I think this may be the definition of bliss, an emotion one wouldn’t normally associate with a hippo. We took this photo on Lake Kariba in Zimbabwe.
I didn’t expect hippos to be photogenic, but they kept Peggy and me busy with our cameras. Today’s post will mainly be made up of pictures. Folks who read my long elephant blogs deserve it. LOL. But still, a few facts are in order. I’ll work them into the photos.
My new camera with its super long lens provided plenty of opportunity to get up close and personal with hippos. You could count the whiskers on this guy’s snout. Hippos spend around 16 hours a day in water. Their nose, eyes and ears are all on top of their heads. This allows them to be able to see, hear and breath while being close to submerged— keeping cool and protecting their skin.This is a common photo of hippos in water including males, females, and babies. They like to hang out together in groups of 10-30 known by such names as schools, pods, sieges or bloats. My favorites are the last two. If you were surround by these guys you would definitely feel like you were under siege. As our boat on Lake Kariba in Zambia approached this group of hippos, they were sinking under the water, a normal tactic.These hippos at Lake Kariba provided a photo op. “Okay, everyone, line up. And stop mooning the camera!”The sun was setting on this big fellow when we took our first boat trip on the Chobe River in Botswana. I’d say ‘bloat’ works here. An average female tips the scales at 3000 pounds while a big male can weigh up to 9000.Groups are normally dominated by a large male who is in charge of protection— and mating, which is mainly carried out in the water due to the weight factor. The gestation period is eight months. Moms give birth to one baby weighing 30-50 pounds. The babies can actually nurse under water.Hippopotamus is derived from ‘water horse’ in ancient Greek. Can you imagine trying to ride one? You would probably drown. They can’t swim. Their size and density makes them sink. But they are ideally suited for travel under water and can stay down for five minutes at a time. They actually walk or run along the bottom. Flaps over their noses and ears close automatically when they go under. A special lid covers their eyes. This fellow, BTW, is probably asleep. Hippos can sleep under the water for up to ten hours, automatically rising every five minutes or and so and sucking in air while continuing to snooze. Great whiskers.This was my favorite shot of hippos in the water. Is it a two headed four eared hippo? Grin. Huge odds are not… But I sure couldn’t imagine how they managed to arrange themselves this way. Going for a ride? Breeding? Maybe.The literature emphasizes that hippos stay in the water during the day and come out to graze at night. Fortunately, everywhere we went that included hippos, a few were out happily stuffing themselves on grass. They average around 80 pounds a night/day, traveling some 6 miles (10K) to get their fill. When out in the day, their skin exudes a protective layer that serves as sunblock. A pair of hippos grazing along with oxpeckers. (The birds peck off insects but they also peck holes in the hippos and drink blood. Hmmm, friend or foe?) I’m assuming this is a pair. Males tend to mate for life but are polygamous.Peggy and I took lots of close-ups of the hippos grazing along the river in Chobe National Park, Botswana. Check out the big tusks. They are used for fighting, not grazing.Any large African animal, be it hippo, elephant, Cape buffalo or giraffe, has a coterie of birds that follow along and catch insects the animals stir up.The little guys seem fearless. Is it grabbing an insect from under the hippo’s foot?We liked this head shot.Males are very territorial. It’s one of the things that make them so dangerous. And they have a unique way of marking their territory. They use their tails to fling poop. That’s what is happening here. The tail is moving so fast, it’s a blur. Remember the old statement, “When shit hits the fan.” You don’t want to be around. Hippos can actually fling their stuff for 10 meters, almost 33 feet. Be you man or beast, you might become toast (or possibly a pancake) if the hippo decides you are invading its territory. And they can run up to 30 miles per hour for a short distance, i.e. probably far enough.Imagine being on top of this small hill at Lake Kariba photographing a few tons of hippos as they come charging over. Fortunately, my telephoto lens allowed me to be a long way off.This hippo skull was beside a small road we were following into Matusadona National Park at Lake Kariba. Note the tusks.The park ranger who was taking us on the tour into the park, got out of our safari vehicle to demonstrate how far a hippo can open its jaw.Peggy captured the phenomena on the Chobe River. From a humorous perspective, it appears junior is getting a lecture on his behavior. “Next time you go near that crocodile, I’ll let him eat you!” And look how long the hippo is! A large male can grow up to 16 feet.This is the ultimate picture of a hippo opening its jaws and declaring a territorial challenge, or yawning. Everyone who goes on safari wants to capture one. Believe me, we tried. Our last opportunity was when we were on the Zambezi River outside of Victoria Falls. Unfortunately, we were on the wrong side of the boat. One of our tour group was glad to share.
I’m going to try something now in concluding this post that I rarely do: Share a video. We normally take several for ourselves but not for the blog. Too many oops. Handheld videography has its challenges! But this two minute video shows an excellent example of an elephant-hippo confrontation. It’s worth checking out, even with its occasional shakes. It’s almost funny as the hippo maneuvers his way through the elephants trying to show itself as harmless and submissive as possible— and only raises its head when the elephants are left far behind. You can almost hear its sigh of relief. Enjoy. Click twice on the photo to start the video. On our next post, we will feature giraffes, Peggy’s favorite animal.
A family of elephants, consisting of the matriarch, her sisters, kids and grandkids, head for a water hole in Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe.
