Part of a herd of Plains Zebra, Equus quagga boehmi, with a couple of Blue Wildebeest, Connochaetes taurinus, crossing the Mara River in Kenya, East Africa.
Although I had been to Kenya in July (I was a teacher!) several times before this visit, I had never seen the migration crossing the river, as that tends to happen around the second week of August (I was told it regularly started on the 12th of August). But happily on this visit, the Wildebeest and Zebra decided to start the river crossing early, so this photo, and many more, were taken on the 2nd August, a very pleasant surprise.
The animals reach the top of the bank of the river and stop there, as though nervous to start the descent, as well they might be as there are crocodiles waiting in the river for their annual feast. Then the sheer volume of animals lining up behind them ‘encourages’ some bolder animals to ‘take the plunge’, and go down the riverbank. The front-runners are then generally followed by hundreds more.
On this occasion, possibly (?) because it was so early in the crossing ‘season’, the hundreds of animals piled up as usual on the far bank, but there was a great reluctance to go ‘over the top’, and after a few dozen had crossed the river, the others turned back, to return to try another day.
This image is copyright © Liz Leyden, all rights reserved.
My image of Zebras crossing the Mara River is for sale as wall art or as various home or personal accessories at Pixels.com.
My original photo, from which the image was derived, is also available from my portfolio at Pixels.com.
It is also available to license as a stock photo of Zebras crossing the Mara River from iStock.
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