We saw two species of gazelles on our recent Kenya trip, this being the more common Thomson’s gazelle. And when I say common, that’s an understatement. They can be seen in numbers exceeding 200,000. They are small and fast. In fact they are the fourth fastest land mammal on earth. Unfortunately for them, their main predator, the cheetah, is the fastest land mammal. That said, “tommies” can often use their speed and agility to evade danger. We saw two cheetah/gazelle chases. One was successful for the cheetah, the other for the gazelle. Nikon Z8 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 200, f/5.6 at 1/800th of a second.

Helmeted Guineafowl are a common sight on safaris. They are widespread throughout sub-Sahara Africa and often get overlooked as they scurry in front of or behind more sought after species. In fact, this one was running past our vehicle while we were photographing a couple of lions. Nikon Z8 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 1800, f/5.6 at 1/640th of a second.

These two female lions found the best seat in the house (in this case the house being Samburu National Park in Kenya). They were up there for a good while, surveying the landscape below, no doubt keeping an eye out for their next meal. Nikon Z8 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, f/5.6 at 1/1250th of a second.

Here’s another shot from our first night when we visited Nairobi National Park. It was getting pretty dark at this point, but still enough light to catch a few portraits of this secretary bird nesting in the top of an acacia tree. These guys spend most of the day on the ground before returning to their nests at night. They are birds of prey and quite large (growing to more than 4 feet tall). They’ve been described as an eagle-like bird on crane-like legs. Nikon Z8 with Nikkor 500mm lens, ISO 2800, f/5.6 at 1/640th of a second.

We saw this mother cheetah and her four cubs three or four times over a four-day period in northern Kenya, often in pretty good light. This was early morning and Mom was just joining back up with her cubs after hydrating down at a river. You can see all four cubs hiding in the grass. Nikon Z8 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 1250, f/5.6 at 1/1250th of a second.

Here’s another shot of the white rhino mother and calf that we saw our first night in Nairobi National Park. From the ground level perspective, the calf looks almost as big as the mother. Nikon Z8 with Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 lens (at 69mm) ISO 2200, f/5.6 at 1/640th of a second.

These guys seemed to be hatching some sort of an escape plan. A Cape buffalo, yellow billed stork and a pair of yellow billed oxpeckers all hanging out in apparent symbiosis. Nikon D850 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 200, f/5.6 at 1/500th of a second.

“Big tusker” is a term used to describe elephants with tusks that weight more than 100 pounds each, and are so long they graze the ground as the elephant walks (the heaviest ever tusk for an African elephant was 226 lbs). The last of the true big tuskers live in an area of Tsavo National Park in Kenya. They are nearly gone due to their desirability to hunters and poachers. I photographed these two elephants in the Masai Mara of Kenya. They aren’t exactly in the big tusker category, but they did have the longest tusks of any elephants we saw on this recent trip, especially the bigger of the two in the foreground. Nikon Z8 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 125mm) ISO 320, f/5.6 at 1/1000th of a second.

Olive baboons are often seen grooming one another. It’s part of their social behavior, usually removing ticks in areas that the one receiving the grooming can not reach. Photographed just outside the Masai Mara in Kenya. Nikon Z8 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 500, f/5.6 at 1/640th of a second.

We didn’t see too many ostriches on this trip, but we did have good luck with them the first night in Nairobi National Park. This is the common ostrich. We also saw a couple of Somali ostriches while in Samburu, but none posing for the camera quite like this guy. Nikon Z8 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 560, f/6.3 at 1/640th of a second.