Among elephants, family is everything— at least among the females. A herd normally consists of the matriarch, chosen for her leadership and knowledge, plus her sisters, kids, and grandkids. Females born into the herd almost always stay with it. The family can exist together for decades and beyond. The matriarch is expected to find water and food when they are scarce and provide protection when necessary. Her nurturing abilities are also quite important. The size of the group normally ranges between 6 and 20 elephants depending on available resources. New families are created when resources are limited, but they remain bonded to their original families. A celebration with much trumpeting of trunks, touching and general joy is shown whenever the groups meet up. The longer they have been apart, the bigger the party
Males leave when they are 12-15 years old to go off and live on their own, or to join a loose knit group of other males where an older bull provides leadership, protection, discipline and education. This dispersal guards against inner-breeding within the family and assures genetic diversity among herds.
The young male is normally around 30 before he is large enough and strong enough to get his first chance at breeding. His adventure is encouraged by what is known as musth, a period when his testosterone goes wild and he feels the drive to go in search of female companionship. Teenage boys will recognize this. (The hormonal imbalance of musth has an added characteristic of leading the males to be moody and dangerous. Guides recognize the condition and steer clear.) Off on his search for true love and romance, or at least sex, the young bull rumbles his rumble and— if he gets lucky— finds females with similar intentions who rumble back, often from several miles away. He makes a beeline for them, proving once again an elephant’s uncanny ability to communicate and find its way over substantial distances. Once he has done his job, he heads back to his group or solitary wandering, leaving the female to raise the kid. She’s not alone, however.
Gestation is a long, drawn out process. At 22 months, it is the longest among mammals. Baby is something of a relative term, given that the calf weighs in at somewhere between 200-300 pounds or more when born. The aunts and older female cousins stand in a circle around the newborn, trumpet in celebration, and kick dirt on it. At first I thought that maybe the dirt was an initiation ritual: “Welcome to the world, kid. It’s tough out there.” But actually the dirt helps protect the baby’s delicate skin from sunburn, a potentially serious problem. (As I write this, Peggy is sitting on a beach in the Caribbean soaking in the rays. She’s on a mother/daughter cruise with our daughter Tasha. I hope she remembered her sunblock. It beats the heck out of the dirt option.)
Raising a baby is a family effort with all of the females pitching in. Even the teenage females are given babysitting chores, a kind of on-the-job training. Education is big among elephants. It takes several years before a calf has reached the point where it can strike out on its own.
I’d say more than a baby bump. This female in Hwange National Park must be very close to giving birth. I expect it will be a stretch.Another family makes its way along the Chobe River in Botswana. Mom, a teenager and baby in Chobe National Park, Botswana. The baby is about to go for the gold: Mama’s milk.This is a case where the ever useful trunk has to be shoved out of the way.A close up. Momma is feeding herself at the same time. She is stuffing grass in her mouth with her trunk. Babies nurse exclusively for six months, and then off and on for a couple more years as they adjust to regular food. One way they learn what’s good to eat is to shove their trunk into their mother’s and aunt’s mouths to sample what’s on the menu. Some calves will continue to nurse on occasion right up to the time the mom delivers another baby! (When I was a young kid, we had a tomcat that continued to nurse long after he was bigger than his mom. I thought it was perverse and would throw cold water on him. Poor fellow.)An elephants mammary glands are located between their front legs, or ‘arms,’ like they are on humans and other primates.A final family portrait.There is one other grouping of elephants known as a clan, where many families and bond groups join together during dry season in areas where water and food are more readily available. The clan can number up to a hundred or more elephants and even includes bulls. This is along the Chobe River in Botswana. We were lucky to be there at the end of the dry season when everyone was still hanging out. After the rainy season starts, the families disperse throughout the National Park.
This post was twice as long. I had every intention of wrapping up elephants today so I could head on to hippos. They are getting impatient— and no one wants an impatient hippopotamus on their hands. Believe me. A nagging voice in my head suggested this post was too long, however. So I’ve scheduled the last half to go up on Monday where I will talk about such things as big brains, migrating teeth, 5 inch eyebrows, the fact that elephants can’t jump, and why they poop so much. Hint: It’s not rocket science. If you eat 350 pounds of food a day and have a poor digestive system, guess what…
The first elephant we saw was when we were traveling by bus from Victoria Falls to Chobe National Park. It was a magnificent animal with the largest ears we would see on our whole trip. I thought it might charge. The odds are it was simply cooling down its body, or curious. I learned it might have been warning us, however. When an elephant looks at you, raises its ears, and makes a short charge in your direction, the message is clear: Back off! The raised ears are to make the elephant look bigger than it is! An even worse scenario (other than the heart attack you could suffer in the first one), is when the elephant lays back its ears tight against its body, raises its trunk, and starts to charge. Good luck. Running isn’t much of an option unless can run faster than 25 miles per hour. The fastest human in the world might just stand a chance. Standing behind a very large tree could be more helpful. Peggy did that once when a giant bull elk charged her in Yellowstone where she was working as a college student. And she’s still here.
I have big ears. They are 3 1/2 inches long. African elephants have provided a new perspective. Theirs can be six feet long and five feet wide. “The better to hear with,” you might note. And elephants do have good hearing with a range from 14 to 16,000 hz. (Humans range from 20 to 20,000 hz in comparison.) The lower range is known as subsonic. Elephants can actually make subsonic sounds with their trunks that humans can’t hear but elephants can— up to miles away! The large flaps also serve to direct sound toward the inner ear. Think of cupping your hands behind your ears. It helps to say “eh.”
