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leap of leopards

on Nov 30, 2011

Seeing a leopard in the wild is an experience like no other. The sheer beauty and magnificence of this cat is truly breath taking. For 16 years I searched for this elusive cat as we went on countless bush holidays with my family and friends. Eventually the search ended one glorious afternoon when we found a female leopard in a tree staring at the traffic that had surrounded her on the busy roads of the Kruger National Park. I can still remember the adrenalin pumping through my body and the pure elation at seeing my favourite animal in the whole world. My breath was short and my hands clumsy as I tried to fumble for the binoculars to get a closer look at the dappled coat and take in as much as possible because if it was going to be another 16 years before I saw another leopard, I wanted to have a memory to fill the gap.

Young Male Leopard

I have come a long way since then with very regular sightings of leopard whilst working here at Sabi Sabi. The area has the densest leopard population in the world due to the high prey concentration. As I said earlier, seeing a leopard in the wild is an experience like no other, and I was in for a whole new experience on our afternoon safari.

Dominant Male Leopard 2

The morning had been busy and we had caught a glimpse of a female leopard, but with new guests arriving in the afternoon I wanted to make sure that they too got to experience their first leopard. We headed straight out to the area to look for tracks that would hopefully lead us to her. One of the other rangers found her and her 23 month old cub who, amazingly, is still dependent on his mother. According to most textbooks the length of time that a cub stays with its mother is variable but the general number is 12 months for a female and 18 months for a male, however periods as short as 6 months before being fully independent have been recorded. This is the longest I have heard of and I am sure it is not the only example of such a long period of dependency. My opinion is that due to the large leopard population and pressure from big males, the mother wants to give her son the best opportunity to grow to adulthood as what she can.

Just before I arrived at the sighting the other vehicles were following the two leopards down the road when suddenly the territorial male from the east came launching out of the bush and attacked the young male. This territorial male was already responsible for killing and eating this males’ brother and everyone watching was wondering if he was about to do the same to this male. They scuffled very briefly before his mother came to his rescue, jumping in and throwing a couple of punches of her own. This brave female who is only half the weight of the male managed to stand up to this huge leopard and keep him from dispatching yet another of her offspring.

Both males had small nicks on their noses from the swinging claws but none had any serious injuries. We watched as they all sat around in a tense standoff, breathing heavily after the energy sapping fight in the summer heat. The deadlock was almost broken again about 15 minutes later when the young male approached the big male again, whimpering as he advanced, only to be greeted with deep growls and body language from the adult male suggesting that he keep his distance. What a crazy sighting, not one but three leopards in one place, all interacting! WOW!

  • by: Richard de Gouveia (Little Bush Camp ranger)
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