Warning … not for the faint-hearted …. and especially not for python lovers ….

A remarkable wildlife ‘tug of war’ was witnessed by guests staying at Mala Mala recently, and was caught on camera by American photographer Josh Scheinert.

The 2m long African rock python was caught by a female leopard in long grass, but as she dragged it along behind her (still alive and wriggling frantically by this stage trying to escape), the python was ambushed by the leopard’s son, who proceeded to try and tug it away from his mother.

Mother leopard was having none of it though, and the two leopards ended up in a bizarre tug of war match for about 30 minutes. The battle only ended when the female leopard gave up, retreating to a tree while her son tucked in to his prize.

But he only ate a morsel before deciding it was not to his taste, and he discarded the snake’s body in the long grass.

I think you will agree …. wow !! It might be a bit gruesome, but it is not a sight that you see every day on safari !!!

My first ever trip to the famous Masai Mara. To say I was excited was a bit of an understatement.

From Nairobi, I caught the Safarilink flight to the Mara. Upon landing, I was approached my guide from Porini Lion Camp, who was dressed in traditional Masai garb – and welcomed warmly to the Mara.

We set off in the open Land Rover, and within 5 minutes we came across 2 lions snoozing under a tree. We left them, continued on our way … and saw a leopard running fast through the bush, hotly pursued by a lioness. So within 10 minutes, the tally was already 3 lion and one leopard. We followed the leopard for a bit, then went back to find out why he was running away – and realised that he had been chased off his fresh kill (of an impala), and there was the original lioness and her 3 sisters, tussling with the carcass as they each tried to take it for their own. Lion count now 6. And 15 minutes into my first Mara game drive. To say I was impressed was another understatement.

And it just got better and better. Wildlife everywhere – more lion, elephant, giraffe, buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, topis (a form of antelope), impala … the list really did go on and on.

Porini Lion Camp is located just outside the Masai Mara Reserve, in the 20,000 acre Olare Orok Conservancy. I arrived at Porini Lion Camp, and settled into my tent – extremely spacious, a comfortable double and single bed, an en-suite bathroom with flushing WC and a bucket shower. Everyone at the camp was extremely friendly, and I was already starting to wish I had longer here than just one night (the downside of a business trip !).

The food was extremely good, no complaints there at all.

My 2 guides were great – Jackson and Steve – and I learnt a lot from them in my game drives, including how to age a lion (by the colour of its nose apparently).

All in all, yes, I would highly recommend Porini Lion Camp.

Young leopards are generally quite curious, and up for anything.

This young chap however probably should have listened harder when he went to Leopard School – Lesson One is do NOT try to eat a crocodile.

The brave leopard actually got near enough to the croc to tap the croc on the head with its paw …. and not surprisingly, the croc snapped back. Luckily the young leopard got out of the way in time!

Pictures courtesy of Savanna Private Game Reserve, in the Sabi Sands.

OK, so hands up … these photos WERE taken in the UK … but wouldn’t you just love to see a leopard like this in its own habitat ?

The world-famous private game reserves and safari lodges near the Greater Kruger Park offer possibly the best Big 5 game viewing opportunities to be found anywhere, with lion and leopard tracking a particular speciality.

These lodges are either located within one of a handful of concessions in Kruger itself, or in one of the neighbouring private game reserves (such as Sabi Sand, Timbavati, Balule, Klaserie, and Manyeleti) on the western side of the Park, or in one of the nearby fenced reserves such as Thornybush and Kapama.

The land is privately owned, so the game viewing vehicles are not restricted to the road network and it is therefore possible for the experienced guides to follow the wildlife through the bush and to get extremely close to the animals.

Oh, yes … back to the photos … these photos were taken by a photography student at the Santago Rare Leopard Project in Hertfordshire , England. The brave little mouse apparentely appeared just after the keeper had dropped in the meat for the leopard.

Seemingly totally unaware of the huge leopard, the mouse scampered right up to the meat and started eating away.

The leopard, Sheena, stood and looked on in amazement at such boldness. After a few minutes, she tried to gently push the mouse away with her nose, but the mouse refused to budge, and stayed munching until he was full.

Simply amazing !!

Fpr guests recently staying at the Inyati Private Game Reserve, in the Sabi Sands Reserve which forms part of the Greater Kruger Park, they have been treated to some wonderful elephant sightings.

The lodge itself is situated right on the banks of the Sand River, and their particular stretch of the river has become a firm favourite with the eles, providing guests with some awesome game viewing from the lodge deck !

In particular, the elephants seem to congregate together for a midday drink, so what better background for lunch than a herd of elephants – although guests do have to be careful that they remember to eat their delicious lunches inbetween snapping photographs !

As well as the elephants, leopards have visited the lodge too – and one even wandered through camp during dinner one night !

But lets not forget the ‘smaller’ sightings in and around the lodge that have also generated a lot of excitement – such as a small spotted genet, a white tailed mongoose with a black tail, a serval and her cub, and even a Cape clawless otter.

Generally, otters are very rarely seen, but it is thought that the low water level in the Sand River had encouraged this particular otter out of the thick reeds in search of food.

This week has been witness to a remarkable milestone in the 16 year history of the AfriCat Foundation, with 1,000 big cats now rescued!

The sheer determination and unshakeable belief that has allowed the foundation staff to achieve this goal is staggering. Every single one of the rescues has meant a lengthy drive or light aircraft flight, careful liaison with the owner of the land or the community (at best curious and at worst plain hostile towards the predator) and then the laborious and dangerous task of extricating the cat to sanctuary.