Of equal importance, an elephants ears play a big role in helping it to keep cool. The fancy name for this is thermoregulation, the process that allows your body to maintain its core temperature. For example, a message from your skin goes to your brain saying it’s hot. Your brain sends a message back to your skin: Sweat. Unlike us, elephants don’t have sweat glands except around their feet. They cope with Africa’s hot tropical sun using other methods. We’ve already discussed mud baths. Wrinkly skin is another.
One look at this elephant and you might think it’s older than Methuselah given its wrinkles. Actually, even the youngsters have wrinkles. The cracked skin enables elephants to hold up to 5-10 times more moisture on their skin when they take water or mud baths than they would with smooth skin. As this moisture evaporates, it helps to cool the elephant. A close up of an elephant’s wrinkled skin. Note the hairs. There aren’t many, but scientists believe the thick, bristly hairs serve to transfer heat from the body into the atmosphere, especially if there is a breeze. The impact is apparently much greater than one might imagine.Ears are different. There are no lack of hairs there. (This youngster might also win a wrinkle contest.) While hair growing out of an older man’s ears serves little purpose other than ugly, elephants find them quite beneficial. In addition to keeping bugs and mud out, they also transfer heat and add to the cooling process that takes place in an elephant’s ears. Check out the blood vessels and veins in the elephant’s ear above. It’s packed with them. They are close to the surface and covered by a thin layer of skin. The system allows excess heat to escape from the blood vessels into the air and help to reduce the elephant’s core temperature. It is estimated that an elephant passes the blood in its body through its ears every 20 minutes. This illustration from ScienceGate provides another perspective.
Elephants enhance this process in various ways. Providing air to move the heat away and cool the ear is the most important. Elephants are known to stand in the wind with their ears out. The most common approach, however, is to flap their ears. In addition to providing a breeze for the ears, the flapping also fans the body and blows insects away. (I wish I could flap mine.) Watching a group of elephants crossing the savanna while flapping their ears is so common it’s iconic. Other methods include getting out of the sun and taking mud/water baths.
Returning to our elephant that was bathing and cooling down at a water hole in Hwange National Park in my last post, he paid special attention to spraying down his ears. Given the exposed blood vessels in his ears, it’s easy to understand why this might be an important part of his cooling down effort.
This caused me to think about another aspect of elephant behavior related to their ears. When the elephants came out of the mud bath I featured in my December 4 blog, they gave a vigorous shake to their ears. I thought at the time it was like, “Woohoo!” Thinking back, I wonder if they weren’t shaking the mud off of their ears. Given that the mud in general helps to keep them cool, protect them from sunburn, and frustrate biting bugs, why? My conclusion (for which I couldn’t find back up data) was that the mud coats their ears and reduces the ability of their blood vessels to transfer the heat to the air.
These elephants gave their ears a vigorous shake when they came out of the mud bath. Were they having a Woohoo moment, shaking the mud off, or doing something else?And now it’s time to turn to elephant’s feet. They’re big too, which shouldn’t come as any surprise considering they belong to animals weighing between 2 and 7 tons, the world’s largest land animals. This is an actual footprint of one that Peggy is holding up. It was made by Jumbo, the biggest elephant at the Wild Horizons Elephant Sanctuary, by pressing his inked foot down on paper. We bought the print and carried it home with us. The paper is rather unique in itself. It’s made out of recycled paper and elephant poop. To provide another perspective, this is my size 15 shoe next to a fresh elephant print. We came across it when we were on a safari walk with Terry Anders, who, along with his wife, Sheona, is the owner of the Iganyana Tent Camp located on the edge of Hwange National Park. Terry explained to us that its size indicated it was a large bull elephant. He also told us that each elephants footprint is unique like a fingerprint. Eventually the ridges wear down through extensive walking over varied terrain, providing an indication of the elephant’s age. Here’s what an elephant’s foot looks like close up. Like us, an elephant has five toes on each foot, but not all of the toes have toenails. It actually walks on its toes. A thick pad of gristle extends backward, working something like a shock absorber. The bottom line: This foot was made for walking, and walking it will do— up to 30 miles a day. And, if you irritate the elephant, it may walk all over you. (My apologies to Nancy Sinatra.)This is an elephant’s toe bone that Terry showed us when we were out on our safari walk.Tracking an elephant after a rainstorm would not be a problem!Elephants tend to follow the same routes to reach food and water, creating well worn paths.
Given the years I have spent wandering in the wilderness, I’ve always been interested in animal tracks. And that certainly applies to elephants. But what interests me the most about elephant feet is how they ‘hear’ with them via seismic communication. Caitlin O’Connell-Rodwel, a Stanford researcher, has been returning to the same elephant watering hole in Namibia for over 25 years figuring out how they do it. Her work has demonstrated that African elephants exchange information by emitting low-frequency sounds through their trunks that travel dozens of miles through the ground. She believes this communication is the key in understanding the dynamics of elephant groups. “Announcements” can include warnings, mating calls and navigation instructions, e.g. “Don’t be alarmed sweetie, but I would really like to make it with you under the acacia tree next to the pond.” In a more passive sense, elephants can also keep track of each other through the sound of each other’s foot steps.
