Warthog bites the dust...or the leopard bites the warthog...

After a great drive in the morning which comprised of watching hippos, rhinos and elephants as well as an incredible tracking mission to find the lions we headed down to the river for a quick look and a cup of coffee. It was a fitting end to a great couple of days with some amazing guests. After they left it was time for a bit of R&R before my new guests arrived.

My new guests had just come from a reserve in Limpopo and had see a great deal there. The few things they missed out on were leopard and buffalo and the mission for the afternoon was to find just that. Within a half an hour of the safari our big male, 'M', was found and he was looking hungry. When we got into the sighting he was up on a termite mound keenly surveying his surrounding looking for some food. He spotted some warthog on the edge of the tree line and decide to make a move for them. Stalking through the long grass he made his appraoch and before we knew it all we heard was the squealing pig as he sunk his teeth in. We got to him and he was busy suffocating the warthog. What a rush. First time my guests have seen leopard and within the first 15 minutes they have seen a kill. We watched for a while as he moved it around trying to find a suitable tree to stash his prize in!

This morning started off with a pride of lions from the South that had found their way onto the property which is a little out of their normal territory. This makes we wonder what new dynamics are going to start happening around Sabi Sabi with regards to reshuffling of lion territories. Our dominant males have been all but invisible for the last 2 weeks and the other lions in the area have started to realise that there is a gap in the market. We will just have to wait and see how it all pans out.

NEW CUBS.....

Yesterday afternoons drive was spent looking for the lions down in the south. Unfortunately with tracks only from the night before we had no choice but to wait till things cooled down and hopefully find them when they started moving again.

On route to the area where the lions had last been seen we bumped into an elephant bull in musth and he was not so happy to see us. We had to maintain a healthy distance from him in order for him to relax and continue with his feeding. He was not the last elephant that we would see as we found a huge male who looked like he had had an interesting life. He had no tail, rips in his ear and the tip of his trunk was missing, but in spite of all his experiences he was as relaxed as can be. He was feeding no more than 6 metres from us and didnt even bat an eyelid to our presence.

Unfortunately we had no further luck with the lions and had to go home satisfied that we had tried everything to find them. 

The morning started well when we bumped into a male and female rhino and while watching them, Arthur called in that he had a lioness with cubs very close to where we were. I sped off after calling myself in hoping that she wouldn't take the cubs into thick bush before we got there. This female has just had the cubs and this is only the second time they have been seen. At 4 weeks old they are still being carried from place to place by the mother. When we arrived she was in the process of coaxing the one cub out of a thicket, then she picked it up in her jaws with the delicacy of a surgeon and started to move the cub. Arthur and I came to a decision that as amazing as this sighting was we would have to close it to all other vehicles and leave ourselves as the cubs were still to small and the stress that the vehicles would have on them and the mother was not worth it. I had time to squeeze off a few photos and we left her to move the little ones to the next den site! WHAT A TREAT!

We were then inundated with animals when we found impala, wildebeest, four rhino, a herd of elephant with tiny babies and a herd of male buffalo all in the same open area. One of the little baby elephants was so inquisitive it kept coming up to the vehicle to investigate. At one stage he was no more than a metre from us and we all just giggled as he tried to get us to join in him in his game of throwing around bushes. I am sure he was thinking... 'when mom does this it has much more impact, wonder what I am doing wrong...'

All in all a magnificent morning and we were truly blessed to see the new cubs. That must go down as one of the most amazing things I have ever seen since I started guiding!

Spots and stripes

It felt almost impossible that I was going to be able to top the mornings drive after our close encounter with the pride of lions, but with unwavering optimism we set out on the afternoon safari. My aim was take the guests through to the kill that our female leopard, Nottens, and her cub were on and maybe see some rhino and other general game.

First to grace us with its enormous presence were three rhinos that were grazing around a mud wallow. As we watched they all took turns to go into the wallow and cake them selves in mud. Each one leaving the pool and heading to trees to use as rubbing posts. While watching them a buffalo had the same idea in mind and approached the wallow with caution making sure that the rhinos were not going to do anything unexpected. Once he made it into the wallow his demeanour changed from that of an old man to a child…he was rolling and horning the mud as if he had never encountered something so amazing!

Unfortunately on our way to the rhinos one of the other vehicles went to relocate on Nottens and her cub but could only find the cub lying in long grass, mother nowhere to be seen and the visual of the little one not worth the effort in going to see. However, I knew that as it neared darkness the cub would be forced to seek safety in the tree so we went to try our luck. As we drove in, the little guy jumped onto the trunk of the tree, stared at us for a second and then ascended. He then proceeded to pose like a super model for our cameras. He was not the only one there and we soon saw the ominous looking hyaena waiting patiently for some scraps to fall out of the tree.

This mornings plan was to see if we could find some giraffe and zebra and then just enjoy the smaller things. Unexpectedly we found a herd of 19 zebra on one of the open areas. This is by far the largest herd I have seen in my year at Sabi Sabi. With them were some wildebeest and impala and they seemed way to interested with something other than the usual feeding and grooming. We went to go investigate and saw a number of vultures in the trees and assumed that there must be something there. We headed out on foot to see if we could find what had attracted the vultures or find whatever predator had attracted the attention of all the herbivores. It wasn’t long before we saw a male leopard slinking off into the long grass. We only got to see him for a short while as he moved towards a major thicket in the river and there was no way to get in.

We had one last animal to find before my guests left and that was the giraffe. Fortunately some had been spotted and we headed out to see them. These majestic creatures were far off but still worth the sighting and this left all the guests smiling and ready for breakfast.

Male leopards and lion charges

Just when you think things are too good to be true and your luck must be running out...it happens all over again. With profoundly different weather from the mornings rain we set out on a beautiful sunny afternoon. All the general game seemed to have found its way out of the thickets and we were bumping into lots of new things. 

After seeing a rhino bull wallowing, kudu and impala we started to make our way to the Nottens side of the reserve. As we approached the open area we found ourselves in the middle of a huge aggregation of animals which included wildebeest, zebra, kudu, impala and warthog. The guests were loving it and were all taking photos. My tracker Solly even got employed as photographer for one of the guests, a job which made his face light up with joy!

About five minutes later we found ourselves watching our big new male, who has been named 'M' because of the M shaped making on his face (see the photo above), while he slept away on an open area. Whilst watching him a young elephant bull came out of the bush to say hi and then disappeared into the thick bush again. Eventually M got up and started to get on the move just after the sun had set and the temperatures had dropped. He started scent marking and we followed him for about an hour before he lay down for a sleep in the long grass and we could no longer see him.

This mornings mission was to find the lions. So we headed south and found fresh tracks in no time. After about forty minutes of following the tracks we were force to follow them on foot as they had left the road. This led to the next road and we were back on the vehicle following the tracks again. Eventually Arthur found the last tracks close to the fence line and they had headed back into the reserve. He decided to head round to the next road and I decided that Solly and I would follow their tracks through the grass on foot. So we headed off to the last tracks and saw where they had been lying...from there we could see the bent grass where they had walked and began to follow...we hadn't walked 3 metres before the bush in front of us sprung to life with four lionesses hissing and growling and then running in the opposite direction to us. I had in this time chambered a round and was staring at the fleeing cats down the sight of my rifle... WHAT A RUSH!!! The guests had been watching the whole thing from the vehicle and as we walked back to the vehicle all I could see were the whites of their eyes. 

We followed these ladies for a while and then headed off to find some elephants that had been seen earlier. The morning was topped off by a great walk through the bush back to the lodge...what a great morning!