In many cases, that is simply the beginning of a period of rehabilitation with the aim of releasing the cat back into the wild.

So who was lucky number 1,000? He was a 3 month old leopard cub rescued along with his mother (cat no. 999) from a farm in the Grootfontein area. Fortunately both mother and cub were in excellent health and were released together into the wild just 24 hours after their rescue.

The 1,000 cat statistic represents 650 cheetahs and 350 leopards. It does not include the scores of smaller predators that find themselves in need of AfriCat’s help. Every single one of these predators would have been destroyed were the AfriCat Foundation removed as an alternative option.

If you consider the fact that 86% of these cats are released back into the wild to continue the species, the impact AfriCat has on preserving Namibia’s predator population is quite amazing. The influence that AfriCat has on the awareness and tolerance for predators is impossible to quantify but just as significant long term in the survival of these species.

The AfriCat Foundation is able to operate because of private funding and the support of their single biggest donor, Okonjima, where guests can stay one (or ideally 2) nights at either Okonjima Main Camp or Bush Camp, and participate in the many activities on offer including the tracking on foot of the rehabilitated cheetahs on the Cheetah Tracking Trail, or radio-tracking leopards from an open game viewing vehicle in the 4,000 hectare rehabilitation area; bushman trails and walking trails; and a visit the Cheetah Project, an invaluable insight into the welfare work of the Foundation.

A particular female leopard in the Sabi Sand Game Reserve has become a regular sighting for guests at Lion Sands on game drives over the last couple of months. On most occasions when the she has been sighted they have seen her moving in and around the dry riverbeds and the thicket vegetation surrounding the riverbeds. She had been in the same area for about 3 weeks now and this lead the rangers to believe that she might have cubs in the area …

On Saturday morning one of the rangers located both the female leopard and her cubs sunbathing on an old dead tree stump in the area that she had been frequenting!!

This litter includes 2 cubs which are approximately 2 months old as their coats appear to be smoky gray as the rosettes are not yet clearly defined. This was an incredible sighting for the guests!

Female leopards are capable of breeding at 2 years and will produce litters of one to 3 cubs after a pregnancy lasting about 3 and a half months. Leopard cubs weigh around 500g at birth and their eyes open after about a week. For the first 2 months the mother keeps her cubs hidden in dense bush, rock clefts or hollow tree trunks to minimize detection from predators.

The cubs will venture from hiding after about 6 to 8 weeks by which time they are rather successful tree climbers.

Mothers leave the young cubs for periods of up to 36 hours while hunting and feeding before returning to suckle them. She brings solid food to her cubs when they’re about 6 weeks old and the cubs are weaned at about 3 months but stay with their mother for the first 22 months. Less than half of the cubs from a litter will on average survive to adulthood.

Keen to see leopards in the wild?   This video (appropriately enough taken at Leopard Hills) is a good example of why the Sabi Sands Reserve in the Greater Kruger Park is probably the best place anywhere to see leopard. 

We get a monthly update from one of our favourite lodges in the Sabi Sand Game Reserve, Savanna – and this month’s newsletter has some very interesting wildlife stories !

The first one involves an unusual incident in the middle of the month when a leopard was confronted by a large male baboon. The baboon seemed to show no fear or respect and it was the leopard which showed the aggression and respect to the baboon. The baboon walked backwards and forwards, displaying itself to the leopard, no more than 4 or 5 metres away.

Finally the leopard, trying not to lose face, turned around and slunk off into the bush. This is an unusual incident, as many people believe that baboons are a favorite prey species of the leopard. This may be the case in areas where other species are not as prolific as they are in the Sabi Sands, but in this area it is very rare that a baboon will kill a leopard.

With all the recent rains in the area, the dams are full, and as a result there has been an influx of hippo into the Savanna area and at the nearby pan – at one point they had 8 hippos !

After the elephant, the hippo is the heaviest land animal, and a fully grown male adult can weigh up to 3,200 kg. During the day, a common sighting of hippos is of them half-submerged in lakes or rivers.

One female gave birth in the dam at the beginning of the month and guests at Savanna have had wonderful viewing of this little “blob” bobbing around its mother in the water. Even a baby hippo can look cute!

Adult hippos can submerge themselves completely under water for up to 5 minutes by closing their nostrils and ears, but on average surface every minute and a half. Young hippo calves can only stay submerged for 20 – 40 seconds.

A very rare bird has been discovered on the Savanna property: the striped crake.

This bird has only been recorded in South Africa a few times and it was discovered at a little pan where it had bred and had 2 chicks.

There has been great interest in this bird within the birding fraternity of South Africa and the lodge has also had a number of guests travel large distances just to come and see this nondescript little bird.

And finally, probably one of the most amazing stories for a while … there are 3 adult wild dogs that have Savanna as part of their territory.

One of these adults was caught by a lioness and feigned death while the lioness walked off with it in her mouth.

As soon as the lioness put the dog down and was distracted by the remaining 2 dogs, the 3rd dog got up and ran off, making good its escape.

And they say animals are dumb …. !!

A couple of days ago I mentioned that Savanna Private Game Reserve is one of our personal favourites, and today we just received their newsletter which included the picture below. 

The story behind this is that the Makubela female leopard has given birth and has produced two cubs that are now approximately 2½ weeks old.  She has them in a secluded den, which makes viewing of them fairly difficult, but Paddy and the team at Savanna are reporting getting fleeting glimpses of them on a regular basis.

We are sure that over time the viewings of these cubs will become more frequent and less fleeting as the Sabi Sands Reserve is probably the best place anywhere to see leopards in the wild.

This is why we love Savanna and the Sabi Sands!