They “listen” with their feet in two ways. One is through touch. Just like us, elephants have receptors in their skin known as Pacinian corpuscles that are hardwired to the brain. On an elephant these are located around the edge of their feet. When an elephant is picking up sounds/vibrations, it presses its feet onto the ground, expanding their surface by as much as 20%. Signals are then sent to the brain for processing. While this isn’t hearing exactly, the message gets through. A second method called bone conduction is closer to real hearing. The elephant jabs its big toes into the ground and the vibrations are carried up through its body via bones to the inner ear where they are heard like sound vibrations coming through the air.
And finally, we reach the tail end of this post. Grin. Tails on elephants serve just like tails on cattle: They swish them around a lot and keep the bugs away. But there is more. Almost everyone has seen photos of a baby elephant holding on to its mom’s tail. It serves the same purpose as moms and dads holding their younger children’s hands. It guides them and helps keep them out of trouble. Unfortunately, we didn’t see it on our trip. The mom also uses her tail to keep track of her baby when it isn’t holding her tail by feeling it with her tail. It’s a lot easier than turning around to check on junior. Finally, holding its tail up can signal that the elephant is fearful, highly playful or intensely excited. “Over here, Big Boy.”
At first, I had planned to do one blog on elephants, then it was two. Now it is three. They are just too fascinating, at least for me. Next time I’ll get more into family life, eyes, teeth, bones, and even poop— a single elephant can produce up to one ton in a week!
This baby elephant had just wrapped up a mud bath in Chobe National Park, Botswana. It was about to become part of a dramatic rescue effort.
Today, I am starting my series of posts on Peggy and my recent safari to Botswana, Zimbabwe, and South Africa. It was an incredible adventure, one of our best ever. We owe a large vote of thanks to Peggy’s brother John and his wife Frances for asking us if we would like to join them on the Collette Travel Agency organized trip. Along the way, we visited four national parks, Victoria Falls and Cape Town— staying in accommodations that ranged from a safari lodge, to a tent camp, to a house boat, and comfortable hotels.
Peggy, Frances, John and I with an elephant backdrop on safari in Chobe National Park, Botswana. We were in an open-sided river boat on the Chobe River that provided great views of the wildlife. Since elephants are my subject for the next three posts, I decided repost this photo I used in my last blog.
As for the wildlife we saw? It was incredible! That’s the only way I can think to describe it. In addition to seeing a great variety, we watched them going about their daily business of eating, sleeping, fighting, breeding and even pooping. (Elephants do a lot and hippos whirl their tails like a fan when going. It’s best not get caught in the splatter zone.) What we hadn’t expected to see was the colorful birdlife. It was a plus. Our guides also went out of their way to introduce us to local African culture, which I appreciated a lot, given my service as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Africa.
While we weren’t on a photographic safari, per se, we took a few. Make that 5,000. Grin. We will share some of the best. Exploring in open safari vehicles and boats, plus a “walking safari” provided excellent opportunities for both observation and photography. Our approach will be to feature one animal per blog for the major animals and then move to combined posts for the the birds and animals we saw fewer of.
I’m starting today with elephants. I was going to do two posts on these large, intelligent, family oriented animals but decided on three after I noted a rescue effort by family members when I was reviewing our photos of elephants enjoying a mud bath in Chobe National Park. It reflects an important aspect of how elephants care for one another.
But first, let me begin by noting that elephants take lots of baths, both by cavorting in mud and spraying water (and muddy water!) on themselves. Getting clean isn’t the objective, obviously. With minimal hair and few sweat glands, keeping cool in the hot African sun isn’t easy. The mud baths provide an opportunity to cool down, but they also serve as sunblock, and, to a degree, insect repellent. Elephants can get sunburned. And what blood sucking bug wants a mouthful of mud?
Many of the elephants we saw had mud caked on their wrinkly skin like this one in Matusadona National Park, Zimbabwe.This family of elephants had been grazing on an island in the Chobe River and then crossed over to the shore through the river. Along the way, they had washed off much of their mud. It was time for another mud bath. The bath was located conveniently on their way back into the trees where they would feed on leaves, even if they had to knock over trees to get them. Mom, and the baby shown at the beginning of the post, seem to be having a grand time. Not all was well, with the family, however. One was down and obviously having problems, possibly with a rock embedded in her foot. A concerted rescue effort was about to take place. Members of the family were able to persuade her to stand up and worked out a plan. What happened next was dramatic, to say the least. At first I thought that all of the elephants had crowded together to share the mud hole. Now I am convinced that they joined together to help push the young female out of the hole. Even the calf was lending a shoulder. The young male on the right may have been offering a trunk for support. The adults, having achieved their objective of starting the injured elephant on her way, moved on. The two younger elephants continued to provide support.But then, she fell again, despite their boost…And ended up back in the hole. The youngsters switched locations to encourage her to get up again.And put their whole bodies into the effort.They succeeded and she began crawling out on her own. It wasn’t easy.Note how she is using her trunk for leverage and balance, pulling it toward her and making the dust fly. I’ll write more about this marvelous appendage in my next two posts.Between pulling with her front legs and pushing with her hind legs while using her trunk for balance, she inched toward success. The other elephants moving on likely provided incentive.Finally, she made it! Ears flapping she rushed off to catch up with her family.
