2011-06-11 – Amboseli N.P.

The day started off well with the sighting of a couple of Cheetahs, a mother with her full grown cub. They were shy and I could not approach them before they entered the tall grass. And my main objective are the Elephants so I didn’t keep up with them. I spent some time with a couple of young bulls fighting, I followed some big herds moving from one swamp to the other, and in the evening, in a beautiful sunset light, I concentrated on the Cattle Egrets. These birds live and thrive alongside the big herbivores. The Elephants flush out grasshoppers and other insects from the grass and the Egrets stand ready to catch the opportunities. I tried to capture the relationship between the two species in this image. I chose a backlight and I framed tightly on the Egret, waiting for a moment when the shape of the out of focus Elephant would be particularly distinctive.