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Dragonflies are great subjects for macro photography. But they can often be quite shy, which means approaching them is a challenge. Occasionally, though one can get lucky and find a dragonfly which is happy to be approached. On this occasion, I found one such dragonfly. It was perched on a twig beside our dining room, and as I got closer to it, it tilted its head and gave me a curious glance...

Last flooded season, I caught sight of a tiny harvest mouse hopping across the forest floor beside our lodge. The mouse paused for a moment. Meanwhile, I was carefully trying to creep up to the mouse to perhaps get a photo of it with using my macro lens. Surprisingly, the mouse didn't move and so I managed to get very close and take this photo of it posing in the dappled light...

Two weeks ago, when I was still at Embiara Lodge, I was walking over to a small section of forest beside the river, to check on a video camera trap that I had placed there the day before. A female adult puma had been spotted in this section of forest a few days earlier, and I was hoping that perhaps the camera had picked up some of the puma's movements. I had to walk around a narrow lake to get to the forest, and as I was coming to the end of the lake, I suddenly heard the panicked calls of a capybara in the same lake, about 50 metres behind me. I looked around and watched the capybara running frantically into the water, and my immediate thought was that there must be a predator chasing it. And no sooner had I thought this when an adult puma bounded into the water after the capybara. The puma grabbed the capybara by the neck. Thanks to a high bank that I was standing beside, the puma could not see me. As I was so close to the house (less than 100 metres), I decided to go and get my camera and to then return to a place where I would have a better view of the scene that was unfolding.



The puma remained with the capybara for a few minutes and then laboriously hauled it onto the grass verge.



She was keen to carry the capybara to the shelter of the forest away from other hungry eyes. Just before entering the forest, she stopped for a moment and glanced up in my direction.



After she had disappeared, I headed back to the lodge not believing what I had just seen. It goes to show that you never know what nature has in store.
(The gallery section shows the full sequence of photographs I took of this kill).