Lions and Tigers and … Racehorses?

While at the Los Angeles Zoo last week my big zoom lens finally gave up the ghost.  The auto-focus had been acting up for quite a while but it refused to work at all at the Zoo, so I had to buy a replacement.  It is exactly the same lens; I wish I could afford to upgrade to a faster one but fast, long lenses are way out of my price range.  This one has served me well since 1993, so I expect the new one will have a long life as well.

Here is the main reason we went to the L.A. Zoo:

Zenyatta on the carousel

Ann and Jerry Moss (owners of my favorite racehorse, Zenyatta) donated the money to build a new conservation carousel at the Zoo and they included carousel horse portraits of three of their best racehorses.  Of course, I had to go ride Zenyatta!

Now I can truly say I have ridden Zenyatta

Yes, there were animals at the Zoo as well.  Despite my struggles with low light and having to manual focus with a handheld long lens, I managed to get some decent photos.  Here is a koala enjoying a meal of eucalyptus leaves.

Koala noms

This fellow was either depressed, very tired or recovering from a hangover.  Whatever the reason for his interesting posture, he certainly brought a smile to my face!

Depressed koala?

The zebras were all dozing in the sun.  One was flat on his side, one was standing up and this one was being adorable all curled up like cat.

Portrait of a zebra

Flamingos are beautiful, big birds but boy, do they STINK! Some brilliant person put a restroom on the hill just next to the flamingo pond (we thought the plumbing was bad, but it was the flamingos).  Admire from a distance! (The birds, not the restroom; no one admires a restroom …)

Feeding flamingos

The new tiger cubs were out!  Mama was sacked out (probably worn out by the kids) but the boys were having a great time playing with a log in a clump of bamboo.  Unfortunately, they were hard to photograph because they are so well camoflaged. I did get one good shot of one brother telling the other to BACK OFF!

Playing tiger cubs

It was getting dark by the time we reached the lion exhibit so my photos aren’t that great, but I did manage to get one of the lioness taking a bath and caught her tongue in mid slurp.

My, what a big tongue you have, Ms.Lion!

Related articles

• LA Zoo Carousel of Endangered Animals (mygrandmasue.wordpress.com)

Leopard Love

Yesterday I went on a VIP tour of The Living Desert with my sister P, her friend L and L’s daughter T.  L & T had received the tour as a gift from another friend who had purchased it at a fundraiser.  All of us have been the The Living Desert before but it’s been several years since the last time we were out there, so we were all excited about it, especially the behind-the-scenes at the leopard exhibit portion.

The leopards in question are a pair of Amur leopards, a male and female, both around 18 years old.  The Living Desert doesn’t breed leopards, and they got both of these cats after their breeding careers were over (the male is neutered).  We got to go into the Commissioner’s House, which is a private party facility not open to the general public.  One entire wall of the Commissioner’s House is made of plate glass, for a perfect view of the leopard enclosure.

Here is the female leopard giving me a very “I am a cat and you are a pitiful human” look.

Male leopard

And here’s the male looking rather hungry.

Here you can see just how close we were to the cats.  This is T taking photos on the other side of the Commissioner’s House (the glass wall is sort of U shaped).

The leopards were very nonchalant about being watched.  The female stopped to wash her paws right in front of me.

Then she plopped down and washed her face.

Amur leopards are so rare that their coats go for close to $1 million on the black market.  I think it looks much better on this beautiful girl, don’t you?

This move is so typical of a cat.  That paw was just the thickness of the plate glass away from me. I put my hand up against it and our “hands” were about the same size.

It’s a good thing that glass was there, because I don’t think I could have resisted tickling this belly!

Meanwhile, across the enclosure, the male was channeling my cat Billy with this “graceful” pose …

Eventually she dozed off …

And so did he.

These gorgeous cats put on quite a show for us (I felt like one of those obnoxious papparazzi the way I was following the female around) before they settled down for a long winter’s nap.  What a wonderful way to begin our VIP tour of The Living Desert!

