What better excuse to take another look at the 83 species of South African wildlife that we featured here at de Wets Wild in the past year than World Wildlife Day?

Beautiful African Leopard (Phalanta-butterfly)

Village Weaver (male)

Single-striped Grass Mouse

Violet-backed Starling

Rainbow Skink (male)

Gaudy Commodore (dry season form)

Brown Snake Eagle

Common Orange Tip (male)

Wood Sandpiper

Broad-bordered Grass Yellows

Amur Falcon

Common Hottentot Skipper (male)

Black-backed Puffback

Serrated Hinged Terrapin

Common Meadow White

Black-chested Snake Eagle

Small Orange Tip (male)

Buffy Pipit

Spotted Jokers congregating on rotting fallen fruit in Mpila

Purple Heron

Layman butterfly

Honey Bee on Cape Honeysuckle

White-throated Robin-Chat

African Common White

Ruff

Guinea-fowl Butterfly

Knob-billed Duck female

African Wild Cat

Male Lesser Masked Weaver

Geranium Bronze butterfly

Southern Black Tits

Swazi Lily

Brown-headed Parrot

Leprous Grasshopper

Cut-throat Finch male

Mating Purple Tips

Red-billed Buffalo Weaver in Satara

Wattled Starling (male in breeding colours)

Turner’s Thick-toed Gecko

Black Stork

A huge bush cricket (Clonia wahlbergii) that shared our open-air shower at Mapungubwe National Park

Diederik Cuckoo

Common Diadem (male)

Green-winged Pytilia (male)

African Migrant (Butterfly)

African Migrant (female form florella)

Little Bee-eater

Senegal Lapwing

Solifuge a.k.a. Sun Spider

Spotted Eagle Owl

Yellow-throated Plated Lizard

African Hawk Eagle

Free-tailed Bats roosting beneath the thatch at Mooiplaas’ ablutions

Lesser Striped Swallow

Sycomore Fig

Long-tailed Paradise Whydah

Male Red-backed Shrike (photo by Joubert)

Tree Creeper Scorpion

Green, or Red-billed, Wood-hoopoe

Variable Skink

Black-crowned Tchagra

Black-winged Stilt

Dung beetles

Little Swift reinforcing a nest

Spectacled Weaver

Patrician Blue

African Harrier Hawk

Common Dotted Border

Giant Plated Lizards

Matabele Ants

Ashy Flycatcher

Brown-crowned Tchagra

Forest Beauty

Fulvous Whistling Duck (photo by Joubert)

Red-faced Mousebird

Guttural Toad

Squacco Heron

Little Sparrowhawk

Brown Hyena at the junction of Thuthlwa and Tlou drives in Pilanesberg

Thick-billed Weaver

Greater Red Musk Shrew

Ghost Crabs

Crowned Eagle (captive)

We can’t think of a better way to celebrate World Wildlife Day than to look back at the 64 species of South African wildlife we gave special attention to here at de Wets Wild over the past year.

Click on the first image, scroll through the gallery and by the end of it you are sure to believe, as we do, that South Africa is a treasure chest of beautiful creatures that you absolutely have to visit!

Garden Commodore (wet season colouration)

Black-collared Barbet

Cape Batis (female)

Boomslang

Drakensberg Malachite

Olive Thrush

Golden-breasted Bunting

River Lily

Cape Turtle Dove

Common Blue (Leptotes sp)

Jackal Buzzard

Speckled Rock Skink

White-rumped Swift

Highveld Cabbage Trees

African Olive Pigeon

Rainforest Brown butterfly

Levaillant’s Cisticola

Southern Rock Agama

Cape Canary

Common Tree Ferns

Male Greater Double-collared Sunbird

Yellow Pansy butterfly

African Hoopoe

Common River Frog

Common Sugarbush

Garden Acraea on exotic lantana

Rock Monitor

Male Southern Double-collared Sunbird

Ouhout leaves

Drakensberg Prinia

Gurney’s Sugarbird

Forest Canary

Rock Kestrel

Capped Wheatear

Cape Bunting

Cape Crow

Yellow-billed Oxpecker

Mopane leaves are uniquely butterfly- or spoor-shaped

Olive Sunbird

Thread-waisted Wasp and caterpillar prey at Marakele

Red-billed Teal

Beautiful impala lily flowers

Flap-necked Chameleon

Bennett’s Woodpecker (male)

African Monarch butterfly

Kurrichane Thrush

Sausage Tree Fruit

Purple-crested Turaco

Red Toad at home outside our cottage

White-crowned Lapwing

Brown-veined White

Yellow-throated Bush Sparrow

Velvet Ant female – This flightless wasp mimics an ant whle searching for unsuspecting prey.

