Painted Wolf in the Hunt

Canon EOS 5D Mark II

ƒ/5.6

400 mm

1/200

1250

At full stride, an uncropped photo at dusk, when the pack in South Africa comes alive from a day of rest and weaves through the bush at full tilt, like a sudden breeze that surrounds you and then slips through the trees to disappear in the blink of an eye.

They run at 65 km/hr to exhaust their prey, and they rarely fail (with a 90% success rate versus 30% for lions). They just keep running until the prey is caught.

No two have the same coat pattern. The tail serves as a flag so each can keep a peripheral view of the rest of the pack in the tall grass.

13 responses to “Painted Wolf in the Hunt”

Happy Tinfoil Cat

Jan 24, 2012 at 4:55 am

Amazing capture. Were you moving or did you pan the shot?

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solerena

Jan 24, 2012 at 5:03 am

Great shot, liked your "the last of the mohicans" story last time:)

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pearson3

Jan 24, 2012 at 5:31 am

fantastic shot!

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: Nils

Jan 24, 2012 at 5:40 am

Wow. Nothing like good cardio!

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Astrocatou

Jan 24, 2012 at 12:00 pm

Creepy…
? some awful story I read once…

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TomiTapio

Jan 24, 2012 at 2:35 pm

Great capture!

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jurvetson

Jan 24, 2012 at 4:25 pm

thanks y’all.

[http://www.flickr.com/photos/daveh56] – about eating on the run?

[http://www.flickr.com/photos/slopetrash] – yes, Cardio is Rule 1. Essential survival skills.

[http://www.flickr.com/photos/solerena] – She is the lone wolf turned interspecies leader in Bostswana. This guy is a happy pack member in South Africa taking litter of yipping pups out for a jackal chase.

[http://www.flickr.com/photos/belleville] – in vehicle, paused for a pan shot if I recall. P.S. since the animal’s height is about half of ours, the speed they perceive would be equivalent to a much higher speed for us. Here’s a site that runs the calculations based on your height. For me, it would feel like I was running 84 MPH.

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solerena

Jan 24, 2012 at 5:56 pm

oh, i see – they look similar… this happy pack memeber is kinda flying in zero gravity in your shot:D

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Happy Tinfoil Cat

Jan 24, 2012 at 7:11 pm

Well then exceptional shooting. That’s a cool site and I like that a cat feels like over 100MPH at about four inches from the ground. I will now add kitty to the top ten list of animals to be reincarnated to. Scratch off mouse even though it feels like 168MPH because it’s actually only 8MPH, one fourth the speed of the cat… which ends horribly for the mouse.

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jurvetson

Jan 24, 2012 at 7:34 pm

…especially when they have the zombie infection

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Kevin Baird

Jan 25, 2012 at 12:22 am

Great catch at that speed!

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scleroplex

Jan 25, 2012 at 1:34 am

impressive!

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sofiacruz

Feb 2, 2012 at 4:11 pm

Steve, I love this photo.
I shared it on my blog about South Africa:
southafricaphotoblog.tumblr.com/post/16865441694

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Painted Wolf in the Hunt

13 responses to “Painted Wolf in the Hunt”

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