Lions of Timbavati

[Potato]

Tanda Tula update

Whilst the spotted felines were doing their bit to avoid me, their larger tawny cousins played along very well – so much so that we had lions on offer pretty much every drive, and quite often there were multiple sightings to choose from.  A copy-and-paste week for the Vuyela males, as they remained relatively central for most of the week, only heading off property to the north as the week drew to a close.  The River Pride remained quite central after a good feed early in the week, but they were the reason that the males headed north as two lionesses and the cubs (along with three males) were reported to be found on a young giraffe kill many kilometres to the north of our concession at the end of the week.  The pregnant female was seen walking around on her own a couple of times towards the end of the week, but with her belly still full, she has not dropped the cubs yet. 

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

This week saw the first sighting of the new Sark Breakaway Pride’s cubs – Steven found the mother and her three bundles of cuteness in the western sections yesterday morning on his way back to camp.  The cubs are around 7 or 8 weeks old and will slowly be introduced to the rest of the pride, but they will likely only be brought to large kills in the next month or so.  The Sark Breakaways themselves moved quite a bit this week, and were mostly joined by a single Vuyela male.  Obviously, they were all seen feeding on a wildebeest kill on the morning I was not driving (just in case you thought it was only the spotted cats that avoided me).  I also caught up with the pride when they made their way to our airstrip and spent the evening resting there – I did also see them with a kill that evening, but it was far less exciting…a poor little dwarf mongoose!   The Giraffe Pride were also found feeding on a buffalo kill in the far west in the middle of the week, and portions of the pride were around for the latter part of the week, but I don’t believe any of our guides headed all that way to see them. 

*This image is copyright of its original author

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