IN BLACK AND WHITE

It  was while tidying up around the house on this rather cold and gloomy afternoon, that I came across this display of soft joy:

Reminding me of cuddles, fun, laughter and chatting with children and grandchildren. It also reminded me of how the beaded zebras downstairs joined in our Christmas festivities:

That picture reminded me that Laurie Graves can’t wait for me to go to – and return from – the Mountain Zebra National Park to show her more photographs of zebras. This foretaste is for you:

While scrolling through to find that one, I see this cake:

Back home, this is one of many cows making up the Urban herd:

Lastly, here is a Pied Starling:

ANOTHER LOOK AT TERMITE MOUNDS

The Eastern Cape is riddled with termite mounds and so I do not have to travel very far to see some. This one, for example, is in fairly good condition:

You can see where some extra layers have been added to both the top and the sides. There are a number of holes exposed on the side facing us, yet this does not mean that the mound has been abandoned. A mound along the same fence line and not far from this one has been broken and so the intricate holes and tunnel systems inside have been exposed.

Another mound, this time photographed in the Mountain Zebra National Park, shows signs of more recent repairs.

So far so good. We know that mounds are raided by aardvarks and by aarwolfs, yet something I had not witnessed before is cows breaking off and chewing bits of antheaps.

Presumably the antheap had already been broken open, but these cows were sniffing it, licking it and breaking off chunks of it which they moved aside to chew.

That is what the cow on the right is doing. This might be because these animals feel the lack of minerals such as phosphorous or salt. I have seen zebra licking sand and kudu chewing bones, but this is my first sighting of cows eating bits of an anthill.

OUT AND ABOUT

A Hadeda Ibis has been sitting on her nest in our back garden for some time now. Usually she raises a single chick – I am assuming it is the same birds as hadedas tend to reuse their nests – and am delighted to note that two chicks are making exploratory forays around my garden this summer. Here they are observing me hanging up our laundry:

A herd of up to ten donkeys have been hanging around our suburba for several weeks already. This makes placing our garbage bags on the pavement once a week a bit of a hit and miss affair, for once the donkeys tear into them there is an awful (and widespread) mess to clean up and rebag. We hear them braying from early on some mornings and even late at night. Here are a few of them next to th playing field of a local primary school. Note the foal having a drink. The three green tanks in the background are for harvesting water for the school – very necessary in our town – we have four such tanks at home.

Lastly, a scenic view of part of the Urban Herd resting on an open park space not far from where we live:

DOING SOMETHING

I enjoy the photographs of other people which show animals, birds or insects doing something. While the following selection are not dramatic, in each case the subject is doing something. We start with the smallest one, which is a snail exploring:

Then we meet some donkeys walking down a road together:

This time you can see a different spotted cow grazing:

As we are moving out of town anyway, let us stop to watch a scrub hare eating:

A little further on we spot two male lions walking:

Some creatures, such as this giraffe, need to look up to find their meal:

THERE IS BEAUTY IN BROWN

There is no one shade of brown. Brown is the colour of nature itself. See the different hues of brown in this rough stone terrace that supports one of the arterial roads into the central part of the town where I live:

Brown does not have to be dull. A golden retriever playing ball on the Hout Bay beach is a shade of brown:

The trunks of trees are varying shades of brown – this is the bark of an Erythrina caffra in my back garden:

The Urban Herd sports a variety of brown patterns, such as this spotted cow grazing on the industrial road that bypasses my town:

Then there is the timeless translucent brown of the Pears soap, which was always my father’s favourite:

The brown of this freshwater crab helps it to blend in with the natural brown of the grass and the rock at the side of the road: