Hello again and welcome to another installment of “A Week in the Bush...” It has been another exciting week here at Sabi Sabi and I am very excited to share the moments with all of you as we take another look at the highlighted events of the week.

One of the reserve’s female cheetahs was again making herself a regular feature on game drives this last week being seen repeatedly on hunting missions or simply just relaxing on top of some of the termite mounds that can be found all over the reserve. The predators are thriving at the moment on the surplus of impala lambs that are being born on a daily basis.

Nottins has been doing the rounds and was found several times searching intently for prey so that her and her young cub could feed. One tends to forget that life as a predator out here is incredibly tough and that these animals are not as successful as the documentaries would have you believe. Statistically with regards to leopard, it is estimated that only 4 of every 10 hunts will result in a kill. And of those 4 kills, hyenas may steal 2 or 3 for themselves. You can see now how tough it really is for these animals, and having the added pressure of providing for cubs only makes matters worse. Nottins though, has been extremely successful in providing for the young cub and her time spent hunting is proving to be worthwhile. She managed to capture one of the young impala lambs that can be seen all over the place at present, providing her cub with some much needed sustenance.

Little Bush female is in essentially the same predicament as Nottins female and is perhaps under a bit more pressure at the moment, because her cub is slighter older and could surely put away a lot more meat. She is also doing well, however and she too was found with her youngster to be feeding on a young impala lamb this week.

In the southern section of the reserve, Lisbon was seen trailing Mandleve trying to entice him to mate with her and it seems the young lad has had enough of her. He was seen fleeing from her every chance that he got. Whether he is sincerely trying to get away from her or luring her deeper into his domain, is anyone’s guess at this point. We will keep you updated with the developments as they happen.

A female not often seen around these parts and particularly not in the last four months, is the striking White Dam female. She was last seen here mating with Maxabeni many months ago and we had suspected for some time that her absence was a result of her being pregnant and denning somewhere quiet and out of the way. Well, we can definitively say that she has indeed given birth to cubs, but we have not had eyes on them yet. We do hope this litter will survive and if the other two females that have offspring via Maxabeni are anything to go by, she should do just fine.

It’s not just the impalas that have a lot of youngsters running around at the moment, but many elephants as well. In fact most animals will time the births of their young to the rainy season, which makes the most sense really. There is more than sufficient water, food and shelter at this time of the year, making their chances of survival that much greater than if they had to be born in the dry season when all those things are hard to come by. There are not many animals out here that can compete in terms of cuteness than that of the baby elephant. There is just something about these incredible creatures that will melt even the hardest of exteriors. We were very lucky to spend some time with these youngsters in particular.

The Southern Pride split was found at the waterhole in front of Selati Camp this last week where they were lazing around after having fed the night before. This was the first time that they had ventured this far north into reserve for quite some time. It wasn’t long though before they began to move off to the west and eventually headed back south, where the Sand River males followed them shortly after. The split, as we commonly refer to them now, was looking in desperate need of a meal and so it was great to see them have at least some form of victory. I think curiosity also drew them north, but the Sand River males almost immediately picked them up.

It is still hard to say exactly what is going to happen with the estranged members of the Southern Pride, but one thing is for sure, the Sand River males are not going to tolerate them within the territory willingly. I think that if they forced the young male out, perhaps the females could gain favour with the Sand River males, but it does not seem likely that this will happen any time soon. The three Sand River males were hot on the heels of the split, following them along the same path almost exactly. The males themselves seem to be in general good shape with the exception of the male with the crooked back. He always seems to have a new injury on almost every meeting with them. The bond between these three males is strong though and it doesn’t seem like there are going to be any changes in the dynamics here in the immediate future, although there are some of us who wish there was.

Moving away from the cats for the moment, we have been having some incredible viewing of the various species of migratory birds that are visiting our shores from all over the world. A specie of bird that is most prominent at this time of year is the Wahlberg’s Eagle, visiting us from central Africa to breed. One of our guides, Pravir Patel, was lucky enough to witness and document one of these incredible birds capturing and killing a Burchell’s Coucal. This is a most rare and special sighting for both our guests and guide alike.

We end this week’s recap with another large bird that is visiting us from Europe at the moment, the Steppe Eagle. Steppe Eagles can often be seen this time of the year on or around termite mounds gorging themselves on alates, but on this occasion this particular Steppe Eagle was doing just as we were, watching the sun set on another beautiful day in Southern Africa. I hope you enjoyed this week’s recap as much as I did. I will be bringing you some more news from the bush next week so stay tuned. Until next time...