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Mellivora capensis (the name means honey eater of the Cape) is the species’ scientific name. “The Cape” is The Cape of Good Hope, South Africa, where many reside. Another one of their names is ratel, which is an Afrikaans word that might be derived from the Dutch word for honeycomb, raat.  It’s true that the honey badger has the Guinness Book of World Records title of “World’s Most Fearless Creature,” but they’re more than just audacious: they’re downright mean. The animals are usually diurnal in winter, but where they need to avoid humans, they’re usually nocturnal. They eat anything, They’re omnivores who will go after mammals, birds, reptiles, insects, larvae, plants, fruit, eggs, and roots. They are thick-skinned, there are reports of arrows and spears glancing off their thick, rubbery epidermis. The honey badger may even have a resistance to snake venom and is sometimes able to sleep off a bite, their thick skin comes in handy in this way, too. Snakes compose a quarter of their diets. Their bite is so powerful they can chomp down with enough force to break the shell of a tortoise.  You might have heard that honey badgers and honeyguide birds have a good partnership going: the honeyguide leads the badger to the hive and then eats up after the honey badger destroys it. Well, honey badgers don’t care and this behaviour in nature is not fully proven, honey badgers are pretty solitary.  Ferocious, fearless, and pugnacious animals aren’t always the smartest, but honey badgers break the mould. They’re so intelligent that they even use tools.  

The European Bee-eater (Merops apiaster) is a beautiful and elegant bird similar to a rainbow when flying. Non-breeding plumage in male is duller than breeding, juvenile is paler than adults and has brown eyes. They breed in Southern Europe, North and South Africa and Western Asia. This species is strongly migratory and winters in tropical Africa, India and Sri Lanka. European Bee-eater feeds primarily on bees, wasps, hornets and similar species. It catches them on the wing, performing sallies from exposed perches. Before swallowing the prey, the bee-eater strikes it against a hard surface in order to remove the sting. One single bird may eat up to 250 bees per day.  They also catch other insects such as dragonflies, butterflies, cicadas, termites and grasshoppers.  The bird frequently regurgitates pellets containing the indigestible parts of the insects. The male performs courtship feeding to female, soon after the birds arrive on breeding grounds. Copulation may follow this behaviour but after several offers. European Bee-eater usually nests in loose colonies. Soon after the birds arrive on the breeding grounds, the pair, often with some helpers, excavates the burrow at the male’s natal site. The nest is made in flat or sloping sandy ground, mainly in earthen cliffs. The birds remove between 7 and 12 kg of earth from the burrow, and the process can last between 10 and 20 days. The burrow is about 70-150 cm long, with oval section of 7 x 9 cm. Female lays 4-10 eggs at 1-2 days intervals. Incubation lasts 20 days, sometimes more in Palaearctic, but only 13 days in South Africa. Both sexes incubate and take turns. European Bee-eater is locally common and widespread in most parts of the range. However, this species is threatened by hunting as pest or for consumption, by the use of pesticides involving heavy declines in insects’ populations, also by canalization of rivers with loss of sandy banks nesting-sites, and human developments and disturbances.   Source: HANDBOOK OF THE BIRDS OF THE WORLD

