For my last collection of photos from Maasai Mara, I have accumulated two days worth of cheetah and hyena encounters. We saw one large family of hyena (at least I assume they were all related): several adults, a number of older, but still immature ones, and then a few pups only a few weeks old. I am a big fan of the big cats and so usually think of hyena as the "bad guys" because they are constantly harassing the cats and trying to steal their kills. However, getting a chance to see hyena interact as a family unit definitely softened my opinion of them.
#1 I generally don't associate the word "cute" with hyena, but it certainly applied to these little guys. They were curious and so kept looking at us, but also decided it was safest to stay underneath an adult and so didn't venture very close.
#2 On the other hand, this guy was pretty fearless. While still a youngster, he was much older and larger than the pups in photo #1. He had no qualms about coming right up to the vehicle to check us out. So much so that the minimum focusing distance of 4.5 feet on the 70-200 lens meant that I couldn't take any pictures of him as he stopped right underneath me and looked up at me. He even walked under the vehicle for a few moments before re-joining the rest of the pack.
#4 While watching a pup play with a stick can be a lot of fun, it takes on a slightly different aspect when the "toy" the pup is playing with is the forelimb of some animal.
#5 They day after we saw the family with all the pups, we saw a group of several adults. They didn't have any pups, but one of the males seemed determined to change that with one of the females. They kept circling and running around as he tried to get her in position. These shots aren't as crisp as I might like because it was so overcast that even at f2.8 I had to boost the ISO up to 800 to manage a shutter speed of 1/500 - which was still just a smidge too slow to freeze the rapidly moving pair.
#7 We also saw these three brothers late one morning. I had mixed emotions about this encounter. On one hand, I, like all the other photographers in our group, wanted to get into good position to photograph them. On the other, I think during this encounter the vehicles (there were a total of five vehicles in the area - four from our group and a fifth from a different safari) probably crossed the line at times between getting into good position for a photograph and herding the three cats. One of our drivers told us that the cheetah in the area had started to hunt in the middle of the day to take advantage of the fact that there were no vehicles in the area to alert the prey of the cats' presence (game drives end mid to late morning and don't resume until late afternoon). After all, it is pretty hard to sneak up on something when you have five Landcruisers following you.
#11 Speaking of herding cats, I would have loved to have captured all three cats looking in the same direction (from a decent angle - capturing it from behind doesn't count) as they marched through the grass. However, they had their own ideas. We spent about 30 minutes with these cats. After that we decided it was time to give them some space to hunt and for us to head back for lunch.
Excellent series with wonderful commentary. Those hyena pups are indeed cute. We never came across pups that young during my recent trip. In fact I only saw two fairly big pups, even bigger than one in #2.
You capture the family interaction of hyenas very well.
#8 is fantastic. High perch and the blurred BG all add to that.
When is your next trip to Africa?
Harsha
Jay, this is another compelling series. Regarding your comments about harrassment of the cheetahs, I heard precisely the same thing from a friend who had been in Tanzania a month or so ago. He told me he photographed several instances in which safari vehicles actually got between several cheetahs and the gazelles they were stalking, ruining the cheetahs' approach each time. It's a sad commentary on the state of tourism in the southern Serengeti.
harshaj1 wrote:
Excellent series with wonderful commentary. Those hyena pups are indeed cute. We never came across pups that young during my recent trip. In fact I only saw two fairly big pups, even bigger than one in #2.
You capture the family interaction of hyenas very well.
#8 is fantastic. High perch and the blurred BG all add to that.
When is your next trip to Africa?
Harsha
Thanks, Harsha. #8 is one of my favorites from the entire trip. I don't know when I'll make it back to Africa. I would certainly like to go back, but there are other places that I haven't been to yet that I would really like to see and so it may be several years before I return.
Chris Willis wrote:
Jay, this is another compelling series. Regarding your comments about harrassment of the cheetahs, I heard precisely the same thing from a friend who had been in Tanzania a month or so ago. He told me he photographed several instances in which safari vehicles actually got between several cheetahs and the gazelles they were stalking, ruining the cheetahs' approach each time. It's a sad commentary on the state of tourism in the southern Serengeti.
Chris
Unfortunately, the same could be said of eco-tourism in many areas. Yellowstone is a similar example here in the US and I was just reading an article a few days ago about the explosion of visitors to Antarctica and the Galapagos over the last decade or so - both of which are showing signs of stress from the current volume of tourism. Then again, I enjoy going to places like these which means I'm part of the problem too. I wish I knew what the answer was, but I'm not sure there is one.
I always look forward to your post Jay. This is another great set and great narrative with the images. Tanzania is getting quite a bit more tourism this year because of the unrest in Kenya. We have had to make several changes in our inteniary because of the increased traffic. As with most everything else there are good guide services and bad and many of the guides I have had in the past hate for this to happen but there will prabably always be more of a problem with increased traffic. There are rules against this but not all abide by them and often cause ill feelings between the different guide services.
As you mention this is becoming more and more of a problem within our own National Parks and with forecast of much more visitation over the next few years several of our parks have studies underway to try and find a solution to manage automobile traffic as well as ways to prevent disturbing wildlife. My hopes are that this will be done reasonably and not go way overboard with restrictions.
Grant
Edited on Apr 01, 2008 at 09:56 PM
Apr 01, 2008 at 09:55 PM
anthony whitmo Offline • • • • • • Upload & Sell: Off
Yep number 6 is a definite "NO" My wife gives that same look and I can tell it a mile away
Great series and really enjoyed these. Well done capturing these guys and informative to the current conditions. I guess more education to the locals would be appropriate and in order as they are the ones in control............
