A lone lioness takes down a female zebra on the edge of Mankwe dam in the Pilanesberg National Park.
Cameron Badenhorst of birding and wildlife safari’s recorded this footage and says:
“We watched a lioness stalk a mixed group of plains game and manage to take down and kill a Zebra mare in the Pilanesberg National Park, South Africa. Don Walton edited the different video clips and blended them to produce a video of the whole event.”
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WATCH: Bull elephant flips vehicle at iSimangaliso Wetland Park
A family outing to the iSimangaliso Wetland Park took a disastrous turn when a bull elephant battered and flipped the family's vehicle this past weekend.
The family - believed to be a husband, wife and their two children, aged 8 and 10, from the coastal town of Mtunzini - all managed to escape death and serious injury after their vehicle was charged and overturned by the angry bull. However they are reportedly severely traumatised.
Daily Maverick reports that the attack took place on a tourist road near Catalina Bay in Cape Vidal. .
At this stage it is still unclear why the elephant attacked the car, but an investigation will be launched by park officials.
Horrifying video footage taken by the occupants of another vehicle show the elephant mauling a white Ford pickup truck after it had flipped the vehicle over onto its roof.
Images circulated on social media show that the windscreen was cracked, with dents to both sides of the vehicle.
iSimangaliso Wetland Park is home to more than 100 elephants, living in separate family herds, all of which have been reintroduced to the park over the past 20 years.
The majority of these were relocated from the nearby Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park - orphans whose parents were culled in Kruger National Park - with some of the herd being more recent introductions directly from Kruger.
There have been various reports highlighting the long term psychological damage suffered by these orphaned and relocated elephants, with many believing that the trauma caused will never allow them to peacefully interact with humans.
Since the reintroductions began there have been a number of incidents of human-elephant conflict, including one reported fatality in 2005 when Ezemvelo KwaZulu-Natal Wildlife general assistant Zelani Ntuli (50) was gored in the chest by an elephant that charged her vehicle.
Ntuli and fellow staff were returning to their camp in a land cruiser when they came across a breeding herd of 26 elephants drinking at a reservoir in the early evening.
In order to not startle the herd, they stopped the vehicle and switched off the lights. After waiting for a while, the team tried to continue, but were stopped by the herd. It is believed the elephants may have become disorientated by the flickering of the vehicle's lights.
A large elephant then rammed the truck, pushing it back off the road and up against a tree. The windscreen was shattered and the roof lifted off its mounting, while Ntuli, a mother of two, was fatally gored.
In a separate video clip from 2016, a party of tourists recorded a close escape after encountering an elephant at close quarters on a tourist road – highlighting the dangers of visitors approaching elephants too closely, particularly when testosterone-charged bulls are in musth (a condition of heightened aggression and unpredictable behaviour in elephant bulls).
WATCH | Hungry Hippo Visits Petrol Station
Why did the hippo cross the road?
For a late night snack run of course! Come on, we've all been there.
It’s quite common for guests and residents in St Lucia, South Africa to see wild animals casually roaming the streets. With the town being situated within iSimangaliso Wetland Park, hippos especially seem to sometimes want a taste of city life.
On Sunday 23 February, the OK Express & Engen Garage in St Lucia posted a video shared by Marié Stubbe of a sizeable hippo strolling through the petrol station.
The post read:
"Just a casual Sunday night stroll in St Lucia looking for snacks at OK Express. The hippo returned back to the lake after grazing around town. St Lucia town is surrounded by a large lake and extensive natural habitat for wildlife,"
The viral video has attracted many comments with some suggesting the hippo must have run out of petrol, or that he was in the mood for some snacks.
Stubbe, who has lived in St Lucia for 26 years, says that it’s very common for hippos to venture into residents’ gardens at night for some fresh green grass:
‘They’re not aggressive and don’t really care about people, but might become dangerous if a cow has a calf with her.’
She also added that although people don’t usually approach the hippos, some tourists try to get close to them for pictures:
‘Everyone wants to show the world they saw a hippo in the street, and when people get too close, that’s when it can get dangerous for the hippo and the people.’
All wild animals are best appreciated when observed from a distance and without human interference, especially hippos who boast a fierce reputation as Africa's most deadly animal!
iSimangaliso Wetland Park contains three major lake systems, eight interlinking ecosystems and is Africa’s largest estuarine system.
Watch: Surfers Don’t Notice Giant Whale Swim Under Them
Last week, a giant gray whale swam through a group of unsuspecting surfers and the rare encounter was captured from above by drone.