Searching on the net, I found where moms help their babies out when they are stuck in mud holes. I also read that when an adult went down, possibly because of old age, the other elephants gather around and help it stand, leaning in to provide support. Such behavior suggests the caring, empathetic nature of elephants. My post today provides a unique example, particularly the role played by the younger elephants.
I’ll conclude today by providing an example of another mud bath, this time traveling into Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe. Several artificial water holes have been established in the park to provide wildlife with water in dry season. It also serves to spread the animals out to reduce overgrazing. Peggy and I took these photos from an observation tower that had been set up beside one of the water holes.
One elephant left its bath while another remained, seeming to play submarine and blow bubbles. Actually, it was using its trunk and possibly its tusks and feet to stir up mud for its mud bath. Having stirred up enough, the elephant surfaced. We were amused by the secretary bird who seemed shocked to see this ‘dark creature rising from the black lagoon.’It seemed to offer a salute. Maybe it was scratching its head… And who knows what it was up to with this pose. The photo-bombing secretary bird didn’t seem impressed.It finished off its bath by spraying itself with muddy water it had sucked into its trunk. I’ll leave you with the vision. In our next post, we’ll continue to explore the fascinating world of elephants, plus visit an elephant graveyard.
Come on in, the water’s fine. How fast can you swim? I can manage 5 miles per mile galloping along the bottom and 19 miles per hour on land.
It took me a while to get back to Africa after my Peace Corps assignment there from 1965-67. When my feet first touched African soil at Roberts Field in Liberia, Peace Corps was a baby of four and I barely qualified as a young adult at 22. That was 58 years ago. I always wanted to go back, but there was a lifetime of other things that needed to be seen and done…
A very young me as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Gbarnga, Liberia in 1967 with the senior class. I taught African History, World History and World Geography at Gboveh High School. My students took top national honors in Social Studies that year.
Peggy and I made up for our lack of African travel this year. In February we flew off to Egypt and boated up the Nile to celebrate my 80th birthday. It was an incredible experience, packed with ancient history and magnificent structures stretching back over 5000 years.
Peggy and I doing the tourist thing after we had just re-entered the world of the living from our trip deep under the pyramid of Khafre at Giza.
Now, we have just returned from a journey to the southern part of the African continent that included national parks in Botswana and Zimbabwe, Lake Kariba, Victoria Falls and Cape Town. It was equal to, if not more impressive than our Egypt adventure. Imagine a herd of several dozen wild elephants joining us for dinner by drinking out of a swimming pool located next to our dining table.
Elephants kept arriving to drink out of the swimming pool which was located about 20 feet away from our dining table at Iganyana Tented Camp in Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe. One group would finish and another would arrive to take its place. This went on for at least an hour. I was kept busy with our iPhone taking photos. Best dinner show we have ever had!
Our recent trip started with a call from Peggy’s brother, John Dallen. Eleven years ago we took a delightful repositioning cruise with him, his wife Frances and friends Lee and Kathy Saaga, exploring the Mediterranean before sailing across the Atlantic back home. Since then, John has called several times with offers to join Frances and him in exploring the world. There were some great trips. But, as John likes to note, our travel styles differ substantially. If he is going to be out for six months, each day is carefully planned and reservations made, normally at four and five star hotels. If Peggy and I travel for six months, we have a vague idea of where we are going and make reservations a day in advance, if then. We once travelled for a year without making one. Our normal mode of travel is with a van or small travel trailer— or, putting our backpacks on and disappearing into the wilderness.
Frances, John, Peggy, Kathy and Lee in Santorini, one of the many places we visited in the Mediterranean.
This time, John made us an offer we couldn’t refuse. “Would you like to go on an African safari with us?” It took us five seconds to say yes. There would be hippos and lions and elephants to see, not to mention leopards, wart hogs, baboons and numerous other animals and birds. I will be featuring the places we visited and the wildlife we saw in our next several posts.
Today’s photos will give you a taste of what to expect. Peggy was traveling with her usual camera, a Canon EOS Rebel with a 20 to 300 mm Tamron lens. For Africa, I upgraded from my pocket Canon Power Shot to a different version, a Canon Power Shot SX 70 HS. Due to the miracle of modern technology it comes with a 21 to 1365 35mm equivalent lens and weighs just over a pound. It made it possible for us to capture photos like the hippo above.
The King of Beasts, proves his cat like nature by washing his face with a paw bath…While the Queen of Beasts just looks regal.It’s a croc! Is that a smile? Maybe he is dreaming of an impala dinner. “Wait for me Mom. I’m hurrying as fast as I can!” This baby elephant in Chobe National Park, Botswana was playing catchup. Gulp. Ostriches graze with their heads down and then raise it up to swallow. Obviously this guy had quite a gullet full. We came on him a couple of miles from the Cape of Good Hope, South Africa. The local bus? Given this photo, it may be hard to believe that the Cape Buffalo is the most dangerous animal in Africa. The birds aren’t getting a free ride, however. They are picking bugs off, which is much appreciated by both the birds and the buffalo.Would you believe my grey blue tongue is about 19 inches long?Have you seen any road or lion kill? I’m not particular about where it is or how long it has been there. We found this cute little fellow on Table Mountain above Cape Town, South Africa. I’m betting you probably don’t know its closest relatives. We sure didn’t. They are the elephant and the manatee. I’ll conclude today with this photo of Peggy, Frances, John and me on the Chobe River with an elephant backdrop. My next post will feature these elephants and many more we met along the way! John, BTW, has a travel blog you might want to check out at: dallen.posthaven.com. He calls his blog “Are We There Yet?”
