Leopards!!

Brought Allan out on obs with me  on obs last night with Julie and Moira and he must have been good luck because we had some really good sightings!! Allan is very knowledgable about the bush and good at spotting. It was also fun hearing more about maasai culture from him. It looks like these north cubs are denning in three different locations now- though I don’t know if you can call BilJ, Crim, Lady, and Ana as denning at this point. We found the entire crowd by the stankho culvert once again, Waffles with Torani (who was ridiculously fat for a little sub) and still nursing, Sherman was there nursing Lady for part of the time, BilJ and Crimand Ana all hanging out and Angi and Uzi showed up for a period and when we first arrived Leprechaun was hanging out with the girls once again. He’s the highest ranking male in this clan so not totally unusual. 

Saw some really cool behavior when I looked up after IDing Angi and I see Bilj being somewhat pesky around Waffles and her daughter LogC and current cub Torani. It looked like LogC had just t2 snapped at BilJ who was walking around them and sniffingwhile they were napping/nursing and BilJ scapes on Uzi and neither of them back of away from the alpha animals. Something about all this made Waffles and LogC really really mad and they both coal bite-shaked BilJ chasing her very close to the car. BilJ was flat against the crowd squealing while Waffles, LogC, and even Torani a little bit were all bristle-tailed growling shaking the shit out of this little cub. Then Sherman (who is BilJ’s grandmother) comes running up all angry and bristle –tailed and puffed up and confronts Waffles and Logc. Sherman is middle ranking but Julie said she remembers the day when she was higher ranking than Waffles and it was very very impressive to see her standing up so boldly to the pair in order to rescue little BilJ who ran off behind Sherman. Then Sherman got the complete shit kicked out her as Waffles and LogC turned their aggression onto her and both were biting and bite-shaking her. It’s not unusual to see a higher ranking female take out aggression on the mother of pesky cubs for not keeping them in line but it was really cool to see a grandmother granddaughter rescue in this case. Aside from fighting over food this was the most intense aggression I’ve ever seen.

Later on at Grits den we saw Rama nursing from Ema once again. It looks like Ema has given up on Dr. P and has officially settled on Rama to be his replacement. Little Rama is going to start growing really fast now with two moms! Ramone, Strummer, and Gobe were also hanging around though all three are past the den age at this point. Ramone and Strummer were chewing on some topi horns and Gobe kept trying to get his nose in there but Ramone and Strummer would coalition chase him off. As the cub of the lowest ranking hyena in the clan he didn’t have much say about it all. When we drove up Rama jumped up like the little spazz that she is and freaked out and hid in the den.

Then Slim, Dalt, Michelle, and Jude have moved back up to Schipol- we saw them much earlier in the day when we first drove out. Brought me back to my first days here when we'd pause on the road and all these cubs would come running up! 

The best sighting of the night though was the leopard! It was sacked out in the middle of the road as we drove up and it wandered into the grass where we were able to follow it for about ten minutes watching it stride like liquid silk through the grass. It was much smaller than the leopards I’ve seen in zoos but Allan and Julie both said it was an adult. It posed in the light of our headlights long enough for me to actually get photos which was really really exciting. Best of all it was late enough that we had this leopard all to ourselves with no other tourists around. Regular tourists have to be at the lodge or outside the park by 6:30 and it was already dark and past 7 at this point in time.

This morning we had some good sightings also. We took two cars to south hoping to find Marten and dart her before Dave has to leave but no luck. We saw Clovis, Java, Kneesocks, and Nali wandering around but no Marten! However on our way back in we got a call about a black rhino in North territory and hurried over there. Neither IRES student had gotten to see a black rhino while they’ve been here so that was great to see this guy on their last day. After we stopped to look at the rhino a ranger tells us to follow him to a leopard on the same plain but further south. It was very far away but really cool to see in daylight, sitting on a termite mound between some brushy stuff. Such beautiful animals and so lucky to see two in less than 24 hours!! Glad the IRES students got the last two big 5 animals before they drive to Talek today.