August 21, 2016
Lion Cub, Common Squacco Heron, and Leopard in Selous Game Reserve, Mikumi National Park, and Ruaha National Park, Tanzania

I've recently completed an exploratory trip to Tanzania where I visited three new parks for the first time: Selous Game Reserve, Mikumi National Park, and Ruaha National Park. It was quite exciting to go somewhere I haven't been before, and also challenging to act as a guide for two repeat clients who were along for the adventure. It was a great learning experience and we also captured some great images. We started off with six nights in Selous Game Reserve. The large grazing animals were quite skittish, but the birds were much more cooperative, so we spent a lot of time photographing them. The highlight of the visit was spending time on three different days with a small pride of lions (Panthera leo) that had two cubs. In the image above, one of the cubs has a muddy chin from drinking.

We spent one night in Mikumi National Park, and had a great morning at a waterhole that had high sides around most of it where we could photograph birds from near eye level from the comfort of our vehicle. This is a Common Squacco Heron (Ardeola ralloides). As we were busy with the birds, a herd of elephants approached, so we got into position to photograph them drinking from the waterhole. Then a herd of zebras came to the waterhole to drink too.

We ended the safari with six nights in Ruaha National Park, and we had a spectacular time. On our first full day, we had two male lions try to take down a cape buffalo (one had jumped on its back but couldn't take it down) and a little further along the road we had a pair of lions mating. Later in our visit, we had a small pride of lions take down a yellow baboon. The grazing mammals were much more relaxed than in Selous, so it was a lot easier to photograph them. The birds were also cooperative, so we spent a lot of time with them as well. The highlight of our visit was spending about 40 minutes with a Leopard (Panthera pardus) on the ground as she searched for prey. In this image, she paused atop a small boulder to get a better look over the brush.