As you may have gathered from previous posts, there are several smallish herds of Elephants in the area of Sable Dam in the Kruger Park about 15Km from Phalaborwa primarily because it is the only permanent water in the area. It is accessed by many other species too. It is big enough to last through the dry season until the next rains. On Saturday, I was sitting in my car at the North end when 2 herds arrived simultaneously on opposite sides to drink. I took 5 shots to make a Pano. Now, frames 2 & 3 wouldn't merge so my first effort was two shorter Panos combined into a strip. Yesterday I examined the corresponding edges of the offending frames & could not understand why they wouldn't merge. I cropped thin slivers from each which then merged so I tried again using the original 5 & the newly created one - success! https://www.flickr.com/photos/wisselstroom/53168126899/ K5 & HD 55-300 WR Alan C

Am 06.09.23 um 13:01 schrieb Alan C: > On Saturday, I was > sitting in my car at the North end when 2 herds arrived simultaneously > on opposite sides to drink. I took 5 shots to make a Pano. You really live in an interesting place. Having elephants at the zoo just isn't the same. Ralf -- Ralf R. Radermacher - Köln/Cologne, Germany Blog : http://the-real-fotoralf.blogspot.com Audio : http://aporee.org/maps/projects/fotoralf Fotos : https://www.fotocommunity.de/user_photos/770012

Alan - nice image! But, just idle curiosity… Since you merged the images for a pano, will this inspire the two herds to merge as well? Or are they determined to remain separate from one another?? Stan > On Sep 6, 2023, at 7:01 AM, Alan C <cole@lantic.net> wrote: > > As you may have gathered from previous posts, there are several smallish herds of Elephants in the area of Sable Dam in the Kruger Park about 15Km from Phalaborwa primarily because it is the only permanent water in the area. It is accessed by many other species too. It is big enough to last through the dry season until the next rains. On Saturday, I was sitting in my car at the North end when 2 herds arrived simultaneously on opposite sides to drink. I took 5 shots to make a Pano. > > Now, frames 2 & 3 wouldn't merge so my first effort was two shorter Panos combined into a strip. Yesterday I examined the corresponding edges of the offending frames & could not understand why they wouldn't merge. I cropped thin slivers from each which then merged so I tried again using the original 5 & the newly created one - success! > > https://www.flickr.com/photos/wisselstroom/53168126899/ > > K5 & HD 55-300 WR > > Alan C > > -- > %(real_name)s Pentax-Discuss Mail List > To unsubscribe send an email to pdml-leave@pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.

What was it that Kipling wrote? “Oh, East is East, and West is West, and ne’er the trunks shall meet”. > On 6 Sep 2023, at 16:53, Stanley Halpin <stan@stans-photography.info> wrote: > > Alan - nice image! > But, just idle curiosity… Since you merged the images for a pano, will this inspire the two herds to merge as well? Or are they determined to remain separate from one another?? > > Stan > >> On Sep 6, 2023, at 7:01 AM, Alan C <cole@lantic.net> wrote: >> >> As you may have gathered from previous posts, there are several smallish herds of Elephants in the area of Sable Dam in the Kruger Park about 15Km from Phalaborwa primarily because it is the only permanent water in the area. It is accessed by many other species too. It is big enough to last through the dry season until the next rains. On Saturday, I was sitting in my car at the North end when 2 herds arrived simultaneously on opposite sides to drink. I took 5 shots to make a Pano. >> >> Now, frames 2 & 3 wouldn't merge so my first effort was two shorter Panos combined into a strip. Yesterday I examined the corresponding edges of the offending frames & could not understand why they wouldn't merge. I cropped thin slivers from each which then merged so I tried again using the original 5 & the newly created one - success! >> >> https://www.flickr.com/photos/wisselstroom/53168126899/ >> >> K5 & HD 55-300 WR >> >> Alan C >> >> -- >> %(real_name)s Pentax-Discuss Mail List >> To unsubscribe send an email to pdml-leave@pdml.net >> to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions. > -- > %(real_name)s Pentax-Discuss Mail List > To unsubscribe send an email to pdml-leave@pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.

Stan The whole thing hinges on water & food supply. Adult Ellies consume plenty - at least 50L water & 50Kg food per day. The family groups are all matriarchal. The adult, breeding bulls live separately & only join the herds when in musth. In former years wind pumps were erected all over the park to feed artificial water holes from boreholes. The Ellie herds could then roam between them in the dry season. The downside was that Lions (who live in prides to defend a water supply) moved into areas where they could not normally survive. They decimated the rare Roan antelope in the drier northern part of the Park. So, all the pumps were closed down. The Lions left & the Roan have begun to recover. The Ellies are forced to live near permanent water supplies in the drier time of the year. During this period the big herds split into smaller groups (high efficiency with apprentice matriarchs?) which forage for food (mostly Mopani scrub) over a wide area around the dam. So, yes, they will merge when the rainy season arrives because water & food will be available over a bigger area & we won't see much of them until the next dry season. The small herds have become very tolerant of motor vehicles. Some days there are many vehicles trapped at the North end for a couple of hours while the Ellies do their thing. They wander unconcerned between them & even peer inside! Bulls in Musth are another thing altogether - very dangerous & should be avoided. Many vehicles have been damaged, even rolled over, because stupid tourists got too close. Alan C P.S. Some Roan Bulls were imported from Zimbabwe to increase the gene pool & a herd of about 30 has recently been spotted at Tsendze about 100Km north of here which is good news. The biggest headache in the Park today is poaching. In spite of all their efforts, they are still losing a lot of Rhinos. People in Oriental countries believe powdered horn is an aphrodisiac & will pay a lot to get it. The poachers are now targeting Big Tusker Ellie Bulls too. There are only about 2000 Rhinos and 12000 Ellies left in Kruger now. On 06-Sep-23 05:53 PM, Stanley Halpin wrote: > Alan - nice image! > But, just idle curiosity… Since you merged the images for a pano, will this inspire the two herds to merge as well? Or are they determined to remain separate from one another?? > > Stan > >> On Sep 6, 2023, at 7:01 AM, Alan C <cole@lantic.net> wrote: >> As you may have gathered from previous posts, there are several smallish herds of Elephants in the area of Sable Dam in the Kruger Park about 15Km from Phalaborwa primarily because it is the only permanent water in the area. It is accessed by many other species too. It is big enough to last through the dry season until the next rains. On Saturday, I was sitting in my car at the North end when 2 herds arrived simultaneously on opposite sides to drink. I took 5 shots to make a Pano. >> >> Now, frames 2 & 3 wouldn't merge so my first effort was two shorter Panos combined into a strip. Yesterday I examined the corresponding edges of the offending frames & could not understand why they wouldn't merge. I cropped thin slivers from each which then merged so I tried again using the original 5 & the newly created one - success! >> >> https://www.flickr.com/photos/wisselstroom/53168126899/ >> >> K5 & HD 55-300 WR >> >> Alan C >> >> -- >> %(real_name)s Pentax-Discuss Mail List >> To unsubscribe send an email to pdml-leave@pdml.net >> to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions. > -- > %(real_name)s Pentax-Discuss Mail List > To unsubscribe send an email to pdml-leave@pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.