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Leopards of Sabi Sands
Leopards of Sabi Sands
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Leopards of Sabi Sands
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There are so many pages on a population in a small part of Kruger National Park?
Anyway, these leopards are fine specimens, but they seem to be hiding a lot more potential due to the high density of competitors(lions and hyenas). Here is a leopard losing his kudu cow to a sickly lion As Rob mentioned, this is the "biggest" kill he has ever seen. There is obvious evidence they can take down far bigger. Unfortunately, competitors will take from a leopard if he kills too big, so the diet is somewhat restrained, focusing on smaller antelope and juveniles. Like this Hyena taking a Kudu Cow kill from another male. 
Credits to James Tyrrell - Londolozi.
Introducing the Tortoise Pan Male Leopard: Most of you familiar with the Leopards of Londolozi will have some idea about the naming process when a leopard becomes territorial. I use the term “territorial” loosely as territorial behaviour does not necessarily mean that a leopard is actually controlling territory. The rasping calls and scent-marking that are usually involved in demarcating an area usually start long before a young leopard has actually established itself, so I guess the naming process takes place when we observe a certain amount of consistency in the latter two behaviours. Territorial behaviour usually involves a fair amount of scent-marking.  *This image is copyright of its original author Short version: we pick a territorial feature within the area that the leopard is spending the most time and allocate it to the individual, dropping the prefix “young” from the name altogether. The Xidulu female was often found along a road called Xidulu (meaning “termite mound” in Xitsonga, the local language), the Nanga female was first seen scent marking along Nanga Road, and the Camp Pan male was often found around the small waterbody of that same name during his salad days. The Ndzanzeni young male has regularly been found mating with the Mashaba female over the past month or two, and as such, it was deemed an appropriate time to recognise the fact that he’s maturing well and ready to be allocated a name. It’s usually before they are officially territorial that young male leopards are allocated a name, as is the case with the Ndzanzeni young male, who now becomes the Tortoise Pan male.  *This image is copyright of its original author After a few different ideas were bandied about, the Tracker and Ranger team eventually settled on Tortoise Pan male. Tortoise Pan is a small waterhole in the south-eastern section of Londolozi where a number of sightings of this leopard have been recorded. He has mated with the Mashaba female there, and upon reflection it’s actually ironic that he killed her second-to-last litter last year only a hundred metres from the pan. The Tortoise Pan male drinks from his namesake waterbody.  *This image is copyright of its original author Young male leopards tend to be rather amusing animals to spend time with, as they are naturally curious, investigating every funny scent they come across; the roughly 3-year-old age bracket is one in which a young male is likely exploring new territory, having been placed under increasing pressure by his father to move out. Yet we haven’t observed that textbook behaviour from the dominant Inyathini male. Instead, we’ve seen him far more tolerant of his son the Tortoise Pan male, mating together with him. Shades of the Camp Pan and Tu-Tones males from a few years ago. The father-son duo of the Camp Pan male (back) and Tu Tones male (middle) were found consorting with the Tamboti female on a number of occasions.  *This image is copyright of its original author The dangers of having a young male around of course, is that they are exploratory. They move out, sniff out new parts of the reserve, and the end result – sadly – is that they may well run into young cubs to which they are not related, and kill them. By far the biggest danger to a young leopard cub is a vagrant male, as the Mashaba female found out last year, and very recently, the male Ximungwe cub was killed by the Tortoise Pan male in a confrontation over a kill. We’ll run a post on this incident in the next week or two, but needless to say as exciting as it can be for us to have a young male leopard popping up all across Londolozi as he embraces his new-found independence, the females currently raising cubs would beg to differ. The blue area is a rough indication of where we have been seeing the Tortoise Pan male. The red dot is Tortoise Pan itself (approximate) and the black dot is where this male killed one of the Ximungwe cubs recently. The green area is where the Tatowa female has been spending time with her cubs, would be in great danger from the Tortoise Pan male should they meet.  *This image is copyright of its original author With the Tatowa female still raising a young litter, the Ximungwe female still raising her female cub (as far as we know) and the Nhlanguleni cubs not quite independent, let’s all hope that the Tortoise Pan male actually stays around Tortoise Pan, where he will do the least damage to Londolozi’s current cub population.
Credits to James Tyrrell - Londolozi.
