South Africa's Big Five | Elephant | Rhino | Lion | Buffalo | Leopard | Game Reserves | Game Lodges | Game Farms

The male lion, easily recognized by his mane, may weigh up to 250 kg (550 lb). Females are much smaller, weighing up to 136 kg (300 lb). In the wild lions live for around 10–14 years, while in captivity they can live over 20. Lions are predatory carnivores who live in family groups, called prides. The family consists of related females, their cubs of both sexes, and one or more unrelated males who mate with the adult females.

Although it was once thought that females did most of the hunting in the pride, it is now known that males contribute much more to hunting than the amount for which they had been previously given credit. Both males and females will defend the pride against outside intruders. Typically, males will not tolerate outside males, and females will not tolerate outside females. Males are expelled from the pride or leave on their own when they reach maturity. When or if a male coalition takes over a pride and ousts the previous coalition, the conquerors often kill any cubs that they did not father.

Like all other cats, lions are superpredators, but unlike all other cats they are social hunters and take prey too large and dangerous to overpower singly, including adult zebras, cape buffalo, giraffes, hippopotamuses, and even sub-adult elephants. Singly, a lion kills with the neck bite that breaks the neck or severs vital blood vessels; several lions may pin a large prey animal while another delivers the lethal neck bite or suffocates the prey by covering the victim's muzzle, preventing breathing. Lions are not averse to scavenging, and they frequently drive off smaller or outnumbered predators from kills and take the prey. Lions too can be driven off from prey by such competitors as hyenas and wild dogs in overwhelming numbers. Like other cats they have superb night vision that makes them more effective at night. They can sleep as many as 20 hours in a day.

Although it was once thought that lionesses did the bulk of the hunting and killing, it is now known that male lions contribute far more than they were originally given credit for. As a rule, all of the females of a pride are related (grandmothers, aunts, mothers, sisters). Both males and females defend the pride.

African Elephants have a thick, almost hairless skin, a long, flexible, prehensile trunk, upper incisors forming long curved tusks of ivory, and large fan-shaped ears.

Elephants are herbivores, spending 16 hours a day collecting plant food. Their diet is at least 50% grasses, supplemented with leaves, twigs, bark, roots, and small amounts of fruits, seeds and flowers. Because elephants only use 40% of what they eat they have to make up for their digestive system's lack of efficiency in volume. An adult elephant can consume 300 to 600 pounds (140 to 270 kg) of food a day. 60% of that food leaves the elephant's body undigested.

In the wild, elephants exhibit complex social behavior and strong familial bonds. Most females will live in family groups with up to 200 mothers, daughters and sisters. Males, on the other hand, are commonly found living alone or in smaller ( up to 20) temporary bachelor groups. Social hierarchy in calf-cow groups is based on size and age, with the largest and oldest at the top and the smallest and youngest coming in last. Adolescent males determine their own ranking order through jousting contests using head and tusks, where strength and temperament are as important as size and age. Generally, though, males are very tolerant of each other. The exception is when a female is in estrus. Bulls will roam from female group to group, staying with a specific female in estrus for a couple of days to ensure fertilization and will have no part in raising the calf. Females in estrus try not to court males, but usually choose a mate based on size and dominance, which tends to be a male in musth.

They communicate with very low and long-ranging subsonic tones.

Elephants, especially males, have been known to knock down trees and bushes when excited, socially pressured, or when looking for food.

These bovine animals are quite intimidating. They are the most dangerous of the "Big Five" game animals for hunters. They are definitely bovine characters, but also primal and with slightly mean appearance at times, despite the bouffant look of their horns.

The buffalo is up to 1.7 meters high, 3.4 meters long, and can reach a weight of 900 kilograms. The Cape Buffalo is a very powerful creature, demanding respect from even a pride of lions when paths cross. Other than man, they have few natural predators and are capable of defending themselves against (and sometimes killing) lions, who will attack only old, sick, or immature buffaloes. The leopard is a threat only to newborn calves. Crossbreeding with domestic cattle has had only limited success, and the African Buffalo remains a wild animal.

