REVEALED: Serengeti loc | Vintage Vibes

What Happens to a Grassland's Nutrient Cycle Without Large Grazers

A grassland without large grazers looks, at first, like a grassland resting. The grass grows tall. The soil is no longer churned. But within a few seasons, the nutrient cycle that kept the whole system productive begins to slow, and the slowdown is not gentle. How Large Grazers Drive Nutrient…

Times Life · Oct 30

What a Bright Full Moon Actually Does to Nocturnal Animals

On a full moon night in the Serengeti, lions kill less. Not because they rest, but because their prey can see them coming. Predators Lose Their Edge When the Moon Is BrightThe advantage most nocturnal predators rely on is darkness. Lions, leopards, and owls are built for low-light conditions their…

Times Life · Oct 25

In 1950, livestock viruses drove the Serengeti's wildebeest herd down to 300,000. Less than a decade later, it surpassed 1.5 million, helping turn the ecosystem into a carbon sink

In the 1950s, rinderpest and livestock disease pushed the Serengeti’s wildebeest herd to dangerously low numbers. After the virus was brought under control, the population surged from roughly 300,000 to more than 1.5 million within two decades. That recovery reshaped the ecosystem. More wildebeest meant heavier grazing, fewer grass-fuelled fires…

The Economic Times · Sep 5

Lionesses Run the Pride: What the Male Lion's Role Actually Looks Like in the Wild

The Hunters Are FemaleLionesses make roughly 90 percent of a pride's kills. That figure comes from decades of field observation in the Serengeti, including the long-running lion research project led by Craig Packer at the University of Minnesota, one of the most comprehensive predator studies ever conducted. The male is…

Times Life · Jul 14

Why Horses and Other Animals Sleep Standing Up: The Evolutionary Threat Behind This Survival Instinct

The Body That Cannot Afford to RestA horse can fall into slow-wave sleep on its feet. Its legs do not buckle. A passive stay apparatus, a system of tendons and ligaments in each leg, locks the joints without any muscular effort, holding the animal upright while its brain cycles through…

Times Life · Jul 12

Lions Are Not Kings of the Jungle, What the Title Actually Says About Predator Mythology

Lions Do Not Live in JunglesThe African lion, Panthera leo, lives almost entirely on open grassland and scrubland, the savanna. Dense jungle canopy is the territory of leopards and tigers, not lions. The confusion likely originates from colonial-era English, where 'jungle' was used loosely to mean any wild, untamed land,…

Times Life · Jul 4

The world’s great fish migrations are collapsing – that’s a problem for millions of people

Hidden beneath the surface of the world’s rivers, some of Earth’s great animal movements unfold – migrations that rival, in sheer biomass, the famous mass movements of zebra and wildebeest across the Serengeti.

The Conversation · Mar 24

Where Should the Next Season of The White Lotus Be Filmed? I've Done the Research and Have Narrowed Down the Options

Now that the third season has wrapped, the anticipation of what's in store for the next season begins... and more importantly, its location

Livingetc · Apr 15, 2025

Africa’s famous Serengeti and Maasai Mara are being hit by climate change – a major threat to wildlife and tourism

The Mara-Serengeti ecosystem, which includes Kenya’s Maasai Mara and Tanzania’s Serengeti National Park, is one of the most famous and wildlife-rich areas in Africa.

The Conversation · Oct 3, 2024

Tanzania wants to evict Maasai for wildlife – but they’re fighting back

Community members are on a campaign to get international donors to defund their government and stop rights violations.

Al Jazeera · Aug 5, 2024