The Hukumuri male is one not mentioned many times before on this forum, but he has been seen encroaching into the northern parts of Londolozi more and more frequently over the past month or two. In fact, the ever-increasing presence of foreign males to the north of the Sand River begs the question of just how strong the Anderson male’s hold is on the area. We’ll leave that debate for another day, as the case of the Hukumuri male is in itself noteworthy for far more than simply being a new leopard to add to the list of individuals seen. In terms of dispersal, he’s something special. The Hukumuri male walking. Something he’s good at, as you will see…  *This image is copyright of its original author Leopard males usually move out of their natal territory when they reach sexual maturity. Their fathers don’t want the competition, so act aggressively towards their sons to force them to seek life elsewhere. This is what the textbooks tell us anyway, but it doesn’t always happen, as we are currently witnessing in the dynamic between the Tortoise Pan male and his father the Inyathini male, and what we have seen before between the Camp Pan and Tu Tones males. A bigger factor in the lack of dispersal is likely to be the genetic pressure – or lack thereof. Male leopards ideally don’t want to mate with closely related females, so move to a different area in order to procreate. Although this dispersal can be far (depending of course on environmental limitations), research has shown that it is actually usually no great distance; often as little as 10km. Many of the male leopards we see were born on neighbouring reserves and have been followed since soon after birth. The Flat Rock male apparently came from the Tinga property, right next door to the Sabi Sand Reserve. The Makhotini male was born on Londolozi and moved just south on Sabi Sabi. The Anderson male was born to the east of Londolozi back in 2008, and simply moved across over the years. The Anderson male seems to be coming under increasing pressure in the north.  *This image is copyright of its original author The Hukumuri male certainly came from a neighbouring reserve, but not quite next door. Photographic evidence has shown that he came from the Kruger Park, and not just over the boundary, but almost 100km away, right down in the south-east corner near Crocodile Bridge! And he didn’t come to Londolozi as the crow flies. No, he was viewed as a young male on Ngala Reserve to our north, which is over 130km from where he was born. He then moved south through the Manyelethi Reserve before eventually establishing himself in the northern parts of the Sabi Sand Reserve. That’s a lot of walking for a young male to do, and one of the best things we can take from the Hukumuri male’s long march is that it almost certainly indicates a very healthy leopard population all the way along his route. He most likely kept moving because of consistent encounters with or at least awareness of big territorial males; if the space was occupied, it wasn’t safe for him to stay, so he pushed on. And now here he is.  *This image is copyright of its original author Whether the Hukumri male has simply been an itinerant visitor to our northern reaches or whether he is set to become more established (which we suspect), the story of where he came from to get here is – at least for me – the coolest part about him. And if I’m honest, I haven’t even seen him yet! Let’s hope he keeps walking right onto Londolozi. 
"The Anderson male leopard was found with deep gashes in his neck and shoulder, which we presume were inflicted by the Warthog that he had killed... Footage by Ranger Sean Zeedeberg"
Photo by
 *This image is copyright of its original author
Credits to: 2011ACVVV
POSTED ON JUNE 29. Leopard Hosana steals a kill from Hyena!
Wow, fearless stuff there. Don't think I've ever seen a leopard so confidently and directly steal a kill from a hyena like that. Great footage, tfs.
Hukumuri lost his eye.. or maybe there is stll chance for recover?
Photo by by James Tyrell from Londolozi  *This image is copyright of its original author
From Cheetah Plains Private Game Reserve, Sabi Sand, South Africa
"We had an unbelievable sighting a couple of days ago. Male leopard, Hosana was feeding on a steenbok up a tree, but young female, Tlalamba climbed the tree & tried to steal the kill. She eventually managed to get about half of the carcass." (Click to play)  (07-13-2019, 11:07 AM)Luipaard Wrote: From Cheetah Plains Private Game Reserve, Sabi Sand, South AfricaYeah everyone finds it cute and all but Hosana should never lose a kill to a leopard of her size, he is supposed to start becoming dominant and he gets bullied by a one year old female leopard good luck not being intimidated and being able to fight back against males. Also weird behavior from the female leopard she was lucky but next time she might not be as lucky (07-13-2019, 08:04 PM)Michael Wrote:(07-13-2019, 11:07 AM)Luipaard Wrote: From Cheetah Plains Private Game Reserve, Sabi Sand, South AfricaYeah everyone finds it cute and all but Hosana should never lose a kill to a leopard of her size, he is supposed to start becoming dominant and he gets bullied by a one year old female leopard good luck not being intimidated and being able to fight back against males. I agree with most of that although this is exceptional what happened between those two. As for Hosana, he does pretty well against hyena's (defending a kill, not fleeing when there's a nearby hyena, etc). I mean he scavenged from a hyena larger than himself. And I saw the interaction with those lionesses in the tree via the cam, boy was he pissed. I'd say he was rather angry than scared. I'm also curious when he's going to start being dominant. Although I'm not sure if he's capable of pushing other males like Tingana (despite being old). And with the shy male Molwati around, things could get nasty. Best thing he can do imo, is to look for his own territory. As for Tlalamba, it's both brave and risky indeed.
From Sabi Sabi twitter (posted today):
Maxabeni, If Im not mistaken, He is 10 years old.  *This image is copyright of its original author
Tingana - Djuma - Sunset safarilive 18/07/2019
 *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author
Returning to the Sabi Sands
May 11, 2015 Credits :Morkel Erasmus t’s been a while. Three years to be exact. Three years since I was able to last spend time in the Sabi Sands Game Reserve, a jewel in the lowveld and one of the best places to view and photograph leopards in all of Africa. Three years ago, I didn’t have much luck. I was only there for 2 nights and with the constant rain we only found one leopard on the last afternoon as I was about to leave the reserve. Despite living in South Africa and going on safari frequently – leopard photos are a bit lacking in my overall portfolio. I’ve enjoyed amazing sightings of most of the other iconic African mammals, but leopards keep on avoiding me. This encounter in Kruger was the most memorable, but I am yearning for a fresh dose of leopard-awesomeness. This weekend, my wife and I are returning to the Sabi Sands. Between the properties of Singita and Leopard Hills, I hope we will be lucky enough to spend some quality time with Africa’s beautiful secretive predator. At the very least, we should have a great time and recharge some of our own batteries.  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author
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