(04-13-2025, 07:34 PM)Mapokser Wrote:

(04-13-2025, 07:12 AM)Spaske Wrote:

(12-15-2024, 08:54 AM)Mapokser Wrote:

(12-13-2024, 10:43 PM)BA0701 Wrote: We were discussing the situation at Elephant Plains, on the Kruger thread, and it got me thinking about the things that happened back then. The loss of Rasta was a really big blow, just as the loss of KT was even bigger, but, I still believe that the loss of Dreadlocks, to poachers, was the biggest loss to the 6 Mapogos. They had been able to regroup and recover from all of the others, and Dreadlocks played a big role in that. Once Dreadlocks was killed, the end of the Mapogo reign came relatively quickly afterwards.

Yeah, they were still the strongest coalition around before Dreadlocks died, though even before his death, they had already given up on their entire north and east territory, accepting the Majingilane rule, which came with Rasta's death and PB's injuries. Even after PB very quickly full recovery, they never attempted to challenge Majingilane for Londolozi, Northern Sector or MalaMala. I think, however, that if Mr.T had not killed the Ximungwe cubs, bringing the females back to estrus, there might have been a chance for them to make another move against Majingilane.

Still, technically speaking, Dreadlocks wasn't poached, to say he was poached would be to say someone illegally sneaked into the reserve and shot him, but he was killed outside Sabi Sands and the demand to kill him instead of allowing him to get darted and brought back, came from leaders of some local tribes.

But anyway, back to the dynamics, lion strategy or whatever, one should give full credit to Majingilane, I'm sure luck always plays its role, but the bond, intelligence, coordination and teamplay of the Majingis was out of this world, they had competition and clashes with coalitions of 6 ( Mapogo, Matimba ), 5 ( Bboys ), 4 ( Selati ), 3 ( Sand Rivers ) and never lost any members, hell, no member has even been seriously injured, their only lost ever was that of 5th in their first territorial challenge, after that they went into an insane spree off successfully competing with other males.

So basically you saying that two Majingis killed Rasta and badly injured PB? As you stated there is no injuries on other two Majingis. This seems highly unlikely scenario to me.

I didn't say that.

4 Selatis killed Mr.T and only one had very noticeable injuries. Just because only 2 were seen with some injuries doesn't mean they were the only ones involved.

(04-14-2025, 06:10 AM)Spaske Wrote: Understood, but according to your scenario this was not 4 vs 1 situation. Two Mapogos were involved. I personally doubt that in such circumstances 2 Majingis came out of the fight untouched. When MR.T jumped into fight with Majingis he very quickly overpowered one lion and retreated when another came into his aid. PB was bigger then KT and while numbers definitely didn’t work in their favor I can’t see scenario of them being severely beaten with no damage to the other side. At that time Mapogos were in prime.
Regarding Selaties, was it first encounter where PB was severely injured ever recorded?
Many thanks

(04-14-2025, 07:40 AM)Mapokser Wrote: There's nothing fishy about Rasta's demise, no reason at all to even entertain such possibilities.

It's quite the opposite, his twin brother and him went to the neighboring territory where they were competing with the new coalition and only one returned, badly beaten, so it's pretty obvious what happened.

Since these particular lions had some very passionate fans, conspiracy theories came into play, with some Mapogo fans thinking there was no way their favorite lions would have lost to the Majingilane, and humans must have had a hand on it.

Mapogo were still 4 strong after Rasta's death, and that was the case for the next four months, yet they completely relinquished everything east of Singita to the Majingilane, so how is it so hard to accept that Rasta and PB failed trying to push the Majingilane out, and Rasta lost his life?

Things were pretty simple, Eastern Mapogo were ousted from MalaMala, the Northern Sector and Londolozi, KT lost his life. Mr.T ran back west and once his brothers notice the presence of a new coalition in Londolozi and Elephant Plains ( which they still thought as being their backyard with the Tsalala pride ) tried to push the Majingilane out, Rasta lost his life, PB almost followed him to the grave and the Mapogo vacated the area to the new males.

There's nothing fish about what happened.

(04-14-2025, 08:03 AM)FACR2212 Wrote: I think the biggest achievement of the Mapogos, one that surely benefited their descendants above all, it's the fact that they made african lions so much popular than before. That means more tourism, more development of the protected areas, more protection to lions overall. How many of us would not be here talking about lions if Mapogo had never existed?

So much time has passed since they passed away, there comes a time to let them rest in peace.

(04-14-2025, 08:03 AM)FACR2212 Wrote: I think the biggest achievement of the Mapogos, one that surely benefited their descendants above all, it's the fact that they made african lions so much popular than before. That means more tourism, more development of the protected areas, more protection to lions overall. How many of us would not be here talking about lions if Mapogo had never existed?

So much time has passed since they passed away, there comes a time to let them rest in peace.

