And lots of heat shimmer there once the sun is out, making most of the shots unsharp. The light in Africa seems to be only good for a few minutes after sunrise and before sunset, so unless it's an overcast day, it is not easy to get shots with good direct light on them. And the light angle is a bit problematic, giving the rhinos side-light in day time. Since no off-roading is allowed, we are stuck on the road, meaning if they are far away, we can't get close. When it's near sunset time, they walk back into the deep forest far away from the roads to sleep. They seem to like to come out in the meadow only in bright day light. But one usually doesn't come here for lions and leopards. No off-roading is allowed in Ol Pejeta, so if the rhinos are not close to the road, it's impossible to see or photograph them.Īnd since there are patrols on foot, and lions and leopards usually don't like humans on foot (which is different from common belief), it's harder to see lions and leopards there. It was quite dark and he was running away from a herd of buffalos. We didn't see any rhinos for the first day except one after sunset. In our two days there, we saw one black rhino, and 2 mother southern white rhinos both with one baby! In Ol Pejeta, however, there are patrols on foot who protect them from poaching, so one has a higher chance of seeing them. There are rhinos in the Mara but they are harder to see. He said it seemed that some sperms of that last male northern white rhino was preserved. There are only two female northern white rhinos remaining (both captive, no more wild ones). The Southern white rhinos are doing okay, not endangered.īut the last male northern white rhino has just died. White rhinos are doing a little bit better. 3 of the black rhino subspecies have been declared extinct. Edited with DTS.Īnyways, here are the 11 things I didn't know about rhinos.īlack rhinos are critically endangered. I applied the method all the time in Kenya with great success. If you want to learn more about metering, definitely check out my free metering webinar on my website. Since it's relatively low contrast in the scene so I used auto ISO. In his 15 years guiding, he has never photographed one, until this time! He said the species is relatively hard to see. Even afterwards when I was photographing the wild dogs, I couldn't stop looking around to search for this beautiful hyena again but he was like a phantom. I can't believe I used the word beautiful to describe it. I didn't even know of the species striped hyena before.īut once I saw it, I had to confess, I'm hooked. I've only seen spotted hyena before, and didn't think that highly of hyena (too bad the lion king movie influence). ![]() Within a few seconds, he disappeared into the deep bush and was never seen again. He blended in the scene so perfectly like a painting in harmony. He appeared from nowhere, and was calmly observing the distant pack of wild dogs. As he said it the second time, I finally saw him. I couldn't see nothing by looking around us. Instead of following these dogs like most others, we stayed at a distance and just guessed where they would be going and got ahead of them and waited.Īs we were driving, Eric yelled in a low but excited voice, "look, look, striped hyena!" We were following a pack of 30 wild dogs in Samburu, Kenya. I asked myself as I was clicking the shutter. Here's the story behind this shot: "The phantom" Was it a wild dog? Was it a zebra-dog? Drum roll. ![]() I didn't even know such a species existed. We did see an interesting animal briefly. We didn't have much luck with leopard in Samburu compared to the Mara, missing all of the sightings including a kill, for a few seconds, only seeing the last glimpse of a leopard dragging a kill (zebra or topi, I didn't see clearly) into the tall bush before we could take a picture. We spent the first 3 days in Samburu, which was about 6 hours from Nairobi, and 3 hours from Ol Pejeta. Not really believing what he said, I went with the plan anyways because I knew nothing better. What is Ol Pejeta Conservancy? What exactly is a conservancy? Can we skip this?" It's the peak season and you are making reservation just two months away." "Can you just make the whole stay in the Mara?" So when I received the proposed itinerary from Eric, my guide for the second session of my trip (10 days with Federico, 17 days with Eric), seeing locations like Samburu, Ol Pejeta, Lake Naivasha, I was confused. So I didn't even ask my travel agent for it. Before my trip to Kenya, I thought rhinos were critically endangered, and photographing them in the wild would be impossible.
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