day.

Just before we get to the Chobe Game Lodge there is a open area which gets flooded in the high water season. Often we see Buffalo, Puku and Lechwe in this area.

Travelling further upstream passed the Chobe Game Lodge we get to Elephant Ally on the left hand side.

Beyond Elephant Ally travelling west we have Puku Flats in front of us. We returned to where we saw the dead hippo calf to see if there had been any developments.

The water inlets along the edge of Puku Flats are covered in water lilies and depending on the wind and the direction of the light you can get some gorgeous images. In the next image, the light was in the right direction but the wind was also behind us.

Unknown

The next image was taken in the same inlet along Puku Flats that afternoon looking south-east. Again the wind was blowing from behind us lifting the water lily leaves.

The water around this next water lily looks like a mirror. That is how still parts of the river can be at times.

” The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you. Don’t go back to sleep.”

 – Rumi

This time of the year delivers major cumulus cloud buildup with some enormous upthrusts creating plumes of sun drenched clouds pushing up miles into the sky.

Home time for a small flock of White-faced Whistling Ducks. When I look at this image, I can hear them whistling while flying in formation.

The sun peering through the clouds adds drama with a sense of divine light beaming down onto the river.

The park closes at 18h30, so this boat is on its way back to the lodges, which are about three kilometres further downstream.

Some evenings there are no vibrant reds and oranges but rather saturated light pinks, peaches and blues.

Other evenings are bathed in blues and oranges with the setting sun shining a golden path over the water.

This next image was taken on the way back to the lodge around 18h30 travelling passed the Namibian camp on stilts.

The clouds really do help provide drama to the colourful sunsets on the Chobe.

The next four images are of the iconic three Jackalberry trees at the tip of one of the large islands where the western limb of the river meets the main channel as it flows passed the lodges. A pair of Fish Eagles have their nest in the third Jackalberry. Lillac-breasted Rollers have their nest and seem to habitat the first Jackalberry. These trees don’t seem to mind having their feet permanently in the water.

The colours and moods are different each evening. Sometimes there is no sunset due to thick cloud cover. Other evenings the sky is on fire with colour.

I hope I have given you a sense of the different moods of the river which vary each day and are quite different in the morning and the afternoon.

Looking back at the Jackalberry trees at 18h30, we are putting the covers on our lenses, the chatter is animated and I can already taste that first beer after a hot afternoon – gulp!!.

” Life is like a camera.

just focus on what’s important,

capture the good times, develop from the negatives.

If things don’t work out, just take another shot”

Seek to understand nature, marvel at its interconnectedness and then let it be

Have fun

Mike

This is the second post of four I am publishing from our recent five-day trip with CNP on the Chobe River. As many of you who have been to the Chobe know, there are plenty of hippos (or river horses as the ancient Greek’s called them) in the river, some relaxed and some not so relaxed.

There are two types of hippo found in Africa. The small one is the pygmy hippo which is found to very restricted ranges in West Africa. It is a shy, solitary forest dweller and is rare. The other is the ubiquitous large common hippo.

Nature, hating art and pains

Baulks and baffles plotting brains;

Causality and Surprise

Are the apples of her eyes.

 – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Common hippos are known for their aggression and are the animal which kills the most people in Africa each year. The large hippo is an aggressive animal etched with old scars and fresh, deep wounds both signs of daily fights. These daily tangles are usually accompanied by much bellowing, neighing and snorting. An agitated hippo makes a sound like the air-brake exhaust of a 20 tonne Oshkosh truck when it is going down a hill. Hippos have developed some ritualized postures, the most intimidating of which is the huge open-mouthed “yawn” revealing their formidable teeth. With the long, razor-sharp incisors and tusk-like canines, the hippo is well-armed and dangerous. We did not have close calls this trip thanks to the guides knowledge of the river and the hippos. The territorial bulls are apt to show you, not very subtly, that you are in the wrong place and best you should scram. I think that open-mouthed signal is fairly convincing.

For a wildlife photographer, hippos can be awesome subjects but they tend to rest during the day so are usually not very active. That said the bulls are always looking after their territory and harem. Also nature always throws up surprises.

Bull hippos can weigh over 3 tonnes and are able to move through waist deep water surprisingly fast. On land, a hippo can reach 30km per hour despite its bulk. A cameo of experience – I learnt a lesson, first hand, paddling a canoe down the lower Zambesi beyond Ruckomechi. Unintentionally we cut a hippo off from the deeper water and it charged us. The speed of the charge shocked us. The adrenaline kicked in and even Yamaha or Evinrude would have been impressed with our turn of speed in the canoe. We managed to get out-of-the-way unharmed  but shaken. Despite being semi-aquatic and having webbed feet, hippos do not swim in very deep water but rather propel themselves by bouncing off the river bed. We discovered this characteristic one morning on one of CNP’s boats when a bull charged from the side of the river. We moved into the centre of the river which was very deep and thought that was the end of the charge. To my utter surprise, the hippo kept coming even in that deep channel just passed the army camp as you enter the Chobe National Park. This is one animal I have learnt not to under-estimate.

As with most young animals they play while the adults are trying to rest. The next four images of two youngsters, one quite a bit bigger than the other play fighting.

The play fighting seems harmless as they have not developed those killer teeth yet.  The hippos teeth grow all of their lives and are self sharpening as they grind together. The lower incisors can grow to 40cm and canines to 50cm. Hippos do not use these tusk-like teeth for eating but rather protection and attack. Hippos use their molars to grind down the vegetation they eat. Their broad hairy lips are used to grip and pull out grass and aquatic vegetation.

Gie me ae spark o’ Nature’s fire.