If I were in charge of making mountains, I would use the Grand Tetons as a model. A blogging friend of mine told me that the first time she saw them, she started crying. They inspire that kind of awe.
Just before we reached Yellowstone NP on our four month trip around the US last fall, we drove through Grand Tetons National Park. I’ll be featuring photos Peggy and I took of the Grand Tetons and the Absaroka Range today.
As Peggy and I drove across the 9,658 feet (2,943 m) Togwotee Pass, we were excited. We were in the Rocky Mountains and had just crossed over the Continental Divide. We were back in the West! Rivers would now be flowing into the Pacific Ocean. Soon we would get our first views of the Grand Tetons— not that there was anything shabby about the scenery on pass.
As we passed over the Continental Divide at Togwotee Pass, our excitement grew. This area receives over 25 feet of snow a year, a figure that can climb as high as 50, which I suspect it has this year.It was in October and the aspens near the pass were displaying their fall colors.The Absaroka Range, which can be seen from the pass, provided a backdrop for this grove. The range serves as the eastern boundary to Yellowstone NP.My father once painted a picture of the Absaroka Range.Professional photographer Glen Fishback took this photo of my dad painting the Absaroka Range in the 1980s. Pop, as we knew him, had wandered around the country with his sister, Eleanor, a few years earlier. I took this photo through glass so I couldn’t capture it as well as I would have liked to. Glen used my dad as a model and this photo ended up in a national photography magazine.A final Highway 26 road shot of the Absaroka Range. The Grand Tetons were waiting.
The Grand Tetons are a baby range, relatively speaking, less than 10 million years old. Compare that with the Rockies at 50-80 million years or the Appalachians at over 300 million. That’s what gives them their rugged, good looks. Erosion hasn’t had time to wear away their jagged peaks. Earthquakes along the Teton fault on the east side of the range are responsible for their height. Plate tectonic movement, which is stretching the region in an east west direction, is responsible for the earthquakes. When the tension becomes too great, an earthquake takes place, usually of 7 to 7.5 magnitude, i.e. big. Seesaw-like, the mountains rise and the valley next to it falls along the 40 mile fault, with each earthquake averaging around 10 feet of up and down movement. It is estimated that the mountain range has risen some 26,000 feet with 6,000 feet showing above the floor and 20,000 buried under it. Geologists estimate that the last major quakes were about 5,900, 8,000, and 10,000 years ago.
The Tetons were looming above a dark conifer forest in our first views with a hint of the colors to come.Aspens were soon adding larger splashes of color. The high peak in the center is Grand Teton, after which the range is named. It has an elevation of 13, 775 feet.Mt. Moran dominates the northern section of the Tetons and rises 12,605 feet above sea level. The orange colored leaves are from cottonwoods.Our road ran next to Jenny Lake and provided some great views of the Tetons.Ducks were busily eating on the lake.The only photo we took of the park that didn’t feature the mountains.A final photo of Mt. Moran from Jenny Lake. Next Monday’s post will be on the German town of Breisach along the Rhine River.
Peggy and I are wrapping up our visit to Yellowstone today from our journey around the US last fall with pictures of a few of the many scenic views found in the park. All photos are taken by either Peggy or me unless otherwise noted.
When it comes to scenic beauty, one can find plenty in the rivers that flow through Yellowstone National Park. This photo is Gibbon Falls on the Gibbon River.The river drops some 84 feet and then makes its tumbling way for a quarter of a mile to the Yellowstone Caldera. A paved trail leads along the river providing great views of Gibbon Falls.A close up. Can you hear the roar? Having cut its way back from the Yellowstone Caldera, the rock will continue to erode its base leaving the Caldera farther behind and increasing in height. Looking positively serene in comparison to Gibbon Falls, this is a shot of Firehole River not far from Old Faithful and the main hot springs area of Yellowstone. Appearances are deceiving, however. toward the end of the photo you can see where the river narrows. It is about to go tumbling down…A side road runs along the Firehol River and provides views of the river’s rapid descent. I’d say we were no more than a few hundred yards below where we took the ‘serene’ photo.This would probably make a white water rafter or kayaker drool.If I were in a raft and turned around to spot this monster, I might have a heart attack. Can you spot the eyes, nose and mouth? Not to worry, however. Yellowstone National Park does not allow rafting on its rivers. The monster has to eat fish. There is a small section of the river between rapids where Peggy swam when she was working at Yellowstone in 1969. She apparently avoided the monster. The Firehole calms down when it meets up with the Gibbon River. And check out the wall. Isn’t it magnificent? Climb to the top and you will be out of the Caldera. Some rock climbing skills may be necessary. Grin.This close up of volcanic rock spires above the river provides a perspective on how rugged the cliffs above the river can be.The Gibson/Firehole river then joins the Madison for a more leisurely pace and great fishing, which is what the two people on the left are doing. We also spotted buffalo and elk near the river. We found this little beauty on our way up to Mammoth Hot Springs and its travertine terraces. It was a bonus. Known as the Gardner River, it had carved out Sheep Eaters’ Cliff that we had stopped to see.If this looks familiar, these are the same type of basalt columns that I featured on my earlier post about Devil’s Tower National Monument. The primary difference being that the columns at Devil’s Tower formed far