Approximately 12 surfers were relaxing in waters off Doheny State Beach, California, when the giant massive whale approached them, Fox 5 News reported. Payton Landaas, a high school senior who lives nearby, captured footage of the whale’s movements with his drone.
https://www.facebook.com/fox5sandiego/videos/822239364874119/
Landaas told For the Win Outdoors:
“I knew how rare this moment could be so I ran to get my drone,”
According to experts, gray whales typically hang out close to shore while moving through locations.
Capt. Corey Hall, from Dana Wharf Sportfishing and Whale Watching, told KTLA:
“Gray whales are pretty docile; they’re known as the friendly whale,"
Hall added that it may have been the creature’s first or second time migrating south for the winter. Gray whales use landmarks rather than echolocation to navigate their journeys, which could be why this whale was spending time near the shore.
Landaas, who was blown away by the special moment he captured, recently launched Stealth Photos. You can see more of his drone footage and photography here.
SOURCE: GEEK.COM
Orca Pod Hunts Giant Great White Shark Off Cape Coast
Incredibly rare footage of a pod of killer whales hunting a great white shark has been recorded off the Knysna coast, in South Africa.
Donavan Smith, a marine tour guide operating in South Africa's Western Cape, managed to capture footage of a pair of orcas circling a great white shark while out with clients. Orcas are known to snack on great whites, usually going straight going straight for the liver and leaving the rest to float away and decompose.
The great white shark is visibly afraid as it is shown to be near the boat with the whales just a few metres aways. Smith can be heard saying, ‘this is amazing, this is special stuff,’ as the shark swims past the boat, where its enormity comes into perspective. The orcas are hot on the shark’s tail, engaging in a chase and coming closer to the boat.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B7z6_cHnsz_/?utm_source=ig_embed
The livers of sharks are a favoured delicacy for orcas as they are rather large nutrient-rich. In 2017, a number of great white carcasses washed ashore in Gansbaai, Western Cape. After conducting necropsies, experts uncovered that the livers, stomachs and testicles were missing.
In 2019, five dead broad-nosed seven gill (also known as cow sharks) washed ashore on the Betty's Bay Main Beach. After undergoing necropsies it was confirmed that the carcasses were killed in the same way as great whites previously.
The orcas essentially split the shark open by grabbing each pectoral fin, flipping the shark over and pulling it apart, splitting open the throat and chest cavity and eventually exposing the liver.
Yikes.
SOURCE: GETAWAY
Elephant Climbs Over Wall To Steal Mango
Who said elephants can't climb? Watch the moment a rather agile elephant was caught climbing over a five-foot wall in an effort to feast on a safari lodge's mangos:
Guests staying at Mfuwe Lodge in South Luangwa National Park, Zambia, had just departed for their afternoon game drive on Saturday when the giant pachyderm strolled in for an unexpected visit.
Mfuwe's general manager Ian Salisbury, 68, spotted the bull elephant calculating how to haul its giant legs over the stone wall.
Andy Hogg - managing director of The Bushcamp Company - filmed the elephant's brief but unsuccessful hunt for fruit.
A family of elephants are known to frequently visit the lodge between October and mid-December in search of a sweet treat, but this unexpected visitor was too late in its search for mangos, which were out of season.
Ian, originally from Bacup, Lancashire, said:
"He just chose the most direct route and made himself right at home. The guests were very amused at the idea of a climbing elephant. They were in amazement that it would bother to climb over such a high wall.
They were out on a safari drive in the National Park at the time, so were sorry to have missed seeing it [in person]."
The lodge has a central foyer area that is open and often attracts a family of elephants in the early winter. But the herd usually take a stoned pathway, instead of taking the direct route of the wall.
Ian said:
"[The elephant] was a stranger to us. He wanted to investigate. He wanted to get into the central area where this big mango tree grows.
He was obviously quite hungry and expected to get some wild mangos for himself, though there aren't any left now. That's all done with for the year.
He came and stretched over, had a look around, ate a bit of grass, then strangely turned round and came back the same way, which was quite amusing. His easiest way of getting there was to climb over this high wall. It's really unusual behaviour for an elephant, to climb so high.
"It was impressive he could coordinate his four legs to get over the wall because the elephant was quite a major bull, maybe around 30, so middle-aged."
With unusually wet weather for this time of year, Ian believes the lone elephant may have been encouraged to take a detour to avoid floods.
He added:
"Elephants tend to wander around quite big distances and depending on the availability of food, they'll turn up in certain areas.
It has been quite dry then over the last week or so, we had huge amounts of rain that almost caused a flood. Whether that encouraged him to have a look around, I'm not sure."
SOURCE: LADBIBLE