Known as one of the "big five" in Africa, the Cape Buffalo can be a volatile and formidable beast.

Cape Buffalo prefer areas of open pasture, close to jungle and swampy ground where they can wallow. They are found in Ethiopia, Somalia, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Botswana, Mozambique and South Africa, with a significant seasonal presence in Kenya and Tanzania.

The main herd consists of all sexes and ages, though bachelor groups are also found. A male is recognizable by the thickness of his horns, and is called the "Boss." Bulls mature at eight years of age. Cows first calve at five years of age, after a gestation period of 11.5 months.

Most leopards are light tan or fawn with black spots, but their coat color is highly variable. The spots tend to be smaller on the head, larger and have pale centres on the body.

Originally, it was thought that a leopard was a hybrid between a lion and a panther, and the leopard's common name derives from this belief; leo is the Latin for lion, and pard is an old term meaning panther. In fact, a "panther" can be any of several species of large felid. In North America panther means puma. In South America a panther is a jaguar. Elsewhere in the world a panther is a leopard. Early naturalists distinguished between leopards and panthers not by color (a common misconception), but by the length of the tail - panthers supposedly having longer tails than pards (leopards).

A black panther is a melanistic leopard (or melanistic jaguar). These have mutations that cause them to produce more black pigment (eumelanin) than orange-tan pigment (pheomelanin). This results in a chiefly black coat, though the spots of a black panther can still be discerned in certain light as the deposition of pigment is different in the pattern than in the background. There are also white panthers.

Despite its size, this largely nocturnal and arboreal predator is difficult to see in the wild. The best location to see leopards in Africa is in the Sabi Sand Private Game Reserve in South Africa, where leopards are habituated to safari vehicles and are seen on a daily basis at very close range.

Rhinos as they more commonly known are large, thick-skinned, herbivorous mammals having one or two upright horns on the snout. They are divided into the Whito Rhino and Black Rhino species, with both having distinctive characteristics.

The White Rhinoceros or Square-lipped rhinoceros (Ceratotherium simum) is one of the six species of rhinoceros that still exists and is one of the few megaherbivore species left. It is native to Northeastern and southern Africa. The rhinos tend to group in herds of one to seven animals, though they are solitary animals. On its snout it has two horns made of keratin fibers (and not bone, as in deer antlers).

The White Rhino differs from the Black Rhinoceros because of the shape of its mouth – it is wide, for cropping large swaths of grass; according to one theory, the term "White" actually comes from the Afrikaans word "weit", meaning 'wide'. A White Rhino's skin color is quite similar to that of the Black Rhino.

The White Rhinoceros also has a noticeable hump on the back of its neck which supports its large head. Each of the rhino's four feet has three toes. It is sometimes known as the Square-lipped Rhinoceros because of its protrudent lip that helps it graze on short grasses quickly in the savanna. It is capable of going four or five days without water.

South Africa has a White Rhino population of about 11,000, making them the most abundant subspecies of rhino in the world.

An adult black rhinoceros stands 5 feet (1.5 m) high at the shoulder and is anywhere from 10 to 12 feet (3 to 3.65 m) in length. An adult weighs from 1,000 to 3,000 lb (454 to 1362 kg), with the female being smaller. Two horns on the skull are made of keratin with the larger front horn as high as 28 inches (71 cm). Occasionally, a third smaller horn may develop. Skin color depends more on local soil conditions and their wallowing behaviour than anything else, so many black rhinos are typically not truly black in color.

The black rhinos are smaller than white rhinos and have a pointy prehensile upper lip, which they use to eat leafs and twigs. White rhinos have square lips used for grazing grass. The black rhino can also be recognized from the white rhino by its smaller skull and ears and its more pronounced forehead. Black rhinos also do not have a distinguishing shoulder hump like the white rhinos.

The adults are solitary in nature but come together for mating, with the females accompanying their young during the rearing period. Sometimes, mothers and daughters may form small groups.