Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2013/03/21
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]By oversight (and sleepiness) I inadvertently sent these to the Forum. Anyway, here they are, Lappet-faced Vultures at Amboseli. Cheers Jayanand ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Jayanand Govindaraj <jayanand at gmail.com> Date: Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 11:05 PM Subject: Lappet-faced Vultures To: "LUG forum: for off-topic arguments" <forum at leica-users.org>, PSM < psm1857 at googlegroups.com> I have just returned from a longish trip to Amboseli National Park and Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya and Ndutu Conservation Area in Tanzania. To start the photographs off, here are some studies of Lappet-faced Vultures, the largest vultures in Africa, in Amboseli. They are also the only vultures that can cut through the hide of a carcass, so other vultures, on finding a carcass to scavenge, would have to wait for these vultures to turn up to open up the body. A couple were building a nest, so, every now and then, one of them would buzz off and return with a twig - surprisingly, they would search for a particular type of twig on the ground and then pick it up and return. This gave us the opportunity to stake out the nest for a few sorties (after which they both flew off, ostensibly to eat), and photograph them landing on the nest on top of an tree: Landing: http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/EAfrica/2013/Amboseli_20130301_03085.jpg.html Glide: http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/EAfrica/2013/Amboseli_20130301_03089.jpg.html Approach: http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/EAfrica/2013/Amboseli_20130301_03091.jpg.html Flight: http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/EAfrica/2013/Amboseli_20130301_03318.jpg.html Flap: http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/EAfrica/2013/Amboseli_20130301_03090.jpg.html Please see LARGE. Comments and criticism, as ever, welcome. Cheers Jayanand