There is no shortage of babies in the Kruger National Park!

Many mammals give birth in the spring months, but some give birth at any time, and it is certainly not unusual to see baby elephants, rhinos, buffaloes, giraffes and zebras throughout the year. Why is this?

Many herbivores have gestation periods lasting anything from 4 to 8 months, and these species (such as impala, warthogs and other smaller herbivores) generally breed annually and choose spring as the birthing season when the new rains start, bringing an abundance of vegetation. However, larger herbivores such as elephants, rhinos and giraffes have gestation periods lasting well over a year … 22 months in the case of an elephant, 16 months for a White rhino and 14 months for a giraffe. Even a zebra is just over 12 months, with the Cape buffalo coming in at around 11 months. So for these species an annual birthing period just isn’t going to work … so their babies appear throughout the year.

This means that you can see babies of some sort at any time of year … with October to January being the best months to see baby antelopes and warthogs.

Carnivores don’t have particularly long pregnancies, and being meat eaters, are not restricted to seasonal flushes of vegetation for food, so it is possible to see cubs or pups at any time of year.

Larger antelope, elephant, giraffe, buffalo and rhino offspring are referred to as calves, smaller antelope have “lambs”, zebras have “foals”,  the big cats and hyenas (they are closer to cats than dogs) have “cubs” and African Wild Dogs and jackals have “puppies” … and of course the baby “Pumbas” are “piglets”. D.L.