Show Navigation

Duncan Murrell - A Whale of a Time

  • Portfolio
  • About
  • Contact
  • Blog
  • Testimonials
  • Facebook
  • Archive
    • All Galleries
    • Search
    • Cart
    • Lightbox
    • Client Area

Duncan Murrell - A Whale of a Time

Search Results

33 images

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
x
Refine Search
Match all words
Match any word
Prints
Personal Use
Royalty-Free
Rights-Managed
(leave unchecked to
search all images)

Loading ()...

  • Ankarana National Park in north-west Madagascar is a spectacular eroded limestone fortress of sharp ridges, interspersed with patches of dense tropical rainforest, deciduous forest, gorges, deep caves and underground rivers. About 100 kilometres of cave passages have been mapped within the massif. It is a small, partially vegetated plateau composed of 150-million-year-old middle Jurassic limestone, with an average annual rainfall of about 2,000 mm that has led to the erosion that has created the classic “karst” topography, or locally known as “tsingy”.<br />
Ankarana contains one of the highest densities of primates of any forest in the world. Its dense forests supports large populations of crowned lemurs and Sanford’s brown lemurs, in addition to Perrier’s sifaka, northern sportive lemurs, brown mouse lemurs, fork-marked lemurs, eastern wooly lemurs, western lesser bamboo lemurs and fat-tailed dwarf lemurs, and also ring-tailed mongoose, fossa, tenrecs and Madagascar striped civet. There are almost 100 bird species, 50 reptile, including some endemic and threatened snakes and geckos, and 10 species of frogs. Inside the huge labyrinth of caves there are 14 species of bats, along with local endemic blind shrimps and the world’s only cave-living crocodiles.<br />
More than 350 plant species grow in the park; the luxuriant forests around the gorges are always green and are the richest in numbers of species.
    Kayaking-Madagascar-journey47.jpg
  • Ankarana was a really special experience for me. I loved the marriage between the sculpted limestone rocks and the lush vegetation. The tsingy limestone formations are amazing but quite hazardous to walk around on because the rock has been eroded into vertical jagged blades. I discovered that some of the local crowned lemurs have become semi-habituated to visitors, and associate them with snacks, which is not usually a good thing, but unfortunately it is often inevitable, especially if the guides encourage it too. I was able to camp overnight in the forest on the way back to the park headquarters, and had a memorable soak in a cooling stream to listen to the nocturnal sounds of the forest – and to avoid the worst mosquitoes on the trip so far. <br />
I was really impressed with Ankarana, so it was with the usual mixture of wonderment and sadness that I looked back at the very finite perimeter of another protected area when I was driving away in the taxi-brousse. The abrupt transition from incredibly rich biodiversity to barren scrubland was painfully depressing and becoming too familiar in Madagascar.
    Kayaking-Madagascar-journey46.tif
  • Kayak-Madagascar- mammal-birdMadagas...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Madagascar day gecko  (Phelsuma madagascariensis madagascariensis) is a diurnal subspecies of geckos. It lives on the eastern coast of Madagascar and typically inhabits rainforests and dwells on trees. The Madagascar day gecko feeds on insects and nectar. This lizard is one of the largest living day geckos. It can reach a total length of about 22 cm (8.7 in). The body color is light green or bluish green. The skin between the scales often has a light color. A rust-coloured stripe extends from the nostril to behind the eye. On the back there are brownish or red-brick coloured dots which may form a thin line along the mid back. These geckos do not have eyelids, and they have flattened toe pads.
    Kayaking-Madagascar-reptiles7.jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar- mammal-birdMadagas...jpg
  • Kayaking-Madagascar-reptiles23.jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • kayaking-Madagascar-frogs75.tif
  • Kayak-Madagascar- mammal-birdMadagas...jpg
  • Kayaking-Madagascar-reptiles26.jpg
  • Kayaking-Madagascar-reptiles22.jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayaking-Madagascar-reptiles8.jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayaking-Madagascar-reptiles46.tif
  • Kayaking-Madagascar-reptiles57.tif
  • Kayaking-Madagascar-reptiles25.jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar- mammal-birdMadagas...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar- mammal-birdMadagas...jpg
  • Kayaking-Madagascar-reptiles24.jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar- mammal-birdMadagas...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayaking-Madagascar-reptiles9.jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
  • Kayaking-Madagascar-vegetation19.jpg