African leopard (Panthera pardus)  1. Because of adapted retinas, leopards can see seven times better in the dark than humans. 2. Black leopards are seen infrequently in parts of Africa. The difference in colour is not indicative of a separate sub-species, but rather dominance of the dark-coloured pigment melanin in the skin. There is a considerable variation in the coat colour and rosette patterns depending on the location of the animal. In East Africa, the leopard’s rosettes are more circular but tend to be more square-shaped in southern Africa. The yellow coat is paler in the desert regions. 3. Portrayed as the most seldom seen, leopards are actually the most widely distributed African big cat. They can be found in a variety of habitats ranging from desert country to equatorial forests, high mountains to coasts.  4. Leopards are spectacular hunters! Not only are they quite fast and can run up to 58km/h, but are also famous for their incredible agility and strength to climb trees while dragging a kill that is sometimes heavier than their body weight. 5. Leopards survive on a variety of prey. For example, in some regions of southern Africa, 80% of their diet comprises of rock hyrax. In the Kalahari Desert, they are known to favour bat-eared fox. Leopards also eat fish, insects, reptiles, birds, rodents, porcupines, mongoose, baboons, genets and monkeys. 6. How do you tell the difference between a leopard, cheetah and jaguar? Look at the spots! Leopards have rosette spots on the body and solid black spots on the legs, head and sides. There are also no black facial stripes, unlike cheetahs. Compared to jaguars, leopards do not have smaller spots inside the polygonal rosettes. 7. To recognise a male from a female take a look at the difference in size. Males are usually much larger and stockier and have a significantly bigger head and paws compared to females. Male bushveld leopards can weigh up to 90kgs, with female’s around 60kgs.  8. African leopards mate throughout the year, but a higher sexual activity is recorded during the wet season. 9. Female leopards protect their young cubs by hiding them in lairs. Lairs can be found in a variety of places, including outcrops of granite boulders, old aardvark holes made in the side of termite mounds, or dense thickets at the bottom of deep galleys. These hiding places serve as a refuge for when the mother is away, as lions and hyenas pose a significant threat to the cubs. The mother changes the lair every few days to eliminate the chances of discovery by other predators. 10. Leopards make a variety of sounds, including a territorial hoarse, raspy cough, a contented purr, and a threatening hiss. 11. Even though most photographs show leopards in trees, research reveals that they spend most of their time on the ground. Leopards use trees as the perfect escape point from predators; to keep their kills out of the reach of scavengers, and to get the best vantage point. source: Africa Geographic  

Impala (Aepyceros melampus) They might be the most common animal species to see in the Kruger National Park, but they have some amazing characteristics that most people often overlook. When it is not mating season a lot of herds come together and forage, with no apparent territories present. These big herds make an individual impala’s chance of being targeted by a predator much less. This is called a dilution effect. Impala will also, on occasion, associate with herds of wildebeest and zebra to “hide behind other animals”. It is natural instinct for prey species like this to be situated in the middle of the herd, putting other species at a more vulnerable spot. These are known as selfish herds. Impala, like most antelope species, have loose bottom incisor teeth in their sockets that are used as a comb when grooming. They also groom each other (allo-grooming) to get rid of ticks in areas where the individual can’t reach. With these loose incisors, ticks and parasites are trapped between the teeth. Red-billed oxpeckers (Buphagus erythrorhynchus) and Yellow-billed oxpeckers (Buphagus africanus) also aid this grooming process and will often be found on impala These antelopes have incredibly impressive athletic skills – they are able to clear a 3m high and 12m long-jump without any effort! Sometimes, you may also see some members of a herd running around and portraying an almost “playful” gesture where they run at nearly full speed and suddenly change into a jumping and rocking movement of the body. The reason for this – nobody really knows! This is a very vigilant species, and very skittish sometimes when looking out for danger. The smallest suspicious movement can trigger an alarm call from one of its members in the herd. Impala respond to alarm calls of other species around them – whether it is a bird, vervet monkey, or zebra. But, in contrast, not all species react to their alarm calls. Other prey species have learned this – if there is only an impala alarm calling without them really seeing the threat or danger, they don’t really adhere to the warning. Impala might be the most common antelope species you’ll find while on a Kruger safari, but do not overlook them, they are amazing antilops. 