(04-14-2025, 06:57 AM)Mapokser Wrote:

(04-14-2025, 06:10 AM)Spaske Wrote: Understood, but according to your scenario this was not 4 vs 1 situation. Two Mapogos were involved. I personally doubt that in such circumstances 2 Majingis came out of the fight untouched. When MR.T jumped into fight with Majingis he very quickly overpowered one lion and retreated when another came into his aid. PB was bigger then KT and while numbers definitely didn’t work in their favor I can’t see scenario of them being severely beaten with no damage to the other side. At that time Mapogos were in prime.
Regarding Selaties, was it first encounter where PB was severely injured ever recorded?
Many thanks

Nobody saw anything, we don't know how PB's clash played out.

But we do know for a fact that he got badly beaten by multiple lions and at the same time 2 Majingis were reported, on Idube's words "pretty battered", there was one photo at the time showing the Majingilane and we could see injuries in the one Majingi looking at the camera.

We also know Rasta disappeared at the exact same time. There was word of a male lion skull found in Londolozi at the time, but I don't remember anymore if the info was legit or if it was just a myth, I do feel like the word came from a Londolozi ranger, but I don't remember exactly anymore.

It's quite possible, given what we know, that Rasta died in the same fight PB was injured, maybe 4v2, who knows, or maybe they were caught separately in a short period of time, or it was something similar to how the clash with Mlowathi went, we simply don't know and can only make an educated guess.

PB being bigger than KT doesn't mean anything, especially when the difference was so small it was insignificant. We could barely notice any size difference between the Mapogo and there were a lot of photos and videos of them together.

Guides did watch at the least the end of the clash where PB was severely injured by Selatis as they describe how it ended, with both coalitions moving in the opposite direction roaring.

There's a photo showing Pretty Boy being attacked by very young males who @Ngonya assures are the Selati, and I don't think there's anyone else who knows the Selatis better than him.

The issue is that in the photo the grass was dry and dead, but at that time of the year the grass is very green, which can be seen in the footage of the time, and it was also something pointed out by Rob the Ranger.

So that photo is a mystery.

(04-13-2025, 07:34 PM)Mapokser Wrote:

(04-13-2025, 07:12 AM)Spaske Wrote:

(12-15-2024, 08:54 AM)Mapokser Wrote:

(12-13-2024, 10:43 PM)BA0701 Wrote: We were discussing the situation at Elephant Plains, on the Kruger thread, and it got me thinking about the things that happened back then. The loss of Rasta was a really big blow, just as the loss of KT was even bigger, but, I still believe that the loss of Dreadlocks, to poachers, was the biggest loss to the 6 Mapogos. They had been able to regroup and recover from all of the others, and Dreadlocks played a big role in that. Once Dreadlocks was killed, the end of the Mapogo reign came relatively quickly afterwards.

Yeah, they were still the strongest coalition around before Dreadlocks died, though even before his death, they had already given up on their entire north and east territory, accepting the Majingilane rule, which came with Rasta's death and PB's injuries. Even after PB very quickly full recovery, they never attempted to challenge Majingilane for Londolozi, Northern Sector or MalaMala. I think, however, that if Mr.T had not killed the Ximungwe cubs, bringing the females back to estrus, there might have been a chance for them to make another move against Majingilane.

Still, technically speaking, Dreadlocks wasn't poached, to say he was poached would be to say someone illegally sneaked into the reserve and shot him, but he was killed outside Sabi Sands and the demand to kill him instead of allowing him to get darted and brought back, came from leaders of some local tribes.

But anyway, back to the dynamics, lion strategy or whatever, one should give full credit to Majingilane, I'm sure luck always plays its role, but the bond, intelligence, coordination and teamplay of the Majingis was out of this world, they had competition and clashes with coalitions of 6 ( Mapogo, Matimba ), 5 ( Bboys ), 4 ( Selati ), 3 ( Sand Rivers ) and never lost any members, hell, no member has even been seriously injured, their only lost ever was that of 5th in their first territorial challenge, after that they went into an insane spree off successfully competing with other males.

So basically you saying that two Majingis killed Rasta and badly injured PB? As you stated there is no injuries on other two Majingis. This seems highly unlikely scenario to me.

I didn't say that.

4 Selatis killed Mr.T and only one had very noticeable injuries. Just because only 2 were seen with some injuries doesn't mean they were the only ones involved.

(Yesterday, 07:54 AM)Mapokser Wrote: Chances are he got caught, I'd find it unlikely he tried to chase them off alone.

Western rangers reported PB being the least dominant at the time, spending most of his time with the Ximungwe pride while Mr.T and Makhulu were doing the patrolling.

Still, there's no way to know, but before he got injured, the overall view at the time, even from rangers, were that the young Selatis were messing with the wrong lions and didn't know who they were dealing with.

Guides even assumed Mapogo had isolated 1/4 Selati and told others in the radio exactly that, just to end up shocked when they all arrived at the scene and realized it was Mr.T who got isolated by the young males.

So maybe even if PB had not been injured, the end result would be the same and people were misjudging the strengths of the Mapogo and Selatis.

Just look at Nhenha/NK and the PCM, many at the time assumed the younger, barely 5yo PCM wouldn't be trouble to prime NK and old, but legendary Nhenha still in top condition, but when they clashed, PCM easily ousted them.

Anyways, some are of the opinion that we should "let the Mapogo rest" but I think it's interesting that their story was so fascinating that to this day there's still interest in it, and willingness to talk about them.