January 20, 2014

 My Canon SX50 loooves birds!

The photo below is of a Lilac-backed Starling ...

... and this is a European Roller

January 19, 2014

Yesterday we took a late afternoon drive to the Hluhluwe Imfolozi Park

We love to stop at this waterhole and just sit there even if there is nothing major to be seen.

I noticed a small object floating on the water and decided to zoom in on it to see what it was.

I marked the object with an orange square in the photo below

Much to my surprise I found that a very opportunistic spider was holding on to the piece of flotsam with its back legs, while floating the other legs on the surface, waiting for an unsuspecting 

insect to come within range. 

How awesome is the surface tension - it looks as if the spider is making 'dents' in the water

A closer look shows that the spider had caught an insect

Meanwhile on the bank of the pond this strange orange-bottomed Wasp was doing what Wasps do.

January 9, 2014

Bringing you the Moon

 These photos were taken just before 7pm this afternoon before it was totally dark.

In my opinion it is best to photograph the moon when it is not quite dark yet.

January 4, 2014

Calling merrily this morning, a Laughing Dove attracted my attention to the 

abundance of berries on the old tree on the field below my house.  

I have lived here for ten years and have never seen the Waterberry Tree so 

heavily laden with fruit. The children in the nearby school love these berries and can be seen filling their empty lunch tins in the afternoons after school. This year will be a feast!

The Waterberry tree is also know locally as the Umdoni.  (Syzygium cordatum)

Wikipedia elaborates on the many uses this tree has to offer: The fleshy fruit is slightly acidic in flavour and is eaten by  monkeys, bush-babies and birds. The berries are also used to sometimes make an alcoholic drink. The powdered bark is used as a fish poison. In central Africa the tree is known as a remedy for stomach ache and diarrhea. It is also used to treat respiratory ailments and tuberculosis.

January 3, 2014

This photo was ruined because the beautiful Orb Spider decided that the ideal place for its web

 would be between two shrubs in front of the water tank. 

The awful solid background did not do much for the spider so I played around with the photo in Picasa. 

I don't really like manipulated photos, but I have to admit that I am happy with the result.

December 2, 2014

Change of Scenery

This photo was taken in August 2012 on a  wintry afternoon .....

In comparison, I took another photo at the same spot last week

After well over 200mm of rain during December Hluhluwe Imfolozi Park is looking good. 

(If only the roads had the ability to recover so dramatically!)

January 1, 2014

My first experience on this first day of 2014 was to be woken up by a new type of  'Rooster'!

It was sitting on the roof above my bedroom and squawking bitterly at  a pair of crows 

that were frolicking in a nearby tree

The Hadeda Ibis is referred to as a "Flying Vuvuzela" in an interesting article in the Huffington Post

The article also states that another "Hadeda nickname is 'la-di-da,' - a poke at what some view as the hoity-toity airs of suburbanites who share their green spaces with the bird"

On my roof it is a plain Hadeda - no airs in this old house :)

December 31, 2013

While sitting at the lookout point over Zincakeni Dam in the Hluhluwe Imfolozi Park I spotted these old trees doing the Happy Dance down in the valley - probably because 2013 is finally over!  

It was a tough year for some and as you can see Lady Tree even lost her head in the process!

....continued below....

May 2014 be an exceptionally good one - filled with pleasant surprises and many reasons to do the Happy Dance!

Thank you for your visits throughout 2013 and I look forward to seeing you here often in the year ahead. 

In the new year I am not going to feel pressured to go hunting for a photo every day - it feels too much like work ;)  but I will continue to post photos of  'Wild and Wonderful Thingz'  as and when it happens cross my path