Lady Lions

In our company is a man whose hobby is to take fabulous photos while on holiday and then make presentations back home.  He has promised to send me one of his photos of the lions we saw in the morning so that I can post it, because there was no way my camera was able to capture them at the distance we were.

Oh here he is now-thank you!

See what I mean?  With his camera, you can tell they are real live lions and not small specks of brown in a distant hill of brownness.  It was quite exciting though to see them through the binoculars all moving as one.

It took quite a few directions from those that could see them to get the rest of us to locate the line of lions moving high in the hills, paralell to the horizon but a bit below.  A long line moved single file (I counted eight) and every once in a while they would lie down as one, completely camoflaged by the tall grass exactly the same colour.  They were obviously on a hunt, no doubt towards the large herd of water buffalo we just passed.

Male lions rarely hunt as they are more easily detected with their large black manes.  They will go after something if the opportunity presents itself, but it's generally the females who get the food on the table at lion residences.

They hunt by taking a bit of ground before stopping and lying down to hide, then moving again, ever closer to their prey.  They are keenly aware of wind direction and also of any old or young animals that might make a good target.  When they are close enough, they spread apart an come at the herd from different directions.  Buffalos, especially male buffalols, can kill a lion with one head butt, let alone goring one with their sharp horns, but if a lion comes from behind, and there are more than one lion, then that might well be lights out for the buffalo.

decidedly not my photo!
No animals we injured in the posting of thise blog spot