I recently returned from South Africa having spent four weeks touring the country and taking photographs of anything and everything! SA is a familiar county to me as I lived there for a few years; and it is a fantastic country with spectacular scenery, great people and a fantastic variety of wildlife
The first part of our trip involved visiting friends, who kindly arranged for us to spend a few days in a private game lodge in the Timbavati Game Reserve. This reserve is contiguous to and has open borders with the Kruger National Park (the largest in Africa) which, on its own, is 20,000 square km (7,500 sq miles). Timbavati is home to and renowned for its very rare white lion (Panthera leo). Our guide told us there are only 4 known to exist in the wild, two cubs having recently been killed.
Wikipedia says the following:-
‘Their white color is caused by a recessive trait derived from a less-severe mutation in the same gene that causes albinism, distinct from the gene responsible for white tigers. They vary from blonde to near-white. This coloration does not appear to disadvantage their survival.’
We were very, very lucky because on our first game drive the evening that we arrived, we found a white lion. Unfortunately it was a bit shy but you can clearly see its distinctive white colouration against the more normal variety.
And “regular” lions (if there is such a thing!):
Here are some bird pictures. Notice that the chickadee is closing his eyes as he grabs the fat. There is also snow flying off him.Black-capped Chickadee (Poecile atricapillus) Closes Eyes Getting Some Fat
Dark-eyed junco (Junco hyemalis) — I like how he’s holding his foot.
I thought I’d throw in an aquarium picture because it turned out well. I recently fought a battle with cloudy water & fixed it with a really nice UV sterilizer. I think I had brought in a pathogen as well as I had some fish loss but the UV sterilizer fixed that too. Here is one of my Black Tetra (Gymnocorymbus ternetzi) a fish originally from the river basins of South America.
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Love those pictures of mama lion & cub, especially the one where it looks like they’re both smiling for the camera.
Cub goes “bump!”
We’re not snowed in, in SW Ontario… just thawing out from the Polar Freeze a couple of weeks ago and the dribs and drabs of snow after that. Major melt today; the snow is practically gone!
Great photos.
All the weather changes have been killing me, but as soon as I got an inkling that a migraine was on its way, I took some medication and the stiff neck and back muscles aren’t as bad as they usually become.
Great pictures of the lions and the rarest.
Wonder if the Junko can get to the sunflower seed?
Crazy warm weather here in southwest Iowa. 60s and even 70 last few days and this is Feb. I see thousands of geese flying and some ducks coming in as there is no ice.
“My” juncos eat almost exclusively on the ground under the feeders . . . good thing the flicker is messy and throwing seed and suet around for them!
I tried to photograph a cute junco in the shadows, who was jumping and digging in the snow for seeds. The cute little thing was, alas, too quick!
Yeah that junco was gobbling up sunflower seeds. My birds are spoiled and get to have extra seeds on the railings of the deck so that I can photograph them. I feel it’s fair payment.
Wonderful pictures and explanatory text. Not to be missed.
The lions look so happy! I especially like the paw photo.
Diana, did you use a flash or ‘natural light’ to take a picture of the fish?
No flash. The aquarium is well lit because I have plants. I have two ballasts that hold two high output T5 bulbs each. I used my 5D with the 40mm lens.