Beneath all that sun flare is an elephant enjoying a drink of water before calling it a night. This one was taken in the Linyanti Concession of northern Botswana late one afternoon.
Nikon D700 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 95mm) ISO 400, f/22 at 1/60th of a second
Friday seems like as good a day as any to post another lion cub. This little one hails from the Central Kalahari Desert in Botswana. He/she seemed to be feeling ferociously confident — albeit hiding behind the safety of mom and dad.
Nikon D300 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 300mm) ISO 400, f/5.6 at 1/640th of a second
I caught this meerkat late in the day making a dash across a patch of sandy ground. Meerkats are always aware of raptors, jackals and other predators lurking about and they much prefer grassy areas to hide in as opposed to more barren desert. That being said, they’ll risk the exposure to hunt for scorpions, their favorite meal.
Nikon D700 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 200mm) ISO 400, f/5.6 at 1/640th of a second
You have to work a bit for this one, but there’s a cheetah in there — lower left hand corner, just in front of the termite mound. I captured this image late one afternoon on my first trip to Botswana just over three years ago.
Nikon D700 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 75mm) ISO 800, f/8 at 1/200th of a second
People seem to be of mixed minds about the honey badger. I for one, think they are pretty cool animals — true scrappers able to defend themselves against much larger beasts. This guy didn’t quite know what to think about me when he saw me crouched down in the grass just outside of my tent in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve.
Nikon D300 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 400mm) ISO 400, f/5.6 at 1/500th of a second
It was past sunset and actually much darker than it appears when I took this photo of two giraffes in Botswana. I upped the ISO to 3200 and opened up the aperture to its widest setting in order to avoid any motion blur on the slowly moving giraffes — while still adding quite a bit of light to the scene.
Nikon D700 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 75mm) ISO 3200, f/2.8 at 1/250th of a second
It was twilight, and this leopard was just waking up from a nap. We watched her for quite some time as she climbed down the tree, stalked through the grass, and jumped up on a termite mound to get a better view of any unsuspecting prey. By then it was quite dark so we left her to her hunt and headed back to camp.
Nikon D800 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 400mm) ISO 1600, f/4 at 1/200th of a second
Here’s another look at a genet. They are commonly called genet cats, but aren’t really cats at all and are more closely related to mongooses. This one came creeping around our camp one night in Botswana. We were actually at dinner and luckily, I brought my camera along in case of just such a thing.
Nikon D800 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 200mm) ISO 640, f/4 at 1/60th of a second, two SB-900 flash units on off camera bracket
It’s been a while since I posted a meerkat. Here’s one that was running straight toward my camera. As usual when I get the chance, I was face down on the ground. It was a challenge capturing focus on these little guys — they’re pretty quick — but I was able to get quite a few shots like this during my three day stay at Makgadikgadi Pan in the Kalahari Desert of Botswana.
Nikon D700 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 200mm) ISO 400, f/8 at 1/1000th of a second
A springbok stops to pose for the camera in front of the rising sun in the Kalahari Desert.
Nikon D700 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 160mm) ISO 800, f/4 at 1/1600th of a second