Yellow-rumped Tinkerbird

Black-bellied Bustard

Citrus Swallowtail

Orange-breasted Bush Shrike

Large-spotted Genet in Tamboti

Martial Eagle

Common Dwarf Gecko

Sabota Lark

Sickle Bush flowers

Emerald-spotted Wood Dove

Two-pip Policeman (butterfly)

What better way to celebrate World Wildlife Day than to look back at the 301 species of South African wildlife we featured here at de Wets Wild over the years?

Click on the first image, scroll through the gallery and by the end of it you are sure to believe, as we do, that South Africa is a treasure chest of beautiful creatures that you absolutely have to visit, and fully deserving of its reputation as one of the ten most biodiverse countries on the planet!

Plains Zebra

Cape Mountain Zebra

Ground hornbill

Black rhinos

White Rhinos

Kudu

Nyala bull

Bushbuck

Eland

Buffalo bull

Von Wielligh’s baobab in summer

Lion Kings of Addo

Oribi ram

Southern Reedbuck are extremely common around Lake Saint Lucia

Mountain reedbuck ram

Grey Rhebok

Waterbuck, S100, Kruger National Park

Variegated slug eater

Male Samango Monkey

Red duiker

Elephant crossing the Napi Road (H1-1)

White-backed Vulture

Palm-Nut Vulture, Umlalazi Nature Reserve, March 2016

Cape Vulture

Lappet-faced Vulture

Bearded Vulture

White-headed Vulture

Hooded Vulture

Common Duiker

Springbok Ram

Klipspringer in typical habitat

Crowned Hornbill

Trumpeter Hornbill

Red-billed Hornbill

Southern Yellow-billed Hornbill

African Grey Hornbill

Sharpe’s Grysbok

Steenbok Ram

Impala Ram

Cheetah, S41, Kruger National Park

Black Heron “canopy feeding”

Crimson-breasted Shrike

Blue wildebeest are curious creatures

Black wildebeest

Blesbok ram

Tsessebe in thornveld vegetation in Ithala Game Reserve

Lichtenstein’s Hartebeest

Dominant Red Hartebeest bull

Gemsbok in the Karoo

Roan Antelope Bull along the Nshawu marsh in Kruger Park

Ostrich male

Standing proud

Blue Crane in Ithala Game Reserve

Grey Crowned Crane

Secretarybird

Kori Bustard

Red-crested Korhaan

Crested Guineafowl – iSimangaliso Wetland Park

Curious Helmeted Guineafowl

Marabou in flight

Saddle-billed Stork

African Openbill

Yellow-billed Stork at Sunset Dam

Woolly-necked Stork

Hamerkop

African Sacred Ibis

We had daily sightings of the rare bald ibis on the Oribi Loop at Golden Gate

Ground Woodpecker

Drakensberg Dwarf Chameleon

Bush Blackcap in Thendele

Mauritian Tomb Bat, Nyalazi Gate, Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park

Wild dogs on the hunt (Hluhluwe-Imfolozi 27122014)

Spotted hyena

Leopard on the Maroela Loop, near Skukuza in the Kruger Park

Hadeda Ibis

Glossy Ibis

African Spoonbill

White Stork

Juvenile African (Edible) (Lesser) Bullfrog

Grey heron at Lake Panic

Goliath Heron

Black-headed Heron

Great Egret

Red-billed quelea

Western Cattle Egret

Little Egret

African Darter in flight

Little Grebe

Great Crested Grebe

Shimuwini Bushveld Camp – Hippo

Egyptian Goose

African Stonechat male

Northern Black Korhaan male

Lilac-breasted Roller

Swainson’s Spurfowl

Black-backed jackal

Southern Masked Weaver

Red-billed Oxpecker

Yellow-billed Duck

Red-winged Starling

African Fish Eagle flypast

Red-knobbed Coot

Evil-looking juvenile Baboon

Laughing Dove

Black Crake

Grey-headed Gull

Pearl-spotted Owlet

Pied crows at the remains of the blesbok

Warthogs drinking from the Sabie

Natal Spurfowl

Cape Glossy Starling

White-bellied Sunbird Juvenile Male feeding on Cape Honeysuckle nectar in our garden

Reed Cormorant

Pied Kingfisher

Water Thick-knee

Cape Robin-Chat

Blacksmith Lapwing

Bold crocodile near Olifants

African Black Duck

African Jacana

Tawny Eagle

Pink-backed Pelican in flight

Chinspot Batis (male)

Dark-capped Bulbul

White-fronted Bee-eater

White-faced Whistling Duck

Common Moorhen

Crowned lapwing

Vervet Monkey

Blue waxbill

Black-winged Kite

Leopard tortoise feeding on fresh shoots next to the road

Cape Weaver

Three-banded Plover

Rock hyrax, or dassie

Verreaux’s Eagles at Walter Sisulu National Botanical Gardens

Banded Mongoose

African Green Pigeon

African Wattled Lapwing

Crested Francolins

Scrub Hare

Burchell’s Coucal

Grey Go-away-bird

At night, Skukuza’s bushbabies come out to play

Scarlet-chested Sunbird (male)

