Lions of Timbavati

[Potato]

Tanda Tula update

As seems to be a common trend of late, the lions of the western Timbavati held center stage. The Giraffe Pride continued to operate on the plains around Plains Camp with pleasing regularity. I returned to drive to hear that Tristan and Glen had found the pride with a fresh zebra kill in the morning, but by the time we headed out in the afternoon, the kill was no more, but the pride was still resting around a nearby waterhole. The next day they spent the day on plains, and after two days just south of our concession, they returned to the plains to end off the week on a high. In the two days that the Giraffe Pride were away (although we did have one single lioness from the pride wandering the plains one evening), the Sark Breakaway and Vuyela males were worthy substitutes. We found the pride one morning by pure chance – we were heading east for a change of scenery when Glen spotted two dogs on the access road some distance away. A glance with my binoculars confirmed that they weren’t hyenas, and were definitely of a canid nature…we started heading there a little quicker to relocate and almost missed a male lion that was in the long grass right next to the road. We had a quick look at the smaller Vuyela male making a rapid entry into Giraffe Pride territory as he followed the scent trail of something. We opted to leave him and head for the wild dogs instead but were soon returning to look for the lion as the wild dogs turned out to be two jackals. We headed onto a small clearing when the sound of fighting lions quickly led to us relocating on the lions in a thicket; the reason for his sniffing around was that there were eight members of the Sark Breakaway Pride hidden in the thicket, as well as three other Vuyela males. The arrival of the fourth male led to some fighting and growling, and he soon decided that it wasn’t worth hanging around and wandered back east. The pride remained around for another day before heading north into the Klaserie. The Mayambula Pride was not active within our concession this week, but the River Pride lionesses were seen on a couple of occasions in the eastern block to round off a great week of lion viewing.

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

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