Hyaenas love water: Video
Published by Wildcaster 2 years, 1 month ago Tags: africa, animal kingdom, blogumentary, cites, conservation, documentary, ecotraining, education, elephants, endangered species, flickr, GLTP, gonarezhou, Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park, hunting, hyaenas, IUCN Red List, kill, malilangwe, mashable, narrowcasting, Open Content Alliance, pamushana, peace parks, photos, polls, predators, quickmaps, rain, scavenging, sosigi, video, wild dogs, wildcasting, wildlife, wildlife documentary, youtube, zimbabwe.
My good friends the hyaenas were entertaining as usual.
It took me many hours to find the elephants this morning. Mandlovu had moved right up into the north into some of the thickest bush on the reserve. After bashing around after them for several hours I eventually came out on a track. Finding a suitable mopanie tree with good shade I took a break waiting for them to reach the road.
Lying on my camera box with feet on the dashboard, things were pretty good. Shortly my peace was interrupted. Mama-notch, a big elephant cow with a notch in her right tusk, sidled up to my tree and proceeded to strip leaves from it. As innocent as I was lying there, she innocently fed without concern as to my presence. Having stripped what she could she moved on.
Chipfongwe was also having a day of leisure until his sister pushed him aside. She wanted to get to the wet cool soil that he was lying on. Lethargic as he was, he just rolled over and passed out again.
Not having any joy with the elephants in this rough country and with little chance of them moving out (they had water all around them with pans full from the rains the other day), I moved out.
I picked up on the wild dogs sleeping close to Sosigi dam. They all looked really well fed and didn’t budge until just before sunset. They all awoke with mass excitement and greeted each other as they do. I always find it amazing how they can get so excited to see each other, even though they’ve all been lying together and have already greeted each other several times that day. It all helps to reinforce those very strong social bonds.
The pack headed out hunting at sunset but not with much enthusiasm and we abandoned them once it got dark. This was when we picked up on the hyaenas in Manyuchi pan.
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Not my idea of steak but very smart of them to hide it in the water as long as there are not watery meat eaters.
Cheers,
Toni-Ann
I really like your website with all the AMAZING photo’s of elephants!!!!!
It really gives me great pleasure to start the day at the office with some snapshots of my favourite thing, that will be wildlife!!
I think it is a great job to photograph wildlife every day, and to see them interact with one another.
Keep up the good work!
Jurgen
I’m a big fan of the Spotted Hyaena ! They are so fascinating.
thanks Kim.
Spotties are great. The scene today with them and the dogs was just so cool to watch. Check out the “Wild dog and hyaena drama”
Wanted to let you know Kim how much I have enjoyed your video’s, commentary and blog on this site. Seeing the wild dogs interact has been fasinating! I didn’t realize that the adult dogs seem to let the pups get to feed more often than themselves? Chip, the little elephant is a joy to watch. I hope he will be a fine leader when he grows up. I have also enjoyed watching the hyaena’s -they are amazing animals given the bad rap they seem to get. They are so interesting to watch. Wanted to let you know I really enjoyed your ‘Hyaena’s at War’ film on the Natational Geographic channel and look forward very much to your next.
Just please don’t get ’stuck’ in any more mud!
Thanks Dana. Looks like Wild dogs is going to be the next film out. We should start the edit towards the end of next year. Will keep you informed.
Enjoy the ride.
Cheers
Kim