With their sleek, streamlined body, short, reddish-gold coat, and dramatic markings on the face, caracals are among the most beautiful of wild cats. The caracal ranges across Africa and the Middle East to India. It is keenly adapted to the potentially harsh environments of savanna, semi-desert, dry woodland, arid hilly steppe, and dry mountains.  Like the rest of the small cats, caracals may purr when content and make a variety of other mews, growls, and hisses to express their mood. Caracals are usually silent but can cry out like a leopard. Scent is also used to get a message across, and caracals have scent glands between their toes and on their face. The cats can sharpen their claws on a tree and mark their territory visually and with scent at the same time! The scent may serve to keep other caracals away or to indicate a willingness to breed. Despite their secretive habits, caracals have been a part of humans’ lives for hundreds of years. In India and Iran, they were used to hunt birds for sport. Owners would have contests to see how many pigeons their cat could bring down in a single try, often reaching 10 or more! The saying “to put a cat among the pigeons” comes from this ancient practice. The picture is shot in a rescue center for big African cats confiscated from illegal trade and the black market. 

Giving birth is difficult for female spotted hyenas, as the females give birth through their narrow clitoris, and hyena cubs are the largest carnivoran young relative to their mothers’ weight. Cubs are born with soft, brownish-black hair, and weigh 1.5 kg on average.   Unique among carnivorous mammals, spotted hyenas are also born with their eyes open and with 6–7 mm long canine teeth and 4 mm long incisors. Also, cubs will attack each other shortly after birth. This is particularly apparent in same-sexed litters and can result in the death of the weaker cub. Male cubs that survive grow faster and are likelier to achieve reproductive dominance, while female survivors eliminate rivals for dominance in their natal clan. Spotted hyenas are social animals that live in large communities (clans). Females dominate males, with even the lowest ranking females being dominant over the highest-ranking males. High-ranking hyenas maintain their position through aggression directed against lower-ranking clan-members. Spotted hyena hierarchy is nepotistic; the offspring of dominant females automatically outrank adult females subordinate to their mother. Compared to other hyenas, the spotted hyena shows a greater relative amount of frontal cortex which is involved in the mediation of social behavior. Studies strongly suggest convergent evolution in spotted hyena and primate intelligence. The spotted hyena is very efficient at eating its prey; not only is it able to splinter and eat the largest ungulate bones, but it is also able to digest them completely. Spotted hyenas can digest all organic components in bones, not just the marrow. Any inorganic material is excreted with the feces, which consist almost entirely of a white powder with few hairs.  

I couldn’t not add a gallery about Romania, I couldn’t not pay the tribute to the country that welcomed me like its son and gave me everything I am today.  To be honest, to make wildlife photography here it’s much more difficult, maybe because I am at home, maybe I do many other things around, but wildlife photography here means something completely different and I almost missed it. My purpose for the future is to immortalize all the emblematic species of Romania, and they are a lot, I am so lucky to live in one of the countries in Europe with the highest biodiversity and I have the duty to honor this.  Let’s start with an old king, who disappeared at the end of the 18th century from Romania and with big efforts reintroduced slowly in the last decade by several NGOs in different natural habitats. The European bison (Bison bonasus)

We were roaming around for hours without spotting nothing else than herbivores, at one point we took a small lateral road, a car approached us and announced that there is a cheetah far away in the bush. It took us some time to find it, under some trees was laying a long silhouette, we enjoyed that almost invisible cat for a while, the cheetah did absolutely nothing, that was its nap. No one was around. Half an hour later they decided to move, yes, they, because there were two cheetahs in the bush, few meters far away one from the other.  Adrenaline was high, they start walking toward us ignoring us, I shoot some more pictures, then the angle changed, soon I changed the lens of the camera, head up and at least 10 cars were blocking us and our view.  I know this is normal during a safari but I stopped shooting and just hoped the animals would disappear soon, it took a few seconds more for them to vanish in the bushes.  This picture represents my first cheetahs and my intimate encounter with them. 

Elephant families have a matriarchal head, meaning that an older, experienced lady elephant leads the herd. A family usually consists of a mother, her sisters, their daughters, and babies (calves).  Occasionally, non-related elephants join to form families. Female family units range from three to twenty-five elephants. Female elephants (cows) help each other looking after calves. Babysitting other female’s calves is important for elephant development; young females learn how to look after the young, and the calves are shown how it’s done. The survival rate of a calf greatly increases when more females are present and willing to take care of it.