July Theme - Animals!!

So when I decided to have animals as my theme this month, I went looking to see what all I had and to pick out the best of the best. Turns out that I really don't have very many pictures of animals (something I will have to work on more, I guess), so this first post will probably have the most pictures and the rest will be shorter.

To start this off I went with the animals from my trip to Florida's Busch Gardens.

This dragon was huge and just laying there right where I could get a good picture, not bad to start out the visit. 

Even though the Flamingos were rather pungent, they were still very beautiful and full of character.

I loved the variation of color in this handsome fella (at least I think he was a guy).

You could pay extra and go on a mock safari driving around the huge enclosures and could even hand feed some of the animals. 

There is also a train that goes all around the park with several "train stations" and it would cut through some of the enclosures, giving its riders a view sans the fences. 

Giraffes are amazingly beautiful creatures.

These are some kind of deer that would stand absolutely stone still whenever they felt threatened or watched. Their stillness afforded me a couple great shots of them as we passed on the train.

This was one of the best pictures I got of any animal through the glass, with very little reflection or hand prints. 

There were two different enclosures for the tigers and the walkway went between them so the tigers could see each other through the windows and would play an amusing game of chase from window to window. 

If you have never been up close to one of these big cats let me assure you that they live up to their name, they are very big. 

I have always liked the elephants, maybe because they are so very big but they almost remind me of huge dogs, in the way that I get the sense that they are very loving animals.

These are Asian elephants (see how small their ears are) but I still think they are great.

Ah, Darwin's tortoises (not really) it amazes me how old these big guys can get and how they manage to survive despite how slow they move around.

 Every time I see Hyenas, I can't help but think of Disney's The Lion King. 

Speaking of Lions...

We didn't see any male Lions and by the time we made it this far it was after feeding time so everyone was taking naps in the shade. 

Another dinosaur just laying around waiting for me to take his picture.

Another kind of deer, I got this one from the sky-tram (which was really nice, I would recommend it to everyone who goes to Busch Gardens).

Nothing to see here folks, just a living tank that's all... 

Baby tank and Momma tank. 

There was also a Black Rhino but he had his own island that separated him from the rest of the place (they are the really aggressive ones).

There were several monkey enclosures but in typical fashion most only wanted to show me their butts.

These guys were a little bit more accommodating in their poses for my camera. 

All in all, there were some really beautiful and amazing animals at Busch Gardens and I highly encourage everyone to try to visit at least once in their lifetime.

I hope you enjoyed these as much as I enjoy sharing them. As always, I encourage you to leave a comment, tip, or criticism so that I may continue to learn and get better at capturing this wonderful world that we live in!