We love showcasing guests’ photos, particularly when those guests are as talented as Graham Wood.
“Woody” as he is affectionately known, is a long-standing friend of Londolozi with a passion for all things photographic. He is well travelled across Africa’s many wildlife areas, but has a serious addiction to Londolozi, where he finds himself returning a couple of times a year. Woody has watched the overthrow of the Mapogo by the Majingilane, he has followed the saga of the Tailless lioness first hand, and he has been visiting since the Mashaba female – now Londolozi’s oldest female leopard – wasn’t even born.
During his latest visit I asked Woody if he would mind if we shared a few of his pictures on our blog, and he sent me a spectacular collection of images from his last two trips here.
The Mashaba female – who wasn’t even around when Graham first visited Londolozi.
Here’s what Graham had to say about the photos:
I have been lucky enough to spend 2 weeks at Londolozi over the last couple of months and be witness to the natural wonders and changes that occur here on a daily basis.
Since my last visit, the land has become parched, with temperatures pushing into the 40’s on a daily basis. Large concentrations of Elephants and general game can be found along the trickling Sand River and game viewing has been exceptional throughout my stays. Heavily pregnant Impala, Zebras and Wildebeest can be seen everywhere & the rains can’t come soon enough. Bird numbers are starting to increase with a few recent sightings of migrating Cuckoos, swallows and water birds but alas no Woodland Kingfishers to record as of yet. Leopard viewing as always has been superb, and a number of new individuals are setting up territory. An exciting summer awaits.
We’ll be presenting Graham’s photo highlights in three separate posts over the next week or two.
Enjoy this first stunning batch…
A female cheetah in the south-western grasslands, beautifully silhouetted in the evening light. Cheetahs will often hunt into the evening, but will generally abandon their kills before too long, as during the hours of darkness they are incredibly vulnerable.
Leopards or cheetahs on fallen trees are not uncommon, but Wild Dogs? The canids aren’t known for their ability to climb; in fact they lack one almost entirely, but this horizontal fallen Knobthorn didn’t prove to be too much for this individual to scramble up on.
The Tortoise Pan male, very recently Londolozi’s most regularly seen leopards, appears to have been forced out by the Senegal Bush male, who has been encroaching ever further into Londolozi’s central territories. Here the Tortoise Pan male begins what would ultimately be an unsuccessful stalk on a herd of impalas.
Although lions will allo-suckle – that is, nurse cubs that aren’t their own – for the most part when a pride starts getting active it is their own mothers that cubs will greet first, and vice versa, which helps greatly when trying to establish whose is whose…
The Ndzanzeni female is an interesting source of debate at the moment. She is the last hope for the survival of the original Mother Leopard lineage, yet hasn’t been seen for a couple of weeks, and was nursing a bad limp in the last sighting of her. Has she simply shifted territory (s so many leopards have in the last while), or has the worst befallen? It’s probably too soon to make a call…
A male village weaver comes in to land. Summer is peak breeding time for a lot of birds, but some weavers are entirely dependent on grass to build their nests; will Londolozi get enough rain to enable a full grass bloom, in so doing enabling many bird species to nest successfully?
A young nomadic male lion (presumed to be one of the Mhangeni sub-adults from 2016) had wandered onto Londolozi. The rising sun behind him caught his breath beautifully. With the Birmingham males still in full control over eastern and central Londolozi, there is not too much space for a young nomad to eke out an existence.
The Ximungwe female on a fresh impala kill. Some of you may have seen this sighting on the recent Londolozi Instagram Story. The leopard had killed the impala right in front of us before sunrise as we headed out to look for wild dogs, and we had watched her hoist it before 5am! She rested for quite a while before starting to feed…
The Ximungwe female again, this time with her cub. This is her first litter that she is attempting to raise; she lost her female cub to the Tortoise Pan male, and with the continued encroachment of the Senegal Bush male into her territory, her remaining cub’s survival is by no means assured…
The all-too-familiar stare of the African Buffalo… With the rains still not having come, the large herds are focussing their movements around the few remaining waterholes on the reserve, but the grass cover is almost depleted, so unless the rains come soon, we can expect their d=condition to continue deteriorating…
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Stunning images.
These are great Graham! Works of art for sure!
When the animals get to old to hunt why do people not help so they don’t starve. They make enough on photos and videos. Please don’t say we can’t interfer with nature because we already have in so many unhealthy ways
woody is my best🤞🤞🤞I realy enjoy watching his pic , well done buddy!!
Some beautiful photos here Graham. I noticed all the images were shot with three different Nikon bodies, save for one. I clicked on the dog image and aha, photo by Pete Thorpe- a ringer…….Seriously, I’m in awe of your images and time spent photographing these special animals. I was fortunate to spend time with the Tortoise Pan male a year ago and am so happy he’s been thriving, save for the encroachment of the Senagal male. Looking forward to your next installment.
Hi Denise!
A sharp eye you have. We accidentally put the wrong wild dog image in here but have now replaced it with one of Graham’s. Now you should notice – all taken on one of Graham’s Nikon bodies…
Woody, Thanks for sharing your amazing images! Especially love the Weaver shot. Can’t wait to see more!
Awesome images Graham!…so great to “steal” a quick visit back to Londoz through your and the team’s pics!
What an incredible collection of photographs ! Thank you for sharing looking to more wonderful glimpses into the bush. Victoria
The photo of the male lion is out of this world!!
An incredible photo gallery!!!!
Not sure which I envy more….the number of trips to Londolozi or your beautiful photographs! I look forward to seeing more in the next few weeks, which will be accompanied by renewed envy! Lol…..
Nice photos Graham
Lovely photos. I especially love the ones with sunset as the back light