underground and grew to gigantic size. These were part of a lava flow along the surface and are much smaller. I suspect you are curious about the name. I was. The cliff is named after a band of Shoshone Indians who were known as the Tukudika, or Sheep Eaters. They apparently found big horned sheep quite tasty. I get it. I presently have a package of lamb in our refrigerator that I am planning on turning into lamb curry, one of my favorite dishes.As we continued our journey toward Mammoth Hot Springs in the northern section of Yellowstone, we came on a wildly colored meadow painted with fall colors. I liked it so much that Peggy took my photo standing in front of it.This comes close to my idealized view of the Western United States with vast distances topped off by impressive mountains. The soft colors of fall, the dark tree lines and gently rolling hills all added to the beauty. Over on the right, you can also see an aspen grove.Another view of the backcountry on our way to Mammoth Hot Springs that we liked.We even found a buffalo that seemed to fit beautifully into the fall scene.Ever feel like you are living on the edge? The view around the corner was spectacular.It was the sunlight on the peak that caught our attention. But note the avalanche path along side the peak as well. It has to be one of the longest paths I have seen. And finally, there was the splash of brilliant yellow from the aspens.Speaking of aspens, I’ll wrap up today’s post with these beauties. They will also serve to wrap up my series on the Yellowstone National Park. In our next Monday post, Peggy and I will visit two scenic towns along the Rhine River. BTW, as you read this, Peggy and I are on a riverboat traveling up the Nile River in Egypt on my 80th Birthday trip.
Today,Peggy and I are continuing our exploration of Yellowstone National Park, which we visited as part of our four month, 12,000 mile exploration of the US between September and December this past year. All photos in this post were taken by either Peggy or me unless otherwise noted.
If you are visiting Yellowstone National Park, be sure to visit the colorful travertine terraces of Mammoth Hot Springs.
Located 50 miles north of Old Faithful, the travertine terraces of Mammoth Hot Springs are one of the most unique and beautiful of Yellowstone’s hydrothermal created landscapes. The terracing is a result of underlying limestone. Hot water dissolves the limestone and deposits it on the surface. The bright colors, like the colors of the hot springs in the Yellowstone Caldera to the south, are created by thermophiles, tiny microorganisms that thrive in the hot springs. Different types of thermophiles have different tolerance for the heat and come in different colors based upon their exposure to sunlight. Those that can tolerate the most heat live deep in the pools and tend toward blue and green. The ones living on the cooler outer edges are more in the brown and yellow range.
Peggy and I took a day to drive up from where we were camped in the town of West Yellowstone to visit Mammoth Hot Springs. On the way up we saw a lot of great scenery that I will feature in another post and two hydrothermal features I haven’t covered in this series yet: mud pots and fumaroles.
Mud pots occur when hot thermal water is flowing under a layer of clay that blocks the water from escaping to the surface. Steam from the water, however, is able to make its way through the clay. Certain microorganisms convert the sulfur dioxide in the steam to sulfuric acid which turns the clay into a gooey, sticky consistency. Bubbles are created as a result of the steam bubbling up through the goo. It sound like plop, plop, plop. I included this exploding bubble in an earlier post. I liked it so much you get to see it again.A fumarole is similar to a geyser but lacks the water to create eruptions. Instead, the heat from the volcanic rocks turns what water is available into incredibly hot steam that escapes from vents and ranges in temperatures up to 280°F (138°C). It can be noisy. This is a shot of Roaring Mountain that received its name from the noise created by the escaping steam. It could be heard from miles away in the 90s. It’s quieter today.
And now it’s time to visit the terraces of Mammoth Hot Springs. A convenient road takes you around the terraces. Walkways off the road take you to the lower terraces. The following photos were taken from the walkways.
Canary Springs is one of the most popular sites along the lower terrace trail at Mammoth Hot Springs.A broader, softer perspective of Canary Springs.A view of the travertine terrace just above Canary Springs.Another perspective of the terrace just before the water flows over the edge.Cupid Springs. I don’t have a clue on how it got its name.Umpteen shades of grey.
The road snakes around the upper terrace. There are several pullouts that allow close up views of the various formations.
This section is known as Angel’s Terrace. I’m assuming it’s because of the white travertine, which is how the dissolved lime comes out of the ground.Another perspective. Like stair steps.We really liked the contrast of colors here.It was the colors, shape and tree that caught our attention that had us pull out our cameras.This unique dome is known as Elephants Back.We were driving back to West Yellowstone when we came across this very colorful small dome. The steam coming from the back suggests a fumarole. We simply had to stop and photograph it. That does it for today. Our next post will be on Heidelberg Castle. After that, it will be back to Yellowstone and its scenic beauty.
I was cooking beef pot-roast in our insta-pot and time was running out. I had miscalculate the time it would take and we were going to miss the Badlands at sunset. “Go ahead,” Peggy told me. She knew how much I wanted to catch the colors. “I’ll finish up here. We can eat when you get back.” My sweetie didn’t have to offer twice. I was out the door and into the truck. The sunset was quite impressive and the food tasted delicious when I returned. Following are some of the photos I took. Enjoy.
