Blue wildebeest

How do you identify a wildebeest?

An antelope 1.15 to 1.45 meters at the shoulder, front-heavy, with high shoulders, a low rump and a massive black head. The coat is dark gray with a bluish sheen, striped with darker bands on the neck and flanks, and the mane, beard and tail are black. The Serengeti subspecies has a white beard. Both sexes have smooth, hooked horns, like a slimmer version of the buffalo's. From a distance, you recognize a wildebeest herd by its single-file lines and its gangly, head-down gait.

How does the wildebeest live?

The wildebeest lives in herds and follows the short grass and the rain. In the Serengeti, 1.5 million animals travel a loop of about 800 km each year, together with zebras and gazelles. The females all give birth at the same time, from January to March, on the southern plains: hundreds of thousands of calves in a few weeks, more than the predators can handle. The river crossings, first the Grumeti and then the Mara, cost thousands of animals, drowned or taken by crocodiles. Outside the Serengeti, resident populations live in Ngorongoro Crater, in Tarangire and on the plains of Nyerere.

Where and when can you see wildebeest on safari?

In Tanzania, you will see wildebeest almost everywhere. Several thousand live year-round in Ngorongoro Crater, and Tarangire receives them by the thousands from June to October. In the Serengeti, the migration is at Ndutu and on the southern plains from December to March, and the calves are born there from January to March. From April to June, it moves north through the Western Corridor, crossing the Grumeti River until July. From July to October, it is in the north, on the Mara River, and you sometimes wait hours for a crossing.

In Kenya, the Masai Mara receives the migration during the same period, and the herds cross the river there too. In Amboseli, wildebeest stay on the plains around the dry lake in every season.

In South Africa, they live year-round around Satara, on the plains of central Kruger. In Madikwe, you see them on every game drive. Wildebeest ignore 4x4s, so you can photograph them up close. Walking in single file along a track, they file past the stopped vehicle.

Is the wildebeest endangered?

The blue wildebeest is not endangered. The IUCN lists it as Least Concern, with about 1.5 million animals, most of them in the Serengeti ecosystem. The threats target the migration corridors. Fences, roads, crops and grazing land cut across the seasonal routes, and isolated populations have disappeared where their ranges were closed off. The future of the Serengeti migration depends on the land outside the parks, in Tanzania and in Kenya alike, and on herds moving freely between the two countries.