That’s a’ the learning I desire.

 – Robert Burns

On the third afternoon of our Chobe trip, we travelled passed Elephant Alley, beyond the Chobe Game Lodge down to Puku Flats. We usually get good sightings of Fish Eagles there. This particular afternoon we saw a female hippo out of the water around 16h00. She was standing over something so we went into one of the nearby channels to have a closer look.

Newly born hippos are relatively small, weighing from 25 to 55 kilograms, and are protected by their mothers, not only from crocodiles and lions but from male hippos which, for some reason, do not bother them on land but attack them in water.

To our dismay, the female hippo was standing over what looked to be her dead calf. We assumed it was dead because it was motionless despite the female nuzzling it and resting her chin on its body.  The calf was lying on its side in the grass close to the water’s edge. 

The hairs on the lip of the hippo look to be highly sensitive and it appears that this female was assessing her calf by touch.

The next image is as close to distress as I have ever seen in a hippo.

This female turned to face us and opened her mouth as a threat even though we were nowhere near. There was a group of nine Yellow-billed Oxpeckers on her back cleaning up all the cuts in her hide. Red-billed Oxpeckers are much more common, so it was quite unusual to this flock of Yellow-billed Oxpeckers. The hippo has little hair and its skin is around 15cm thick. Hippos lack scent and sweat glands. Instead, mucous glands secrete a thick oily layer of red pigmented fluid nicknamed “blood sweat.” It is now known that this fluid is a combination of hipposudoric and norhipposudoric acids. These compounds create a sunscreen effect by absorbing ultra violet rays from the sun and prevent the growth of disease-causing bacteria. The secretion originates colourless and turns an orange-red within minutes of being exposed to the sun.

After watching the scene for some time, it became clear the calf was dead. There was no way of telling how it died. It looked very young. It could have been killed by a territorial bull hippo or some predator the night before as it had a big gash on its flank. The next image shows how protective the mother was and every time the bull tried to get close she would give a stern warning to back off, which he did that afternoon.

The next morning, first thing, we went back to the scene of the dead hippo calf. Now the bull was out of the water and nuzzling the calf and the female still appeared to be very distressed This is one situation where you do not want to get too close. Sexual dimorphism is present in hippos. Males tend to be about 200 kg larger than females at maturity, but can grow to be a few thousand kg larger with age. Males appear to continue growing throughout their life, while females reach their maximum weight around age 25.

We were not sure what the bull was doing to the calf but he was not feeding or damaging it in any way. The Fish Eagle looked like a conspicuous opportunist.

We watched for over an hour but little happened so we decided to return that afternoon to check if there were any developments. Perhaps predators had picked up the scent, as the wind was blowing away from us and into the surrounding bush. We were fully expecting to see predators or at least vultures on the carcass in the afternoon. Instead, the calf’s body was untouched and the bull and female had moved away. Some minutes later, we noticed the female coming into the water from the opposite side of the inlet with two Cattle Egrets on her back. It was clear she had abandoned her calf’s body by this time. 

Hippos are a very social species, living in pods of anything between 20 to 100 individuals. They lead very sedentary lives, resting most of the day and leaving their resting pools at dusk to feed. Most of their activity is nocturnal. Females are the leaders of the herd, controlling the centers of the resting pools. Males rest along the outer banks of the pools, protecting the females and calves.

Nature …. She pardons no mistakes. Her yea is yea and her nay, nay.

 – Ralph Waldo Emerson

If you look closely you will see the left side flank of this female hippo is badly lacerated. Compare this image with the one of the female standing over her calf. She must have been in some savage tangles in the intervening few hours – and her persecution was not over!!

In the previous image, there were two hippos all but submerged in the water as she entered. Immediately the aggression started. The first move was to go forward to meet each other and thrash their heads left and right as a warning. They bellowed loudly and swinging their head from left to right like giant sledgehammers, with wide open mouths and those razor-sharp teeth capable of deep cuts and punctures.

The tangle started with a bit of ‘argy-bargy’ but soon developed into something altogether more serious. They backed away momentarily and then charged each other again. The expression on the left hand hippo’s face showed this was for real.

The female who had just lost her calf was the one being attacked.

It is only when the fight gets serious do you get to see the impact of those tusk-like teeth digging deeply into each others’ open mouths. The hippos rammed into each other, slashing their heads from side to side. The thrusts were backed by two tonnes of body weight.

The strength of these hippos was evident, lifting their nearly two tonne bodies well out of the water. The fight went on for about five minutes and it was furious. A third hippo joined in the fray with two attacking the one female – the one who had lost her calf the day before.

Without context the whole process looked to be very unfair, but of course we did not understand what this altercation was all about.

Once outnumbered the beleaguered female tried to make a run for it.

As she tried to run away the other two females were trying to bite her side and backside.

Our guide said that if she stuck around there was a possibility the others would kill her.

In nature there are neither rewards or punishments – there are consequences.

 – Robert Green Ingersoll

The one thing you do not want to do in this situation is to get too close. All you need is to have three very angry female hippos come crashing into the boat. The 600mm lenses and able knowledgeable guides are critical in these situations.

Taking away human judgement on the situation, it was a good example of the different and sometimes awe-inspiring magnitude of nature that you are privy to when you are on the boat.

From a photographers point of view, capturing images of animals and birds and even landscapes from the water side allows you to get closer, gives a better perspective and allows you into scenes which you would not be able to see from a vehicle on the land side.

Nature uses only the longest threads to weave her patterns, so each small piece of her fabric reveals the organisation of the entire tapestry.

 – Richard Feynman

Seek to understand nature, marvel at its interconnectedness and then let it be

Have fun

Mike