2. South Africa, Ngala 2012

Ngala 2

Cape dwarf cameleleon, cape buffalo, red flowering bush, young kudu, elephant in the bush, black-backed jackel, zebra dominance battle, leopard cub in tree, Mopane tree, leopard with impala carcass, breakfast in the bush, hippopotumus displaying, hippo lunging from the water, hippo with wide open mouth, pregnant zebra, zebra pair, nursing zebra, Cape turtle dove, European bee eater, Stripped kingfisher, sunset over Drakensberg mountains, pair of blue wildebeest, Giant african millepede, warthog with broken tusk, impala with tickbird, Martial eagle with nest, young female lion
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Large old male giraffe, Ngala, South Africa
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Large old male giraffe, Ngala, South Africa

  • Battling zebras-10, Ngala South Africa
  • Zebra stallion biting the foreleg of his rival, Ngala South Africa<br /> <br /> The female zebras that this dominance battle was over are standing with their backs to the fight, apparently ignoring the stupidity of the stallions.
  • Battling zebras-with the harem in the background, Ngala South Africa
  • Battling zebras-13, Ngala South Africa<br /> <br /> Note the females in the backgrouond turning their backs on the stallions and their dominance fight, and ignoring them.
  • Close-up of the battling zebras, Ngala South Africa
  • Battling zebras-15, Ngala South Africa
  • Battling zebras with flying soil, Ngala South Africa
  • Zebra grabs a rival by the ear during fight, Ngala, South Africa
  • Zebra hanging on to the ear of a rival during fight, Ngala, South Africa
  • "Earning his stripes"<br /> <br /> Zebra hanging on to the ear of a rival during a fight, Ngala, South Africa<br /> <br /> As the long fight between two zebra stallions continued, one grabbed the ear of his rival between his teeth and hung on for several minutes! This was a dominance battle for control of the harem of females that was waiting nearby, quite unimpressed by the behaviour of the stallions. There are reports of these battles going on for up to several hours, and getting quite bloody, before a winner is decided when the loser runs off. You can see some of the scars resulting from the battle at larger sizes.
  • Fight for dominance
  • Close-up of zebra hanging on to the ear of a rival during fight-2, Ngala, South Africa
  • Zebra going for the jugular-1, Ngala, South Africa<br /> <br /> Today I've posted the final five dramatic photos of the zebra battle. In this photo the female zebras are huddled together in the background trying to ignore these battling stallions, competing to control the harem.<br /> <br /> In the end these battles end with the loser giving up and running off to 'lick his wounds' and survive to fight another battle. In some ways the animal world is more 'civilized' than the human one where battles CAN end in death.
  • Zebra going for the jugular-2, Ngala, South Africa
  • Large male giraffe with lots of ticks and tick birds, Ngala, South Africa<br /> <br /> Best seen at large size, where you can count a dozen tick birds.
  • Large male and a couple of smaller female giraffes, Ngala, South Africa
  • Large male giraffe with his head in the tree tops, Ngala, South Africa
  • "Oooh, a perfect place to scratch that itch!"<br /> <br /> This large male giraffe found an excellent small branch near the top of the tree to scratch his chin on. (best seen at large sizes)
  • Large old male giraffe, Ngala, South Africa
  • Young lioness, Ngala, South Africa<br /> <br /> After not seeing lions for a few days, we suddenly came across of huge pride of over 30 lions moving through the bush. They were hard to photograph in the thick bush, but when they moved through an open area I had my camera ready!<br /> <br /> Info: taken from around 25 ft away from an open 4WD vehicle using a monopod on my Nikon D800; in natural light using the Sigma 150-500 mm lens at 400 mm, ISO 500, 1/1000 sec, f11.

  • Donald Wolf (1372221pxart)

    on March 13, 2013

    Beautiful shot.

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