the Selati coalition

[Tshokwane]

Credits to Inyati.

Blog for May/June 2014.

The last few months have dashed by in a flurry of excitement, although, you need to be forewarned this story is not an easy story to read. It is however, part of the bush and it adds to the drama of it all as we realize that in the bush the penalty for pure misfortune often is death. So to start off, it  appears that the Selati’s are now gone. The four became three and then the Majingilanes arrived.


For two weeks this reserve was in an uproar as on separate nights the Majingilanes teamed up against individual Selati’s, the one was really badly wounded and another was killed by the Jingies, these battles happened at night and it happened close to the camp and all night long we heard the giant cats fight it out. The other two left via Londolozi and the last update I had was that they were around the Manyeleti a few weeks back.

This new coalition then moved into the area and they were looking for the Prides. Initially the males found the female from the Othawa Pride who doesn’t have any cubs, she mated with these males for almost two weeks, before they realized that they were barking up the wrong tree! This time had given the two prides a head start, the Xhimungwe’s have been hiding from male lions for years when they have cubs, and the Othawa’s had not, and it shows. The Majingilanes then proceeded to hunt the cubs from both prides. This is natural selection at work, it is common practice for new male lions moving into an area to kill off the cubs, it is called infanticide.

One fateful afternoon we happened upon a fresh Kudu kill that the one female had killed. She was lying up in the afternoon sunlight in the sand of one of the many drainage lines that run about the lodge. Initially we knew she had a kill because she was full and covered in blood and we could smell it, it is an acrid smell when the lions spill the stomach and its contents, it catches you by surprise and is not at all pleasant, and it wasn’t pleasant. We found the kill and also by surprise four cubs that had been displaced from the Pride and we had feared the worst. They had gorged themselves on a huge male kudu, not much was left apart from a partially chewed ribcage and a clean beautiful set of horns. We had left that evening thinking that this was there bit of luck, but we were wrong… dead wrong. The next morning two cubs were dead in the same spot and the other two were missing. Jury is still out on who killed the cubs but the manner in which they were left suggests like it was lions. This poor Othawa’s Pride has lost in total 6 cubs with only one male and one female sub-adult left. Should these two perish as well this will give the Xhimungwe’s a chance as the Jingies will spend quality time with the Othawa’s.

The Xhimungwe’s are down to five sub-adults 4 females and a male. The cubs are almost indiscernible from their mother in the Xhimungwe’s. Their tactic seems to be eat impala’s every day, nothing too big to keep us rooted to one spot for too long, and turn away from the roars at night. Reply