Male giraffes compete for dominance by violently pushing, slapping and wrestling with their necks. The idea is to push the losing giraffe off of his feet. The violence can lead to serious injury or even death of the loser, which would be particularly tragic in the case of these highly endangered Thornicroft Giraffes. Fortunately, these two young males are practicing by going through the motions without the full violence of the breeding adults. But even though they were taking it easy, the neck wrestling could easily have led to a serious injury. We were in the South Luangwa National Park at the end of the dry season in November. The remaining clumps of very dry grass were in the bright golden hour morning sun, while the giraffes were still in the shade.
I used a Canon EOS 7D Mark II with a Canon 200 - 400mm f/4L IS USM EXT to take the image. The exposure settings were 1/2000 sec at f/4, ISO 250, 200 mm, handheld.