 

Related articles

• Amur leopard captured on camera in China for first time since 1949 (telegraph.co.uk)
• Persian Leopard Reappears in Afghanistan (naturalhistorywanderings.com)

Japanese Thunder

I know that I promised Japanese drummers and dancers earlier in the week but I have a very good excuse for being late.  No, really, I do!  I lay all the blame on whatever virus has invaded my head and caused me to spend the last 4 days in bed feeling like crap.  I haven’t had a cold in a long time, so I’m not entirely surprised that this one is hitting me hard.  Blah.

But, as promised, here are the Japanese cultural delights.  Last Saturday was Tokyo City Cup Day at Santa Anita Park.  In conjunction with the running of the Tokyo City Cup race, they hold a Japanese cultural festival at the track, which is probably as close as I’ll ever get to Japan.  It was especially poignant this year, coming just a few weeks after the earthquakes and tsunamis that devastated Japan.  Last year, there were traditional samurai horseback riders who performed, but they couldn’t make it this year because the town they are from was hit hard by the disasters.

It was still a fun day of Japanese culture and food.  Earlier in the morning (which was Saturday night in the United Arab Emirates) Japanese horses ran 1-2 in the $10 million Dubai World Cup, the richest horse race in the world.  At Santa Anita, there weren’t any Japanese horses running but there were lots of performances by taiko drummers and folk dancers.

First, there was a performance by a small trio (which consisted of four people; they must have been reading too much Douglas Adams) of taiko drummers on the stage in front of the grandstand. You can only see three of them in the photo, but trust me, there were four.  I had trouble getting a good photo of them because we didn’t realize they were there until they started playing and I had to squeeze in around a tall man with obnoxious elbows that kept getting in my way.

Trio of taiko drummers

After that performance, we went to the festival area behind the grandstand to get something to eat but got distracted by these colorful dancers with huge lotus-flower headdresses.  The colors were incredibly vibrant and each dancer had a little pair of clackers in each hand, which they clacked in time to the (very slow and fluid) dance steps.

Crazy lotus-flower headdresses

I had some delicious chicken curry for lunch and two cups of iced barley tea (my sister decided that it tasted “funky” so I ended up with hers as well as mine) before we wandered back to the festival area to see some more dancers.

First there was a pair of dancers who were incredibly petite and reminded me of Japanese hobbits.  One carried a basket and the other had an oar or a cricket bat or something of that sort.  I’m sure there was a story behind their dance but I just enjoyed their precise, stylized movements and big smiles.

These dancers were so TINY and CUTE!

The last group of dancers we saw wore red, purple and white outfits that, I’m sorry to say, immediately made me think of the Red Hat Society ladies.  They were very graceful, though, and their dance was reminiscent of the hula, with the hand movements and swaying hips.

Before and after the main race (the Tokyo City Cup) the L.A. Matsuri Taiko performed on the front stage.  They used two different drum configurations.  We had a better spot to view them this time and I took roughly a million photos.  If you’ve never seen or heard taiko drummers, it’s something you really should do.  These drums are HUGE and you feel them as much as hear them, but not in that obnoxious way that you feel the bass from the car behind you at the stop light that is blasting out rap music from a crappy sound system.  The sound of the drums is such an organic sound; the drums are made of wood, metal and hides – all natural materials.  It’s more like thunder or a rockfall … something you’d hear in nature.

L.A. Matsuri Taiko drummers

The second drum configuration

This drummer looked like she was just having the BEST time!

Pickles, Pineapples, Alligators and Turtles …

Spring Break is almost over (I have to go back to work tomorrow) and the weather has been uncooperative.  Most of the time, it’s been raining or overcast and cold, and when it hasn’t been, I’ve had various appointments and errands to take care of.  I did get out in the sun on Tuesday, for a trip to the Botanic Gardens at UC Riverside.  The weather was perfect and I got some lovely photos:

No, they’re not alien trees, they’re aloes

You’ve got to love a plant called “little pickles”

Cactus topped with pineapples??

Me and a giant plant

Alligator lizard basking on a rock

Spring-time hill and the Box Spring Mountains

Cool patterns in the mud in the streambed

Rock formation or giant fossilized turtle head? You decide!

Tomorrow: Japanese dancers and drummers!