Tjololo 3rd July 2000

3rd July 2000
We spend a ridiculous number of hours in the field always hoping to get lucky to capture those special moments. But that’s not good enough. Being out there we also have to make sure we are with Tjololo every inch of the way, where possible. It’s hard work but usually rewarding except when the conditions get so bad and we just aren’t able to follow him as happened last night. He was in the Sand river on a bend with a rocky outcrop. There was no way of following him here so we went round to meet him as he came past. While sitting in the dark following his calls, we heard the commotion. Although we have never witnessed it, the sound could only mean leopards fighting. We had missed it and unless we were on foot we couldn’t have got there.
About half an hour later we found Tjololo. He was fine except for a new nick now in his left ear. He’d obviously been fighting. But he seemed confident and went back into the river and north. From his behaviour it appeared he’d got the upper hand of the fight and continued to mark territory to the north, the area where the new male had been pushing him out.
Tjololo had at last stood his ground and won the day. Had his mating session with Tjellers given him a new found boost?
He was still mating with Tjellers in the early evening, when he suddenly turned on her. Her only escape was to take refuge in a tree. That was it, no more mating, as Tjololo headed north in the river.

Tjololo was on the move most of the night and after his fight still managed to kill a male impala. We were all set up for the event, but alas he caught it behind the bushes. We’re beginning to get that hard done by feeling.
He fed well when eventually a couple of hyaenas chased him off. Surprisingly he left the area and slept about 400m away. Usually he hung around trying to steal the kill back. But an hour later he went back to the area of the kill, found the remains and snatched it out from under the hyaenas noses and up a tree.
What a night for Tjololo. Mating, fighting, killing, kill stolen by hyaenas, steals kill back from hyaenas.
He sure “Stands Alone”.
Not far from the area where the leopards had fought, around the same time, we found the White Cloth female in a tree having been chased up there by a lioness.