Crested Barbet

Yellow Mongoose

Black-headed Oriole

African Scops Owl

Tree squirrel at the day visitors picnic spot

Yellow-billed kite

Pied Starling

Cape Grassbird

Male Double-banded Sandgrouse

Woodland Kingfisher

Cape Longclaw

Yellow-fronted Canary

Ant-eating Chat

Greater Blue-eared starling at Skukuza

Burchell’s starling

Bateleur (female)

Bearded Scrub-Robin

African Barred Owlet

Speckled Pigeon

Mocking Cliff Chat (male)

Chorister Robin-Chat

Karoo Long-billed Lark

African Penguin emerging from the surf

Black Girdled Lizard

Hartlaub’s Gull

Cape Sugarbird

Cape Grey Mongoose

Cape Spurfowl

Cape Cormorant

White-fronted Plover

Bontebok

Angulate Tortoise

African Oystercatcher

Knysna Turaco

Kelp Gull

Swift Tern

Cape Bulbul

White-browed Sparrow-weaver

Namaqua Sand Lizard

Double-banded Courser

Grey-winged francolin

Bush Karoo Rat

Karoo Korhaan

Meerkat / Suricate

Karoo Scrub Robin

Southern African Ground Squirrel

Karoo Prinia

Four-striped Grass Mouse

Steppe Buzzard

Red Bishop

Familiar Chat

Long-tailed Widowbird

Western Stripe-bellied Sand Snake swallowing a skink in Shingwedzi

Spotted Thick-knee

White-throated Swallow

Dwarf mongoose in Pretoriuskop

Cape Sparrow male

White-breasted Cormorant

Cardinal Woodpecker

Karoo Thrush

Red-eyed Dove

Tree Agama in Crocodile Bridge

Speckled Mousebird

Cape Wagtail

Southern Boubou

Cape White-eye

Sable Antelope

Red-headed finch (male)

Bronze Mannikin

Southern Black Flycatcher

Green-backed heron

Water Monitor

The cute and tiny lesser bushbaby

South African Shelduck (male)

Temminck’s Courser

Pin-tailed whydah

Fiscal Flycatcher

Painted Reed Frog

Caracal

Striped Skink

Brubru

Southern Grey-headed Sparrow

Sunrise over the Augrabies landscape shows a lone Quiver Tree

Pale-winged Starling

Hartmann’s Mountain Zebra

Namaqua Fig

Orange River White-eye

Augrabies Flat Lizard male

Large Namaqua Porkbush

Pririt Batis

Western Rock Skink male

Sociable Weaver

Camel Thorn tree

Swallow-tailed Bee-eater

Pale Chanting Goshawk

White-backed Mousebird

Karasburg Tree Skink

Bat-eared Fox

Shepherd’s Tree

Burchell’s Sandgrouse (male)

Bibron’s Thick-toed Gecko

Kalahari Scrub Robin

Barberton Girdled Lizard

Eastern Nicator

Red-eyed Bulbul

Scaly-feathered Finch

Namaqua Dove

Marsh Terrapins at the hide in Karoo National Park

This trusting Golden-tailed Woodpecker distracted us from our breakfast at Tshokwane

Groundscraper Thrush

Verreaux’s (Giant) Eagle Owl

Fork-tailed Drongo

Bold honey badger at Nwanetsi Picnic Site

Cape Rock-Thrush (male)

African Dusky Flycatcher

African Pied wagtail

Tawny-flanked Prinia

Epauletted Fruit Bat at Skukuza Airport

African Snipe

Common Fiscal

Bokmakierie

Raucous Toad: Storms River Mouth has an amazing variety of toads and frogs that show themselves after dark

Collared Sunbird (male)

Green Milkweed Locust

White-crested Helmetshrike

Magpie Shrike

Rufous-naped Lark

Spur-winged Goose (male)

Red-necked spurfowl

Brown-hooded kingfisher

White-necked Raven

Foam Nest Frog

African Purple Swamphen

African Paradise Flycatcher (male on nest)

Is this how slender mongooses give a “high 5”?

African Mourning Dove

European Roller

Umbrella Thorn

Arrow-marked Babbler

Greater Striped Swallow

Sombre Greenbul

African Firefinch (male)

Golden Orb Web spider

African Mudhopper

Eastern Natal Green Snake

Red-capped Robin-Chat

Yellow-bellied Greenbul

Kosi Raphia Palms and Joubert

CMR Blister Beetle

White-eared Barbets – iSimangaliso Wetland Park

Common Ringed Plover

There’s beautiful specimens of the fever tree at uMkhuze

Common Tropical House Gecko

Giant Legless Skink

Yellow-throated Longclaw

White-browed Scrub Robin