If wildlife spectacles are judged on sheer numbers and biomass, then the wildebeest migration of the Serengeti-Masai Mara ecosystem deserves to be top dog.
Up to 2 million grass-guzzling herbivores take part, with 1.4 million wildebeest and 200,000 zebras forming the gigantic cavalcade that tramples its way around northern Tanzania and southern Kenya in an endless, clockwise cycle.
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For many, the highlight is the crossing of the Mara River between August and October, where Nile crocodiles await the unwary or unlucky. For others, it is the almost simultaneous calving of the wildebeest in February in the Serengeti's Southern Plains.
The wildebeest migration is a continual process with he animals feeding on the Southern Plains of the serengeti from December to April before heading orth to the Masai Mara. The main crossings of the lara River usually take place in September.