Next week we will be returning to our summer trip up the Rhine River. Please join Peggy and me along with our kids and grandkids as we explore the Rhine, castles, colorful towns, the Black Forest and a couple of impressive cities.
I was getting the ‘look’ when I snapped this photo of a bighorn sheep on Sage Road.
Sage Road in Badlands National Park is known for its easily accessible wildlife population. We drove out it during our recent stay near the Badlands to see what we could find. This fellow, along with a few other bighorn sheep, was hanging out along side the gravel road. Its look seemed to say, “Don’t mess with me.” Big horn sheep were first re-introduced to the Park 1922 with more being added later. The park’s herd now numbers near 250.
This youngster is busy chewing on weeds. Bighorn stuff themselves with tough-to-eat grass like this and then retreat to somewhere high and safe where they can regurgitate it and chew it more thoroughly. (Remember your mom urging you to chew your food!) What we don’t have that the sheep do, however, is four stomachs to help in the digesting process. (Photo by Peggy Mekemson.)Bighorn sheep checking us out.
We also found a few buffalo along the way. The National Park website, which is where I found the details on the wildlife included in today’s post, gives the buffalo’s scientific name as Bison, bison, bison, i.e. they are of the genus Bison, of the species bison, and the subspecies bison. Buffalo was derived from the French “bœuf,” meaning buffalo, and given to the large creatures by early French fur trappers. The Lakota name for bison is tatanka. Bison were incredibly important to the Lakota and other Native Americans of the Great Plains who carefully used every part of the buffalo they killed. An estimated 30 million roamed the area prior to the arrival of Euro-Americans who hunted the buffalo almost to extinction for their hides and tongues. An even darker reason is given for the slaughter: The US government wanted to disrupt the Indigenous people’s way of life to make way for the Euro-Americans. One way of doing this was killing off the vast herds of buffalo that the natives depended on to live.
These large furry creatures paid zero attention to us as they grazed beside Sage road, which is what we wanted! They do look like something that would be fun to pet, however. (Photo by Peggy Mekemson.)Don’t. The fur says pet me; the eyes say don’t even think about it. One does not want to irritate a creature that can weigh up to 2000 pounds and run fast, really fast. Sign after sign in national and state parks where the buffalo roam, warn people to keep their distance. Despite the warnings, some people insist on a closer view, which can result in a bad ending. I watched a video of a guy standing five feet away from a buffalo waving his arms and shouting. A few seconds later, he was taking flying lessons. (Photo by Peggy Mekemson.)Peggy did not take this picture. Unlike her husband, Peggy does not take photos of poop to put in the blog. I tend to go along with the philosophy of the bison: Let the chips fall where they may.
It’s Fat Bear Week, as anybody who hangs out in social media is probably aware. The prairie dogs of the Badlands want you to know that they consider it discrimination that there is no Fat Prairie Dog Week. When their size is taken into consideration, they are willing to take on any bear when it comes to putting on the pounds/ounces!
“Bring it on bears!” this fat prairie dog seems to say as he prepares to stuff more food down his gullet in preparation for winter. (Photo by Peggy Mekemson.)When it seems like just about everyone wants to eat you (the fatter the better), it is wise to look both ways. Prairie dogs have a distinctive set of whistles that warns their fellow dogs of what danger exists. Is it a hawk, or a snake, or a coyote, or a black footed ferret, etc. that considers you part of their menu? There is a whistle for each. Or is it a camera carrying human who only wants a photo?The black footed ferret, btw, was close to extinction. It is now being reintroduced to areas where their main source of food, prairie dogs, live. This suits the ferret just fine. It can eat up to a hundred a year. I doubt that anyone asked the prairie dogs if they wanted to participate in the “Save the Ferret” campaign.
There is a Prairie Dog Town located along Sage Road. Park publicity and a pull-off guarantees that tourists will arrive in significant numbers to capture photos of the fat, furry squirrels. Sharp whistles warn of the two legged visitors. Here’s a fascinating fact that I read on the Badlands NP website: An estimated 5 billion prairie dogs once lived on the Great Plains in their underground boroughs. The largest of their historic towns has been estimated to cover over 25,000 square miles (64,749 kilometers)! For perspective, that’s larger than West Virginia and 9 other smaller states in the US or Croatia and 23 other smaller countries in Europe.
Beyond wildlife, Sage Road shows a different type of beauty than that found along the Loop Road, which runs along the Wall and through the badlands seen in the distance.
We loved the contrast between the golden grass on the gentle hills and green stands of trees found down in the gullies. (Photo by Peggy Mekemson.)The lone tree caught my attention in this photo. Peggy captured me heading for another tree I found interesting. Given my wandering ways, she wondered if I would stop there.I did stop, even though the stand of trees up ahead was calling to me. This is one of a number of photos I took of the tree.Meanwhile, Peggy had found a flock of turkeys that caught her attention. This was just a few of the flock. The others had disappeared down into the gully. (Photo by Peggy Mekemson.)As we drove back up Sage Road, returning to our camp, we stopped for a final photo that had more of a Badlands feel to it. Late afternoon colors were beginning to seep in. I’ll feature sunset photos in my next post. I was impressed. I imagine you will be as well.A preview of next week’s post.
Wandering through Time and Place 