The 2018 Africa Journals Ch. 14: Leopard Lessons

We are on safari in Phinda Private Game Reserve, located near the eastern coast of South Africa.  It is June, and winter here, but not as cold as our last camp that adjoined the northern edge of Kruger National Park.  Blankets are available, but no hot water bottles.

Look above Durban on the eastern coast.

As the map shows, we are in the South African state of Kwazulu-Natal.

On this particular day, we come upon a leopard and her cubs walking down a road in the Phinda reserve.

We follow slowly, giving them plenty of room.    They appear utterly unconcerned about our presence, and never look back.   Eventually, they move into the bushveld.

We follow.   Unlike the national parks (and some private reserves), the safari vehicles are allowed to go off-road.

Pausing for a drink.

The vehicle climbs a steep bank, dodging trees and bushes and finally reaching the thicket shown below.   Another safari vehicle is there.

One of the leopard cubs is in that thicket, and Amy and Telusi move us around, trying to find the optimal spot for photographs.

And there he is.

He often looks up into the branches, obviously thinking he should climb.    But, his mother has left him a lesson to learn and he is reluctant to abandon it.

And then we see his lesson.   The mother caught and killed a young nyala (antelope) and left him with it while she and the other cub went away.

Up the tree he goes.

Then, he's down again.   He watches the vehicles.

He toys with the carcass, rolling around on the ground and pawing at it.

Instinct takes over and he moves the nyala to a darker place in the thicket.   By doing this, he strengthens the neck and shoulder muscles he will need to survive on his own.

That took some effort.   He checks once again for his mother and sibling.

He practices grabbing the nyala by the neck, but his jaws aren't big enough yet to get a good grasp.   Tht is how leopards kill their prey--holding the animal by the neck and suffocating it.

And then, for a brief moment, predator and prey are locked in a deadly embrace.

Leopards tend to carry their prey into the high branches of a tree to protect it from scavengers that would steal it from them, in particular, lions and hyenas.

His indecision is palpable.   He isn't strong enough to lift the nyala, though when he is full grown, he will be able to carry a prey weighing more than himself up a tree.

What to do?   What to do?

Maybe I can practice jumping on it from a branch....

Well, that was fun, but where is my mom?

Again, he opts to play rather than get down to business.
.

(Look at those claws!)

Gotcha!

Mom?   Where are you?   You forgot to open it.

And then, he gets the idea and starts to bite the carcass in its soft underparts.    That's when we leave.

Serendipity Arrives on Ice Skates

Judging from the number of vehicles parked in the pullout, you would have thought it was summer, but the temperature was 15 degrees at Tern Lake late on an afternoon. 

Along with a number of people, Serendipity was also skating on the frozen lake.  As a young boy used his hockey stick to free air in frozen bubbles in the ice, Serendipity brought four long-time friends together as the setting sun turned the horizon pink.

Hoar frost adorned everything and bald eagles flew overhead, waiting until the people left so they could get back to snatching salmon from the open areas of the lake.

After the hugs of greeting, the friends do what Alaskans always do—they tell small world stories of running into friends in exotic places around the world, of connections unknown and unanticipated and delivered by strangers, and of adventures of the wilderness kind.

No hats, no gloves, but for one who was dressed for skating.   For a half hour they talked of long ago when they lived in the same town, just a few miles down the road.  Of jobs they worked in remote places, and special stories of wild animals they encountered and the memories they held dear.   They spoke of friends, children now grown, and things they want to do.

And then they parted, until the next time when they will take up right where they left off.

Gotta love that Serendipity.

The 2018 Africa Journals, Ch. 13: Searching for Spots

 When last we heard from our intrepid travelers, they were happily photographing everything in sight at Phinda Private Game Reserve in South Africa.   Their lodgings at Phinda's Zuka Lodge were exquisite and the food exceptional.  Now we find them on a very special day.

 

Driver/Ranger Amy is so excited she is literally bouncing in her seat as she steers the safari vehicle through the bush.   The rest of us are bouncing, too, but that has more to do with the dirt roads in the Phinda Private Game Reserve.

A ranger reported that a young female leopard appeared in a particular area with two cubs, and that’s where we are heading.   For Amy, this is special.   She has watched this leopard grow up and for it now to return with cubs is thrilling.

We visitors to Africa, so often gobsmacked by the array of animals and birds, sometimes forget to consider what these experiences are like for the guides.   We become attached to certain animals, even though we have seen them only once.   The guides often know several generations, can identify specific animals by name, especially the big cats.   Perhaps the elephants and giraffes, too, but not the prey animals as they come and go and there are so many of them.

When we arrive at where the ranger saw the leopard, there is nothing there.  Amy drives around the area, through openings in the sparse brush, again and again.   She double-checks with Telusi about the location.   He assures her this is the spot.

More circles around the brush and then—deep in a dark thicket—they spot her.   It takes me a while, even with pointing fingers showing me where to look, before I see how perfectly camouflaged she is.

I see only a small part of her, but that part involves teeth gnawing on whatever she has captures and dragged into the thicket.   

Eventually, she comes out and sits in a spot between the trees. 


  

We drive to the other side and watch.   One of the cubs is seen immediately on top of a very uncomfortable looking bush.  

We don’t see the other cub until it walks out of thicket brush and goes to its mother.

We spend a long time with these leopards, hoping second cub will join the two, but that never happens.   The second cub is far too shy, wary of these strangers in the noisy vehicle.

 

The leopard nursing her cub is a sure sign that she is not bothered by our presence.

But, taking shots of her on top of that bush is quite satisfying.

 

Amy's effervescent personality bubbles over when she sees the cubs and she gives Telusi a big hug for his help in finding them.

We leave the leopards and make the mid-day journey back to camp, stopping along the way to photograph  whatever appears.

We visit the leopards on another day.   By this time, one cub has been dubbed Heidi, and with her sister they are known to us as Amy's grandchildren.

 

 

 

 

 We don't have to search for them this time.   The mother is in a tree right beside the trail and one of the cubs is draped across the branches above her.   The other cub,  Heidi, is in the thicket to the left of the tree where their dinner from a few days ago is getting pretty ripe.

 

 

 

I think you have to be a cat to comfortable here.

 

 

Notie the cub's tail draped over the branch.