African Animals

Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and your heavenly Father feeds them.  Are you not much more valuable than they?  Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?

- Matthew 6:26-27

Hluhluwe, South Africa

Hluhluwe-Umfolozi is a game reserve in KwaZulu-Natal, where we live.  It is the oldest game park in Africa.  It was established in 1895 to protect the then endangered white rhino.  It now boasts the largest number of white rhinos in the world; unfortunately, poaching continues to be a major problem and over 1400 rhinos have died in South Africa since 2008.  The park is home to Africa’s Big Five—the elephant, rhinoceros, leopard, cape buffalo, and lion.

Rhino baby & mom

Rhino sniffing his own poop.  This is where he marks his territory.

Giraffes eating

Cape buffalos grazing

Elephant

Zebras grazing

Natal Lion Park, South Africa

The Natal Lion Park is a privately run lion enclosure just outside of Durban.  Visitors drive their personal cars through the park with the lions walking right next to the vehicles or lying in the middle of the road.

White lions are a result of a recessive gene.

Male & female lions gazing at each other. 

Female lion resting on her friend's back.

Serengeti & Ngorongoro, Tanzania

Serengeti, which means “endless plain,” extends from north Tanzania to southwest Kenya.  It contains the world’s largest terrestrial migration.  Each year during the Great Migration, zebras, wildebeest, and other game animals travel north from Ngorongoro through Serengeti to Kenya during the wet season.  The Serengeti was used as the inspiration for the movie, The Lion King.

Ngorogngoro, just southeast of the Serengeti, is a conservation area and UNESCO World Heritage site that is also home to the Big Five.  It is a large crater that formed when a volcano exploded and collapsed on itself 2 to 3 million years ago; it forms a natural enclosure for animals, but animals are able to migrate in and out of the area.  It has the densest population of lions, but many are inbred.

Leopard sleeping

Elephant herd walking towards a bath.

Cheetah brothers

Male agama lizard

Hippo pond.  Each year more Africans are killed by hippos than any other animal.



A lion pride guarding a buffalo carcass.

Simba means lion in Swahili, the national language of Tanzania.



Crane

Eland lying in the grass with a baboon passing by.



Thompson's gazelles grazing



Starling

Wildebeest

I hope you enjoyed my photos!  Each one was an exciting experience for us.

South African Fact:

The rhino poaching demand is driven by Asian countries like Vietnam and China.  Some animal parts can be worth as much as gold by weight.  In an effort to control rhino poaching, as of 2012, South Africa will be denying hunting permits to all Vietnamese nationals.

http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/smartnews/2012/08/in-vietnam-rhino-horn-is-the-drug-of-choice-at-both-parties-and-hospitals/