Monday, January 4, 2016

Nakuru National Park, Kenya, January 3, 2016

Nakuru National Park is only 188 square kilometres and due to a "mystery", the salt water lake is rising, killing trees-



And no longer the home to millions of pink flamingos.  Their food - surface algae, is gone.  The lesser flamingo, which is white, still comes but in limited numbers-


There are also a few Pelicans-


40 female impalas hang out with one male who will eventually get chased away by a stronger male-


Water bucks secrete a "poison" that keeps predators away-


The Cape Eland is the largest antelope in the world-


Zebras are plentiful and tame-



Young ones have brown stripes-


Zebra have never been domesticated.  Our guide said they are too wild to tame.

This lizard has some cool colors-


The wijd (Dutch for wide in English) rhino is named after the shape of its lip.  They also have a convex back and a longer horn.  They weigh 2.5-3 tonnes, have poor eye sight but good hearing.  Their skin is 5cm thick! They have no predators and can live to be 45 years old.  There are only 25,000 left in the world.  They are poached for their horn- it's seen as an aphrodisiac-


Finally they stood up-


Water buffalo are also plentiful.  Egrets eat ticks and bugs hanging around the buffalo-



The Hoo Poe bird is one of the most colorful in Africa.  The head feathers fan out-


The black rhino is VERY rare.  They aren't social at all and are "browser" - eating leaves from bushes.  Their back is also concave and their mouth is pointier than the wide rhino-


The Makalia Falls were rushing well.  Look at those shorts!  Believe it or not they are clean!  However, they aren't coming home with me!  How about the hair!


The landscape is very savannah like-


No lions today but looking forward to heading back to Nairobi tomorrow!



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